“The dagger is Egyptian,” Reese said. “She’s lying, man. Let’s just gag her ass and take her to Theo to see what he wants to do with her.”
“You,” Enes said, narrowing her eyes at Reese, “won’t touch me again without bloodshed.”
Reese moved closer, but Steele stepped between them.
“What does the dagger have to do with raising these vampires?” Because he didn’t believe Enes was lying. She’d been flying under the radar for months. Hell, she’d seen him in the club when he hadn’t seen her. So why would she wait for them here if she didn’t have something to say? Then again, why did she have so much to say? He’d wait to hear everything before he tried to figure that part out.
“It raises the dead. That’s what it was made for by that pharaoh. It’s why the tomb was broken into in the first place, so that some idiot could raise his dead mistress, or some such nonsense. Anyway, the curse on the dagger is that only certain people are worthy enough to wield its power. That woman in the club who caught your eye is one of them.”
Steele felt the heat rising from the pit of his stomach to burn the back of his throat. Since walking away from Ravyn last night the beast had lay dormant as if wondering what to do next now that she was out of the picture. But now it was rising, bringing with it all its fiery rage at the implications of Enes’s words.
“Damn, we’re back to raising some dead vamps again,” Reese complained. “Aren’t you guys already dead?”
This time when Enes cast Reese an evil glare, her teeth elongated until they seemed to prick her bottom lip and a growl-like hiss rumbled in her chest.
“There’s something else here,” Steele said in lieu of trying to intervene with these two again.
Magnum looked around. “I sense it too.”
“It’s more undead,” Enes told them. “And if you don’t trust what I’m saying, just ask Ziva. She knows.”
Steele and Magnum exchanged looks. It was bad enough they were getting all this information from someone who should’ve been their sworn enemy, but now Enes was invoking the personal relationship between her and Ziva that each of them knew about but hadn’t dared mention since the day Ziva almost bit Theo’s head off when he’d ventured there.
“Alright, I’m taking her with us,” Reese said and came around Steele to grab Enes’s arm once more.
Before the vampire could lash out at Reese, Steele held up a hand. “Shhhh.”
He walked back up the steps and stood close to the door. The guy who’d come through it moments ago was still out cold on the floor. “Do you hear those whispers?” They sounded so familiar, the words that were being said and the voice, he could swear he’d heard it before.
Magnum came up the steps behind him, standing just a few inches away from Steele. “I don’t hear it,” he said. “But it could be coming from the dream plane. You could be drifting in and out of the dream, just like you did last night.”
“But you said you felt something,” Steele insisted.
Magnum nodded. “I do. It’s cold and evil, probably the undead just like she said.”
They were speaking in hushed tones but he was certain Reese could hear him, even if Enes and the knocked-out guy couldn’t.
“So you believe her?”
“It makes sense,” Magnum replied. “The girl that’s set to die in your dreams steals the dagger. The dagger’s meant to wake the dead. What’s the common link?”
“Death. Vampires who are undead but need to wake some of their real dead ancestors. The Reaper is the bringer of death.”
“And the Dream Reaper,” Magnum said solemnly.
Steele shook with the words. “Was meant to save her, regardless of what the rules say.”
“Or she was meant to die to save the world from what might come with the real dead vampires,” Magnum added with a serious glare.
For seconds the Eze brothers only stared at each other, at odds with what they believed and what would happen next, but united in the notion that they had to do something either way.
“We can’t take her back to the Office,” Steele said.
“Hell no, Theo would kill us both.”
“I’ll call Isla. You take her to the Towers.”
“What are you going to do?” Magnum asked.
Adrenaline was already pumping through his veins. “There’s a loose thread,” he said. “I’m going to see Robles and find out where he really got the dagger.”
“And then?”
He should have known Magnum wouldn’t let him just walk away. He wouldn’t go with the part of the plan Steele had willingly shared. No, that’s not how his brother rolled.
“Then I’m going to check on her. Even if they only want the dagger, she’s linked to it, or at least she was. I saw it and I didn’t realize it, but now I know. I just gotta see her to make sure she’s alright.”
Magnum wanted to say more. He wanted to warn Steele again, to tell him that there was no way he could stop the Reaper from taking someone who was on its list. But he didn’t.
“Meet us at the Towers,” Magnum said on his way down the steps.
Steele didn’t reply. Instead he stepped closer to that door again and listened.
The dagger is mine.
The female voice said it over and over again and Steele realized where he’d heard it—in that odd dream he’d had while Ravyn was lying in his bed. He took the steps faster than he had coming up, bolting out of the building and to his SUV, totally ignoring the yells from the enforcers that were now up and once again guarding the building.
Yanking the door open after disengaging the locks he climbed behind the wheel and called Isla to let her know what was going on, and then he headed to Sodesto to meet up with Daron Robles, the human who knew the mysterious Dhampir.
Chapter Thirteen
“You look different,” Cree said, and Ravyn continued to stare at
