“We need to kill them now,” Murhder said softly. “It’s the only—”

Poof! Poof!

The entities disappeared, one after another.

As a scream lit off somewhere on the second floor.

Throe tried for the doorknob again, but it burned through the tuxedo jacket—and then getting out of the bedroom suite was no longer an option. What started out as a breeze morphed into a vacuum, the pull dragging him away from the door—

He dropped to his knees. Grabbed onto anything that he went by: A spindly chair. The edge of a side table. The bureau. He fought and clawed, churned his legs, locked eyes on the door into the bathroom as if that would give him a redirection.

He did not want to look again. But once more, his head turned as if controlled by someone else.

The Book had opened itself on the writing desk, and the perfectly cylindrical black void had reappeared, that which Throe had witnessed previously happening anew, that which should have been no deeper than the three-foot drop to the bedroom floor under the blotter funneling into an unfathomable depth—

Something stung his hand. And then his other one.

He swung his head back around. Two of his shadows were before him, and they were lashing out, punishing his grips as he tried to keep himself in the realm of reality.

Throe screamed one last time as he lost all purchase against the powerful draw.

And then his body was sucked feet-first into the void.

Falling. He was falling, the cold damp air becoming more and more frigid. Colder, faster, colder … faster. Ice forming on his upraised hands, his eyelashes, his cheeks.

As his velocity continued to increase, his tuxedo frayed off his body, the fibers brittle from the indescribable freeze, the speed of the fall, the pressure that began to bear down on him. Naked … he was naked now, his skin frosting over, turning black.

And then fraying as his clothes had.

His flesh was next. That which had contained his insides stripped off his bones, and though his eyes disintegrated, he could somehow still see the white of his skeleton—until that turned black as well.

All of his corporeal form was torn away, nothing but his spirit remaining.

And that was when he landed at some kind of bottom, sure as if he still had a physical body, pain lancing through him as if vital organs had been pulverized and his spine destroyed from the impact.

Throe lay on his back, and stared up at a circular stone construction that glistened in torchlight. A well. He was at the bottom of a well.

And that was not torchlight. His path, his descent, had left a glow in the darkness and he traced its path until it seemed to disappear at some far-off place way up above—

Metal clanking brought his head up, and he looked down his naked body which had somehow regenerated. Shackles had clamped on his wrists and his ankles.

“What … what is this?” His voice was hoarse. “What e’er is this?”

He pulled at the metal bands and found no give in them at all. He was on some kind of ancient wooden table, the stains of which made him more than merely squeamish.

“Where am …”

He did not finish the thought.

A woman entered from the walling, as if there was a break somewhere therein. She was naked and gloriously so, her high firm breasts and perfect nipples, her flat stomach and lovely hips, her long legs and hairless sex, the very picture of beauty. And it was only after he had made his impression of her body that he looked at her face.

She had brunette hair that curled, long and luscious, around her shoulders, and her features were bold and arresting.

Her smile was paradise. And so was the sound of her voice: “Welcome.”

“Who are you?” As he felt himself harden, she looked at his erection. “Is this a dream?”

The woman came over to him and trailed her fingers up the inside of his thigh. “No, this is a trade.”

“… what?”

The female stroked his arousal, her touch going through his body, his blood thickening instantly. As he moaned, she smiled again.

“A trade,” she murmured as her hand went up and down his shaft, nice and slow.

The pleasure she called out from him seemed familiar. In fact … her scent was familiar. He knew her. Somehow, he knew—

The Book.

She was the Book.

“That’s right,” she said. “And I have enjoyed our dalliances even though I was only able to participate up to a point.”

Dread, fast and powerful as the lust, came onto him like the pall of death, but somehow did not cancel the erotic swell that was taking him to the very knife edge of release.

Throe struggled, but there was no getting free. Not of the terror that curdled his gut, not of the orgasm that was just about to explode out of him, not of his restraints.

Not of her.

She released his erection right before he could find his relief from the rising tide of pleasure. And as she took a step back, he protested even though he was frightened of her. But she couldn’t stop now. She couldn’t leave him on the verge … could she?

“It’s been fun, Throe. So glad you came looking for me. You showed up just as I needed a way out.”

With that, she tilted her head up. Raising her arms, she bent her knees and propelled herself into a jump.

That took her airborne.

Throe’s scream echoed around the slick walls of the well as the female followed the trail he had lit with his body and soul, her graceful escape taking her up, up, up …

… and leaving him in her place.

Murhder and John took the stairs two at a time as Vishous stayed down below with the corpse of the male who had been killed by the shadow entity.

The brother seemed to be standing guard over the remains, as if he expected the dead aristocrat to sit back up and have a conversation or something. But Murhder didn’t argue as Tohr assigned the second floor to him and John.

On the top landing, he covered right. John covered left.

There was no more screaming, however. No moaning of someone injured. Nothing moving.

But only the inexperienced would take all that as dispositive. There were countless explanations for why someone would scream and then shut up. Especially if that someone was Throe, who had taken off running up here—

The whistling was soft, the kind of thing that could be generated either by an air vent or someone who was having an asthma attack.

Murhder looked to the right again.

But then John nodded in his direction and Murhder fell in behind the male, the pair of them crossing to the opposite side of the corridor so they went down the wall that was solid, as opposed to the one that had all the door breaks in it. Guns up, instincts on fire, they moved in perfect coordination, and Murhder had to smile, even though it made him a freak.

Except John looked over his shoulder. And winked.

Murhder lost his step.

He hadn’t seen that expression in years. Not since he and Darius had hunted slayers together—and wasn’t it great to see that male of worth live on through his blooded son? All you had to do was look at John and know that D was still alive and well … and with the brothers.

Abruptly, the whistling ended, and they both stopped. Without a word of communication, they split and back-flatted on either side of a closed door.

Inexplicably, the panels had a black rim around the jamb, as if there had been a fire inside and smoke had escaped. But there was no heat. In fact, it was noticeably colder here, a draft coming out from under the gap at the bottom. Which explained the sound they’d tracked.