But if Aden hadn’t succeeded in cleaning up the disaster on the fifth floor before the police got wind of it, if he hadn’t gotten to Detective Trevisani in time to steer the investigation along the desired path, it could have proved disastrous. Not just for Aden, but for vampires everywhere, especially given the high profile visitors in the city for the territorial challenge.

But then perhaps that had been Silas’s goal. She’d never been one to risk her own life when someone else’s life would do. She was no different than every other woman in Aden’s life before he’d become Vampire. Always willing to let him bleed to ensure their own safety and comfort. That wasn’t to suggest that women hadn’t tried to use him since he’d been turned, only that they hadn’t succeeded. The lone exception in a lifetime of bitter experience with women was Sidonie, and now someone was threatening to kill her. Aden’s vision filled with blood as he contemplated the pain her abductors were going to suffer when he got a hold of them.

The first step toward that goal was meeting Silas. Aden’s two SUVs pulled up in front of the warehouse near the Chicago River where Silas had set the formal challenge. The building appeared abandoned, its brick walls pockmarked and blackened with age, the windows old and thick, dull as they reflected the distant light of the waning half-moon.

Many of the buildings in this area had been given historical landmark status, a shining memory of another age. Sadly, this warehouse was not one of them. It was clearly abandoned, although on this particular night, there were a fair number of vampires clustered inside. Aden wondered if Silas had purchased the building for her own use during the challenge, or if she was simply squatting. It was also possible that this was one of Klemens’s old buildings, since Silas had been close to Klemens and would know about his properties. If it had belonged to Klemens, it would be Aden’s before the night was over, along with everything else Klemens had owned. Assuming it was still standing after Aden killed Silas.

The area around the building was oddly suited to tonight’s activities. The streets were dark and narrow, with only a few lights along the river more than a block away. At first glance it seemed deserted, but it wasn’t. There were people in the shadows, human predators drawn out by the unexpected activity and by the expensive vehicles which were out of place on these shadowy streets in the middle of a Sunday night.

Travis and Kage got out of the first vehicle and immediately dropped back to Aden’s SUV, taking up positions front and back. In the front seat, Freddy and Bastien opened their doors simultaneously and joined them, leaving Aden alone until Bastien stepped back to open his door.

Aden slid out of the SUV, standing still for a moment as he surveyed the surrounding buildings, the alleys and streets. His power swelled, riding the edge of his anger, the midnight blue of his eyes gleaming from beneath half-closed lids. He sensed the heightened aggression of the human watchers at this invasion of their territory, felt their shock as his power reached out like a physical thing, a rolling wave of energy that buffeted each of them, shoving them back into the shadows. He smiled grimly at the sound of their hearts racing with unaccustomed fear, at the sweat-scented waves of dread rolling off of them as they slunk away. They were not predators this night, they were prey.

Aden turned his back, dismissing the humans from his mind, as he studied the old warehouse. Other than theirs, there were no vehicles in front and no other vehicles in sight, but for a few older cars parked along the curb, none of which Silas would have used. She was too vain to sink so low, even for purposes of subterfuge. She must have arrived earlier. This was her choice of battlefield, after all, so she’d want to prepare it to her best advantage, to deploy her people. He had no illusions about whether this meeting was meant to be a trap. He assumed it was.

He also knew the trap wouldn’t be an explosion, because there was no question that Silas and her minions were inside the warehouse. The presence of so many vampires was as impossible to fake as it was to miss. They hummed like a bad fluorescent tube on the inside of his skull, and if he concentrated he could detect Silas buzzing louder than any of them. She was definitely in there this time.

He glanced around at the four vampires he’d brought with him. They were dressed as he was, in all black—a long-sleeved T-shirt, combat style pants tucked into ATAC boots. Freddy and Kage were conventionally armed, and there were several additional Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine guns within easy reach inside each of the trucks. It wasn’t usual to bring human weapons to a challenge fight; the combatants were expected to rely on their vampire abilities and nothing else. But Aden didn’t trust Silas. For all the old-time formality of her blood-scribed parchment, she’d proven her willingness to play dirty at every step. There had been Stig Lakanen’s attack that first night, when Silas had goaded the much weaker Stig into going after Aden, even though she’d known he would fail. Then, she’d worked with Professor Dresner to maneuver Sidonie into Aden’s camp, using her to set up the ambush at the club—an ambush which Silas had fled, leaving her minions to bleed and die in her wake. And now she’d likely taken Sidonie hostage, probably hoping to blackmail Aden into conceding the fight. As if he were too stupid to understand that she’d kill him anyway, the first time his back was turned.

Not that Aden had any intention of conceding anything to Silas.

The territorial challenges were supposed to be one-on-one, vampire vs. vampire. The kind of petty wrangling that Silas had engaged in—using humans as tools, letting others die in her place—only underscored her weakness. A weakness that would see the Midwest drowning in chaos if she became lord, as vampire after vampire challenged her from inside and out, nibbling away at the territory, breaking off chunks until it was fractured and vulnerable.

That wasn’t going to happen. Even if Aden hadn’t been certain of his superiority, confident in his ability to destroy Silas and every other challenger, he knew Raphael would never have permitted Silas to rule. The Western Lord would take her out himself first, letting Lucas continue to hold the territory until a more suitable candidate stepped up. Perhaps alone among the contenders, Aden had no illusions about Raphael’s role in choosing Klemens’s successor, nor his cold-blooded willingness to do whatever it took to ensure his vision of a secure North America. And now that Aden understood the threat from Europe, he wholeheartedly embraced that vision and would see to it that the Midwest did its part.

Silas clearly didn’t understand any of it—not the looming threat and certainly not Raphael’s role in deciding who would rule. And she just as clearly had deluded herself into believing she could win. Whether it was because Klemens had favored her, letting her believe it was her own power rather than his that fed her rise in his ranks, or if she was simply that stupid, Aden didn’t know. But he did know that one of the reasons she’d remained loyal to Klemens was because he’d let her play her cruel little games, permitted her to take weaker vampires and torment them, to kill humans for the fun of it. Never mind that Klemens was sworn to protect the very vampires Silas had tormented, or that he bred instability by permitting her to prey on humans. The now-dead vampire lord had probably found her games amusing. It wasn’t uncommon for a vampire’s children to be reflections of himself. And Klemens had been one sick fucker of a vampire.

Regardless of why Silas was the way she was, it was too late for her. If she’d come to Aden at the beginning, if she’d stepped aside in recognition of his greater strength and pledged her fealty, he would have rewarded her, even given her a city of her own. Not a major city, but something suitably profitable.

But after everything that had happened, he wouldn’t trust her out of his sight, and he didn’t like her well enough to keep her in his sight. If she walked out that door right now and came to him on bended knee, it would only make it more convenient when he chopped off her head.

Aden did a final check of his vampires, receiving a quick nod from Bastien. Gathering his strength, he sent out a wave of power, searching the warehouse, wanting to know exactly what waited for them inside. True to form, Silas had brought so many of her minions that it was difficult to get an accurate count. He didn’t bother trying. It wasn’t worth the expenditure of energy.

“She’s brought more than I can easily count, so stick close and expect trickery,” Aden told his vampires, then glanced over at Freddy, who stood closest to the entrance, and nodded.

The big vampire pulled back the heavy door on its sliding track, entering first when Aden would have done so. Aden had to smile at that. It was vampire instinct to protect one’s master. He would have done the same thing for Lucas.

Aden entered the warehouse and immediately stepped to one side, clearing the entrance for the rest of his vampires. There were no lights inside. The only illumination came from moonlight through the dirty windows, but darkness was hardly an impediment for a vampire.

Silas’s people waited for him, spread out across the back of the warehouse in disorganized rows, their aggression palpable, raising whatever power they had in preparation for the fight to come. For the most part, their eyes gleamed red, betraying their lack of significant power. Silas stood in the very last row, surrounded by the buffer of her minions. She was a petite woman, so short that he only knew she was there because of the dirty-penny shine of her eyes in the dark warehouse.