1
EMBERLINE DOMINICO
Creeping along the Venetian streets, my uncle looked more like a spider than a vampire.
A brown recluse, perhaps.
Unassuming, but deadly, and how I wished I could crush him beneath the sole of my boot, smear him across the pavement. It was the least he deserved.
From my rooftop vantage point, it was impossible not to see the resemblance—the way he moved erratically, his brown monk’s habit flaring around him like too many skittering legs, slipping through the alleys of Venice as if he owned the shadows.
For most of my life, I believed Giovanni was king of this city.
Then he snared me in his web, drowned me in Venice’s waters, and stole my husband.
Tonight, he was my prey.
Ancient roof tiles crumbled under my boots as I raced along the roofline, staying low. The city stretched out beneath me in stacked layers of red brick and cream stone, moonlit canals threading between them like veins of molten mercury. Lantern light gilded the water as sleek gondolas slid past, filled with laughing tourists oblivious to the two predators amongst them.
Giovanni hugged the darkness, moving in sharp bursts—dematerializing for a breath, reforming farther down thenarrow alley. My uncle wasn’t taking his usual route, likely to avoid prying eyes, but if he sensed me tracking him, he gave no sign.
Since I was still technicallydead, it behooved me to stay out of his tangled web.
Because there was no universe in which I would allow myself to become the fly.
Never again.
When he paused at an intersection, I took my time scanningthe surroundings before moving again. Spies monitored every corner of this city, and chances were, I wasn’t the only one tracking my uncle tonight.
While every powerful family in Venice employed their own spy network, Rome and Florence—the other mafia dynasties—had their own agents embedded here in Venice, just like we had operatives in their cities.
In their homes.
Vampires were long-lived but short on trust, and while all three dynasties were supposed to be united in cause, none of us were foolish enough to actually trust the other.
Keeping three buildings between us, Giovanni dragged that unique scent behind him, an aromatic mix of cedar and limestone from his earlier visit to the ruined abbey on Isola della Cenere. I’d never understood my uncle’s fascination with that place. My father used to pass it off as an eccentric hobby, but these days…
I wondered if there was more to his frequent visits.
He cut through San Corrado without pausing, the old square mostly empty at this hour except for a drunk American leaning against a wall, singing off-key, too far gone to notice the blur of black cutting across the worn pavers.
Lucky for him, Giovanni had no interest in mortal blood tonight.
He was after something else.
I just didn’t know what.
Three weeks ago, my husband vanished. Giovanni was behind his disappearance. Tonight could be the night I discovered how to get Dante back, and once he was safe, my uncle was a dead male.
The male who had raised me and turned me into a weapon was now my enemy.
Giovanni had stoleneverythingfrom me. My husband. My future.My life. Even my brother, since I’d been forced to sever our mental bond while I was in hiding. I’d never gone this long without talking to my twin, and losing Luca had created a hole inside me almost as big as the one Dante left.
I vaulted across a gap, the canal beneath me flashing silver, and landed in a low crouch on the other side, tired muscles twisting as the rubber soles of my boots grabbed ancient terra cotta. My breath puffed in short, quiet bursts, misting the damp night air.
Don’t get sloppy,I could almost hear my husband whisper in my ear
Don’t think about him,I scolded silently, that familiar ache squeezing my heart. But I couldn’t stop hoping he was alive. Couldn’t stop mourning the life that had been stolen from us.
