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knowing?
    Theo .
    “Don’t bother, Gatekeeper. You can’t call out to your brethren.” The demon nodded toward Slade, who stood near the door, watching. “I’m going to go let Votar know she’s awake. Watch her.”
    Slade diverted his focus down in submission to the demon and nodded. He looked about as confused as a five-year-old lost in a supermarket. Son of a bitch. He’d drugged her. “How…?” Her voice was muffled. Pretty tough to talk without a tongue.
    She rested against the rock-hard bed and took inventory of her situation. Metal clamps at her wrists and ankles secured her to a concrete slab. But it wasn’t burning granite. There were concrete block walls on three sides of her, but she faced bars. Much like the holding cells at her compound.
    She wore a white—well, originally white—shirt that was stained with crimson. How long had she been unconscious? They’d already sliced out her tongue and appeared to have filleted her guts, if the amount of blood on the front of her T-shirt was any indication.
    He. Will. Pay.
    A snarl tore through her so violently she thought her beast had jumped through her skin. The Shomrei warrior wanted out. Wanted to decimate. So far only the fangs came. These damned restraints kept her pinned down. Vulnerable.
    Not to death, just to eons of torture if she didn’t escape.
    Theophilus! Beckett!
    Nothing from her fellow Gatekeepers. Utter and complete silence.
    “Here.” Slade pressed a bottle to her lips. “Just take sips.”
    She took in what she could, swallowed some, then spit the rest in his face. “Asshole.”
    He was demon? How’d he evade Halena’s detection? She hadn’t seen any charms on him. Nothing. Not even a tan line from a ring that’d been taken off. No mystical tattoos, either.
    “I’ll…kill…you.” Damn him. She’d bared herself for him, let him touch her. Anger and embarrassment flamed beneath her skin, burning any feelings she’d ever had for the frat boy.
    “I had to. I’m so fucking sorry, Lena. I—”
    “Demon.”
    Slade fell to his knees beside the concrete slab. “They’ll kill my sister, Lena. Addie. I— Fuck!” He leaped to his feet again. “I signed my soul to Votar in exchange for him releasing hers. I—you’re part of my transition.”
    Shit . Slade was in transition. Not quite demon yet. That explained why he didn’t trigger anything in her. But that meant he was doing tasks for his master demon, this Votar asshole the other demon had mentioned, no doubt.
    “What weff…” Damn, she couldn’t talk without her tongue. “…to do?”
    “I didn’t catch that.” He stepped toward her with a cloth in his hand.
    She tried to say it again but didn’t fare much better.
    “What left…to do? What’s left for me to do for transition?”
    She nodded.
    “Final kill. I thought that’s why I had to get you here, but you can’t be killed.” He shook his head. “This is all fucked up, Lena. I—”
    She shook her head and looked the other way, unable to bear the pain in his eyes. He’d seemed so carefree and youthful at the bar, even fun, but it was all a lie? He betrayed her—for his sister.
    But he fucking drugged her!
    “Warr, ahhh, we?”
    “Where are we? Is that what you asked?” He brushed the cloth along her forehead. “France. Some compound. I don’t know how to stop them, Lena. They’re so strong. They’ll kill Addie.”
    The desperation almost cramped her heart. Almost. While his motives were pure, she was chained to a slab of concrete, her tongue cut out, and by the looks of how red the once-white shirt was, her stomach had seen some serious action.
    “How…long?”
    “How long have you been here? Less than a day. You were out for about six hours. I—”
    “So, our little Shomrei warrior has awakened.” A demon, at least six foot five with slicked-back hair, strutted into the cell, followed by the demon who’d been cutting her earlier.
    This must be Votar.
    Flares of orange swirled through his