“And this helps us find him how?” I asked wanting to cut to the chase and get the hell out.

As much as I adored my prince, Ethan and Astrid, I didn’t have time for useless information. Not to mention, being in the same room with Gareth wasn’t my idea of fun. We were oil and water, and he was getting on my very last nerve. All I wanted was my bed and eight hours alone.

And after my performance earlier tonight, I didn’t think Ethan would be too pleased if I removed Gareth’s fangs.

“He’s reportedly been seen in person at several of the televised pageants—in disguise of course. There’s a woman that looks like Juliette among the competitors and he’s become obsessed with her,” Ethan informed me with very little emotion.

“Isn’t Juliette still here in solitary confinement?” Gareth questioned with even less feeling than his brother. There was very little love or concern for Juliette from her family at this point.

Ethan nodded curtly and Gareth relaxed.

Astrid shuddered with disgust. “She’s locked down so tight, no one can get to her.”

Juliette was Ethan and Gareth’s sister and in the strangest twist of fate, she was Astrid’s sister as well. Ethan and Juliette shared the same father but different mothers. Astrid and Juliette shared the same mother but had different fathers. There had been a massive freak out on Astrid’s part until she realized she and Ethan were in no way related by blood. That wrinkle still took me by surprise… and really, very little surprised me anymore.

Juliette was the one who turned Astrid and then tried to kill her, along with just about every other family member she had. She was the only royal sibling without a ruling territory. She was a dangerous rogue. To make matters uglier—if that were possible—she’d teamed up with Vlad. Juliette was his lover, as well as partner in many horrific and deadly crimes against our race. What she wanted above everything else was power. Redemption for Juliette was no longer an option.

I wondered why she was still being kept alive, but that was none of my business. Vampyre punishment held little to no compassion. It was normally swift, vicious, and over quickly. We were a violent race. Brutality was something that we all understood.

Astrid coming into our world as the Chosen One had changed our modus operandi, much to the displeasure of the Old Guard, but she was a force to be reckoned with and had more power in her pinky that the entire Old Guard combined. Astrid’s compulsion for compassion made her far more powerful than the evil bastards.

“Is Vlad daft?” I asked, doubtful of the intel. “He’s being hunted by every known Vampyre in the world and he’s attending beauty pageants?”

“Love—or rather obsession—can make a man do strange things,” Ethan replied with a shrug. “If the data is correct, he’s given us an opening and we’re going to take it.”

“Where did the information come from?” Gareth asked, no longer the snarky, obnoxious man chuckling on the couch.

He was now in full badass Vampyre mode and it was as frightening as it was hot. The muscles in his jaw worked rapidly and fists clenched in anger at his sides. His jet-black hair was laced with grey at the temples—unheard of for a Vampyre since we stopped aging at thirty, but Gareth had been cursed by Vlad and was slowly dying. However, the stupid grey in his hair made him even more appealing. At this point, Vlad was the missing key needed to save him.

Three of the other eleven royal siblings had been cursed as well and were faring about the same as Gareth. Lelia, Alexander and Nathan were on their own missions to bring down Vlad, but so far no one had been successful.