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“Jackson, listen to me.” She put her hand on his arm and squeezed hard until he met her eyes. “I need your help.”

“I know you do, babe. That’s why Nick suggested we take this cruise. To keep an eye on you.”

She blinked. “Dominique sent you?” The shocks just kept on coming. She wasn’t sure how many more she could take at this rate.

“He sure did,” Garrett agreed, picking a roll from a gilded breadbasket. “And I daresay we found you.”

Cassidy cast a hesitant glance at Kambyses, who was, of course, not surprised. He would have learned of his youngling’s plot against him when he fed on Jackson and Garrett, which he certainly would have.

“Jackson,” she tried again. “Listen to me. You’re compelled.”

“Not hardly. Nick knows better than to try that shit on me.”

“Stupid risk you took there, trusting him,” Garrett put in.

“It all turned out fine. Just like I told you.” Jackson raised his glass and looked straight at Kambyses. “Right, John?”

“John?” her voice rose with incredulity.

Kambyses raised his goblet of blood in silent acknowledgement and sipped. Over the top of the cup, his eyes cut back to Cassidy. Beside him, Monica smothered a giggle.

In the recessed ceiling above, a crystal chandelier tinkled with the vibrations from the vessel’s engines, casting bright shards of sound like shrapnel into the dark silence.

“John,” she said, dazed. “Right. Okay. Jackson? Garrett? Listen to me, both of you. You’ve been compelled by the strongest vampire you’ve ever met.” No reaction. “You’re fucking compelled out of your fucking minds,” she intoned, using language she knew had a better chance of registering with them.

They sobered and exchanged a look. Was she getting through to them? They had trained themselves to resist compulsion. There had to be a way to break this spell. Not that she had any idea what they could accomplish if they snapped out of it. Kambyses was in their heads, privy to every thought, just as he was in hers, but not trying—not fighting—was unthinkable.

“You two are vampire hunters and John over there is the badass vampire you’re here to…to—”

Kambyses’s eyes were a physical weight on her. “Just get us the hell out of here,” she finished.

The hunters regarded “John” thoughtfully. Garrett took a bite from his buttered roll, Jackson another swallow of wine. “Aren’t you going to have some?” he asked, nodding at her untouched glass.

“Did you hear anything I just said?”

“Did you say something?”

She gaped at him. There was nothing in his cool, gray eyes beyond genuine confusion.

A crew member came in, balancing a tray of dishes across the shifting floor.

“Oh, good. Food,” Garrett said, rubbing his hands together. “About time.”

She began to shake. Her last, best chance of making it out of this as a living human being was so close she could touch it—and so far away it might as well have been at the bottom of the deepest sea. “No.”

The server placed a steaming bowl before her.

“Did you say something, babe?”

“I said no.”

“No soup?”

“No. No, as in ‘no, I’m not accepting this lying down.’ Damn you, Jackson, you said if I ever needed help, you’d be there for me. Remember?”

“Yes, of course.”

“I need your help now. Right now.” She grabbed his face hard with both hands. “Look at me. I’m sick. I’m being turned into a vampire right in front of you, and you’re too compelled to see it. Listen to my voice. Listen to me. Find yourself. Help me. Help us all.” Tears again. Damn it. She didn’t care. This was her life she was fighting for. All their lives. She’d beg without shame. “Snap out of it, Jack. Please, please, please wake the fuck up!”