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Felix looked up at her through waves of anger and sadness and despair. “You never had me,” he said, shoulders wilting. “I regretted my decision the moment I was birthed into this new life.”

“And so you sought to destroy me?” Elena reached for her anger, but could only find disappointment. Regret. “Lance, Jesus, Robert.” She shook her head. “They were your brothers?—”

“They were collateral damage,” Felix admitted, like he almost wished he could undo it. “It was…” He tried so hard not to reveal how profound his betrayal had been. How targeted at her and no one else. “It was…. You were supposed to be alone when you left. I made sure Lib and Sofia?—”

Librada was on him before he could finish. Nails like talons sliced into his skin where she grabbed him by the throat and hauled him off his feet.

With blood running down his neck, Felix’s eyes widened in terror. Released from Elena’s compulsion, he finally understood how badly he’d misjudged. How wide his misstep.

Elena was a Great White slicing through the current, unhurried in a way only a creature in its domain could be. “Put him down.” She took no pleasure in what she had to do. “Who aided you?” she asked when he was back on his knees, blood staining his collar and Elena’s heart.

“No one.”

“You’ll never be able to trust his answer, will you?” Vermin laughed. “You’ll never be able to trust one of your precious progeny again.”

Plunging back into his mind, Elena funneled all of her will into him. “Who else has betrayed me?”

“No one,” he repeated without hesitation. “I worked alone.”

“What did he promise you?” Elena asked.

Felix had the temerity to look ashamed. “Autonomy. Release. To be free of you.”

“And release you will have,” she whispered, the fabric of her soul collecting another tear when she bent over, sunk her fangs into the back of his neck, and crushed her own heart along with his brainstem.

Marisol gasped when Felix dropped to the rug, motionless. The rest of her progeny looked away. There was no joy in this justice.

“Bond is so strong but look how easily you throw away?—”

Elena didn’t let Vermin breathe another syllable. She was on him, standing on his neck and pinning him down. “I will paint the walls with your remorse. Every scream, every whimper.” She put all of her weight into crushing his windpipe. Painful but not nearly as lethal as he was going to wish it was. “And you will die as you lived. Insignificant.”

“Stop!” Marisol was at her side, her touch too warm on Elena’s cold skin. It was jarring and disorienting. “Wait,” she pleaded. “Maybe he can give you information in exchange for his life.” Her eyes were glossy with unwarranted tears.

“His life was forfeit the moment he moved against me,” Elena vowed, her attention on the purpling face gawking up at her. “That was his choice, not mine.”

“There’s no way this asshat is the brains of their dumbfuck operation,” Zuri said when she appeared at Marisol’s side.

Elena narrowed her gaze. “You can’t possibly buy into the pacifist?—”

“Oh, hell no.” Zuri looked down at Vermin. “I can’t wait for you to kill the fuck out of him, but take what he knows first.”

“Elena, please. Maybe nobody else has to die.” Marisol tightened her grip around her arm, imploring her to change her mind.

“What do you know?” Elena tipped back her foot only far enough for him to talk.

“Fuck you,” he rasped.

Because Marisol’s face had flushed hard and she’d started crying, Elena gave him another chance.

“Tell me where Baylor is and I will give you a painless death you do not deserve,” Elena said in an act of underserved grace.

Vermin’s eyes widened.

“This waste of blood is following a charlatan named Baylor,” Elena explained to the others. “How about this? Tell me where the fuck he actually is and I will allow this to be over.” Elena bared her fangs. “The end I have planned for you will be so slow that decades from now you will think back on this moment and pray you could go back and choose again.”

Moments ticked by in silence. He was thinking about it. Understanding that it was over one way or another and he might as well spare himself. Elena growled. Creatures like this were always cowards. A second life couldn’t change the rot at someone’s core.

“Hogan’s Creek,” he confessed without compulsion, like a gutless amoebae. “Jacksonville. An abandoned church near the overpass. Redeemer’s… something.”