Duncan had met Victor on more than one occasion when he’d accompanied Raphael to Vampire Council meetings, but he’d never matched strength with the vampire lord directly. The annual gatherings were carefully orchestrated affairs, bringing together the most powerful vampires in North America, vampires who were natural rivals at best and enemies at worst. Everyone was on their best behavior at those affairs, which meant there were no outright challenges and no blatant weighings of each other’s power.

But Raphael had known Victor a long time, and there were other ways to measure the depth of a vampire’s power. The upshot was that Duncan knew he could defeat Victor because Raphael wouldn’t have risked him otherwise. And, more importantly, because he knew the depths of his own power. Victor would be ousted from his rule over the territory tonight in the usual vampire way . . . by assassination.

Miguel and Louis rushed through the front door behind him, their power brimming and ready to defend him if necessary. Again, it felt odd to be the recipient of that sort of devotion rather than the other way around. Something he’d have to get used to.

“Any problems?” he asked as his vampires hid the limp bodies of Victor’s two guards behind the same couch they’d been sitting on when Duncan arrived.

Miguel let his burden drop, the comatose vampire’s head cracking loudly against the wooden floor. “None, my lord. The gate is secured, the barracks empty. And all of the human guards on the estate are sound asleep.”

“Excellent. This is it, then. Remember, once we’re in the dining room, I’ll put the humans under immediately. After that, we play it by ear. I don’t care which of us takes down the two remaining vamp guards, but Victor himself is mine alone.”

”Yes, my lord.” Miguel was fairly bouncing on his toes. Louis stood as still as a statue, his muscles coiled for action. He nodded sharply, his eyes fixed on Duncan like a dog on point, awaiting the go-ahead.

“Let’s go,” Duncan said.

Miguel walked ahead of him, Louis behind. They went past the staircase and turned left down a long hallway, their footsteps nearly silent despite the old, wood plank floor. Doors stood open left and right, revealing rooms filled with furniture—a formal dining room with a table that could have seated thirty people easily, and a den or game room with another huge flat screen TV, several different video game consoles, and a foosball table in the corner. There was a spacious kitchen with open containers littering the counter tops and still smelling of the food Victor had brought in for his human guests. Duncan’s research told him Victor typically had his parties catered, with his vampires serving as waiters where necessary. It wasn’t particularly elegant, but then Duncan doubted it was a zeal for good food that brought the humans here in the first place.

The dining room they wanted—the one Victor was using tonight—was at the very end of the hallway, behind a pair of white pocket doors. Miguel reached for the doors and paused, hands resting lightly on the bronze handles.

Duncan tilted his head, listening with both his ears and his power. The conversation from inside was loud and boisterous, the human voices evidencing clear signs of intoxication or drugs. It could be either. Victor was here, too, his mind lazy and at ease, not expecting any trouble. His remaining two vampire guards were far more alert than their Sire, but at the same time they took their cue from him, and their minds were wandering, not at all concerned about what was going on in the room or out of it. What little attention they were paying was focused on the human guests, seeing them more as prey than anything else, while trusting that their now comatose fellow guards at the front of the house would alert them to any outside threat.

Duncan pulled back his probe, drew a breath and gave Miguel a quick nod of assent.

Miguel slid the door back and Duncan stepped through.

Conversation stopped dead as everyone turned to stare at him. Duncan gestured, and the three humans went glassy-eyed, their heads slumping to their chests in unconsciousness, one sliding to the floor beneath the table, while the others merely fell forward into the remnants of their dinner.

Victor’s guards recovered before the first human’s head hit the table, one of them vaulting the table, crystal flying and dishes breaking as he raced to protect his Sire. Miguel caught him in midair, his fingers digging into the other vampire’s throat as he threw him to the floor and punched his chest hard enough to stop his heart in an instant. Victor’s vampire gasped, eyes bulging, as he struggled to gather his power back into himself, to force his heart to pump once more. Given only a moment longer, it might have worked, but Miguel didn’t grant him that moment. He grabbed an empty chair and smashed it against the floor until it produced what he needed. The piece of wood was jagged and raw, half varnished and half bare wood, but it was the perfect weapon. Miguel lifted the stake with a fang-baring grin of anticipation, and Victor’s guard keened a wordless plea, the only noise he could still manage. Miguel brought the stake down in a single clean stroke, granting the only mercy he would—a quick death.

Louis and the other vampire guard were still battling one another, blood flowing as they exchanged brutal blows that would have killed a human with the first strike. Louis slammed his opponent into the wall, cracking the wainscoting and leaving a vampire-sized dent in the upper wall as plaster dust filled the air. Victor’s vampire bellowed in anger. He tightened his grip, his fingers digging into Louis’s arms as he tried to reverse their positions, but Louis used the vampire’s momentum against him, spinning around completely and throwing him across the room. He crashed into one of the unconscious humans as he hit the table, eliciting an unwilling grunt of reaction.

Duncan felt more than saw Victor move, felt the vampire lord begin to gather his power. He glanced up, meeting Victor’s reptilian gaze. The two powerful vampires studied each other for a long breath, but a sharp cry of denial drew their eyes to Louis and the remaining guard in time to see Louis impale his opponent with a jagged spear of wood.

Victor sucked in a breath as his vampire died, and Duncan turned in time to see the vampire lord slump forward, his fist clenched to his chest. As if he felt Duncan’s gaze upon him, Victor relaxed his hand and raised his head with a defiant glare, showing no weakness to his enemy.

“This was unnecessary,” Duncan observed after a moment, stepping back from the two piles of vampire dust with exaggerated distaste. He looked up and met Victor’s angry gaze once more. “You should have taught them better, Victor.”

At the head of the table, Victor remained perfectly still, his stare burning with hatred as a haze of crimson power began to seep over his brown eyes.

“Miguel,” Duncan said, removing his overcoat and throwing it onto a nearby chair. “Get these humans out of here.”

“My lord,” Miguel murmured.

Louis reached under the table and yanked the fallen human out from under it, pulling him into a fireman’s carry and heading down the hallway. Miguel dragged another of the guests—a large, florid man whom Duncan recognized as a U.S. Senator—through the doors, then came back and hefted the last human over his shoulder, before following Louis.

Duncan pulled the pocket doors shut, selected a chair that wasn’t covered in broken dishes or food, and sat, crossing his legs at the knee. He scanned the room idly as he sat there, intentionally ignoring Victor’s growing outrage. It was a small room, too narrow and, like all the others, crowded with too much furniture. The air reeked of cigar smoke and spilled food.

“So, Victor,” Duncan said, finally turning his attention to the other vampire. “How are things in Washington?”

“Fuck you, Duncan,” Victor growled. “You can’t come in here and start killing my people.”

“Apparently, I can,” Duncan pointed out.

Victor snorted a dismissive laugh. “You? You’d never have dared this without Raphael.” He spat to one side. “Where is the great man anyway?” He lifted his head as if sniffing the air. “He’s not nearby; I’d sense him if he’d crossed into my territory.”

“You should have sensed me, Victor. You’ve grown complacent.”

“You’re nothing but Raphael’s lap dog. I don’t waste my time on mutts.”

Duncan merely smiled. “It’s like this, Victor. We can do it the easy way or the hard way. The choice is yours.”

A vicious grin split Victor’s broad face as he stood and kicked his chair against the wall. He leaned forward, fangs bared and hands resting on the table as his power began to build, his eyes now gleaming like two burning coals of fury.

“Give it your best shot, puppy.”

Duncan dipped his head in agreement. “The hard way it is then.” He stood, and for the first time since he’d left California, the first time in the presence of anyone but Raphael and the California lord’s most trusted vampires, Duncan loosed the full measure of his power. He let it build until it was a firestorm in his chest, the pressure both excruciating and exhilarating. Lights flickered as energy danced around the room.

Duncan blinked lazily and met Victor’s surprised stare with a quiet question. “You were saying?”

With a roar of defiance, Victor launched a preemptive volley, a tight ball of incredible energy that must have drawn heavily on his power. It was a bid to weaken Duncan before he was ready, before he could muster his own power into a shield around himself. But Duncan had trained with the best the vampire world had to offer. His shields snapped closed with a concussion of sound. Victor’s attack slammed into them with tremendous force. They flexed, but held, and Duncan flicked both hands forward, as if brushing away Victor’s assault, a move calculated to enrage the other vampire lord.

Victor growled, his teeth grinding together as he smashed one thick fist into the table, amplifying the blow with his power and shattering the whole thing into kindling. He looked up and grinned at Duncan, then raised both hands flat in the air, palms up, lifting the bits of splintered table as if it were still whole. With another power-filled gesture, he flung all of the shards at Duncan, a flying wave of deadly sharp wooden stakes.