“Yes, please,” he said, bringing his lips to mine for some very enthusiastic encouragement as I wrapped my arms around his neck.

My phone rang. Generic cell phone ring tone, so no clue who it might be. Nose to nose, Ben and I regarded each other.

“It could be important,” he said.

“It could be telemarketers,” I replied.

If nothing else, the electronic ringing was annoying enough that I wanted to go shut it off before it drove me batty.

“It’ll probably just take a second,” I said.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he said with a suggestive lilt to his brow that made my scalp tingle. Yup, he’s a keeper.

After digging my phone out from under the mess of papers on my desk, I checked the caller ID, which stated that the incoming number was in Washington, D.C. Which meant the call could still be important or telemarketers.

Keeping an eye on Ben’s cute smirk, I clicked the button and answered. “Hello?”

“Kitty, it’s Alette.”

I frowned. This was important. Alette was the Mistress of Washington, D.C., quite possibly the most powerful vampire in the U.S., and she sounded somber, no brightness at all to her voice. She appeared to be a dignified woman in her thirties, but near as I could tell was several centuries old. She spoke with a commanding English accent. Now, she sounded tired.

“Alette, hi, what’s wrong?” Ben’s amusement fell away, his brow furrowing. Before she spoke, a thousand terrible scenarios passed through my mind. This was about Rick, wasn’t it? Something had happened to Rick—

“We’ve lost Barcelona.”

The statement made no sense. I had to parse it, then catch up with the pronouncement. Barcelona was one of the cities we counted as an ally in our underground war against Roman and the Long Game—or maybe not, anymore. “What do you mean, we’ve lost Barcelona? What about Antony—”

“Antony is gone.”

I slumped against the desk. Again, the statement made no sense. My heart heard it, but my brain had to catch up. I’d met Antony, Master of Barcelona. He was brash, chatty, and seemed young for a vampire, however many centuries old he actually was. He was astute without taking himself too seriously. I liked him. Ben had been very impressed with his fancy sports car. He couldn’t be gone—he was a vampire. Immortal. But not indestructible.

“What happened?” I asked, the only thing I could think to say, my voice catching. Ben came to my side and held my hand, listening in while Alette explained.

“I got the call from Ned as soon as the sun set.” Ned, Master vampire of London. Something big had happened, probably this afternoon local time, while I’d been sprawled out on the floor thinking my book deadline was my biggest problem. “Antony got word that Dux Bellorum was in Split.”

Dux Bellorum, another name that Roman called himself. It didn’t matter how much I thought about the vampire who was essentially my arch nemesis—and how weird was it that I had an arch nemesis?—when I finally learned something about him, an electric shiver traveled down my back, and I resisted an urge to look over my shoulder. Roman, in Split, fighting Antony, and what was he doing there—

“Split?” I asked. “Where’s that?”

“Croatia,” Alette said patiently, the same time Ben whispered that maybe I should save my questions. “He had a location, he had a plan to find Roman, and he thought he and his people could end him once and for all.”

And he’d failed. Alette didn’t even have to say it. “Why? Why’d he do that? We were trying to avoid a direct confrontation.”

“I think he wanted to be a hero.” The weird thing was, I kind of understood that. If he thought he could stop Roman, of course he would have taken the chance. “But he left Barcelona undefended. The city is in the hands of Roman’s followers now.”

It was a battle lost, not the war, I told myself. But my stomach turned in on itself. This was a person, Antony, and his whole Family. If we’d only been able to stop Roman sooner—there had to have been a way. Ben moved his arm around my shoulder and pulled me close.

“There’s more, Kitty. Antony learned some information that he was able to pass on to Ned. I’m passing it on to you. Antony discovered that Roman was in Split to retrieve an artifact he’d hidden there many centuries ago. Something called the Manus Herculei.”

“Hand of Hercules,” Ben murmured helpfully. The lawyer was pretty good with Latin, it turned out.

“Indeed,” Alette said, and might have sounded impressed.

“And what’s that? Is it magical? What’s he want it for?”

“I can’t say. But if I wanted a weapon to use in my quest for power, I might very well want to acquire something called the Hand of Hercules.”

Oh, God, it was probably some magical atom bomb or something. Next thing on Roman’s “take over the world” to-do list: acquire weapon referencing invincible Greek demigod. My stomach couldn’t feel any sicker. “That sounds really bad,” I said.

“It does, rather,” she said with icy calm.

“Does he have it? Did Roman find it?”

“We don’t know. But we don’t think he’s left Split, so perhaps not.”

“So what do we do?” I asked. Pleaded.

“We wait, I think,” she said with a sigh.

That wasn’t what I wanted to hear. We had to do something, didn’t we? “Should we go to Croatia? Send someone? Find out what’s really going on there? Stop him?”

“Just as Antony did? Split is an ancient Roman city. Dux Bellorum’s home territory for some two thousand years. He’s most likely very well protected there, and you think we should send someone to confront him directly?” I let out the tiniest of growls. Antony hadn’t been part of our pack, but he was ours. This felt like an invasion. Alette made a comforting tsk. “We hold our own, Kitty. We watch for an opportunity. We find out what this artifact is, and we learn how to oppose it before Dux Bellorum can use it. We hold the line. Do you agree?”

I tilted the phone away, looked at Ben. I imagined my own expression was as somber as his. He pressed his lips into a thin smile that seemed more fatalistic than comforting, and I snugged closer to his warmth and embrace.

“I—I’m sorry about Antony. I don’t know who else to tell.”