She nodded quickly, then she was running down the hallway.

Dante waited until she vanished then he headed for the elevator. He’d heard the deal that Cassie had made with Jon. She’d been going to exchange her life for Charles’s.

He wondered just what kind of deal Jon would offer him. Not that it mattered.

Death was all the bastard would get.

Vaughn was loose.

Cassie stared at the open door to the vampire’s cell, her heart thundering in her chest. The door should have been sealed.

A keycard had been tossed on the floor. Charles’s keycard. And that had been Jamie’s scream. It had come from that room, she was sure of it.

Jamie had gone after the vampire again.

“Help . . .”

Cassie rushed inside. She didn’t have any weapons with her, no drugs at all, but she couldn’t leave Jamie in there alone, because that was his voice whispering for help.

And there he was. Curled into a fetal position near the far wall, with blood around him. Jamie was hunched, rocking back and forth, whispering, “Help . . .”

Her heart ached as she ran to him. “Jamie. Jamie, I’m here!”

But where was Vaughn? She didn’t see him anywhere. Had he gotten out after attacking Jamie?

When she touched Jamie, he screamed and tried to leap back. “Get away! Get away! I’ll kill you!”

“No, it’s not Vaughn. It’s me.” She tried to make her voice soothing. Dante kept saying she had power with her voice, she could sure use some of that power right then. “It’s Cassie. I’m here to help you.”

Tears leaked down his cheeks. “There’s no way to help me.” His breath sawed from his lungs. “H-he bit me.”

The primal virus.

She grabbed Jamie’s arm. “Come with me to the lab, now.”

“I’m dead! I’m dead!” He jerked away from her and bent to grab a chunk of wood. Then he was back, his hands shaking, as he grabbed her fingers and curled them around the wood. “Don’t let me change.” He brought her fingers—and the stake—up over his heart. “I don’t wanna change. I don’t wanna be . . . like that.”

He was surprisingly strong, and she had to yank with all her might to get that stake away from him. “No!” Cassie yelled because he wasn’t listening to her. He was trying to die right in front of her.

But at her yell, Jamie stilled.

“There’s time.” Those words were a lie. He already had the virus in him. “Come to my lab.” She’d never had a sample from someone so newly exposed. Maybe there was something she could do. Maybe. Please. “Come with me.”

“Promise . . . first. Kill me if . . .”

She wasn’t making that promise. “Come with me.”

He nodded.

She didn’t drop the stake. Vaughn was out there. Somewhere. Cassie didn’t know what he might do, and she had to keep some kind of weapon ready.

They raced down the hallways, their footsteps pounding as the alarm kept blasting. Jamie’s blood made a trail behind them.

There was no sign of Vaughn. Yet.

At the lab, she pushed open the doors and they ran inside. Cassie grabbed a syringe and took some of Jamie’s blood.

Then she got to work, checking the sample, using her microscope—

The cells were already changing. Mutating so quickly.

“How is it?” Jamie whispered.

“It’s going to be fine,” she told him, her voice wooden. “Just . . . give me a few minutes.”

The cure was in her blood, but she didn’t know how to get out the poison. He was changing into a vampire right then, and her blood was poison to vampires—

Cassie stilled.

He hadn’t changed fully, not yet.

Jamie was still human. Primarily. But every second that passed would change that fact.

Her blood wouldn’t kill him as long as he was human. But when the change was complete . . .

Cassie whirled toward him. “Jamie, I want you to trust me.”

His eyes were wild and desperate. “I . . . feel it . . . inside . . .”

“Trust me, Jamie.”

He gave her a slow nod. “What do I have to do?”

“Take my blood.” If she was right on this, her blood would either cure him.

Or it would kill him.

Dante was ready when the elevator doors slid open. Jon had whirled toward him in surprise. Had the fool really expected Cassie to come up?

Dante didn’t waste time. He lunged forward and snapped Jon’s neck before the man could do more than send tendrils of smoke from his fingertips.