ADRIAN’S HEART occupied her throat when she, Randy, and Vincent arrived in the high-ceilinged reception area that looked, for all intents and purposes, like the lobby of any ordinary hotel. A skinny blonde twenty-something sat behind the counter chewing gum and reading a romance novel when their presence caught her attention.

At first the girl gave them a blank stare, but then horror filled her eyes as she slowly laid the book down. “What are you doing?”

Bobby’s dark-haired friend jammed the barrel of the gun into Vincent’s temple. Adrian tightened her grip on the knife Randy lent her, hoping she wouldn’t have to use it.

“You’re going to let us out of here,” Randy said, ignoring the girl’s question. “If you don’t, I’ll blow a hole in this loser’s head.”

Vincent winced. The blonde, who must have been the Giselle whom Vincent referred to in recent minutes, looked uncertain. “What’s he to me?” she asked innocently, already recovered from her initial shock.

“He’s the reason you’re employed, right?”

Giselle gave a little sniff. She leaned over and pushed an intercom button with a delicate white finger. “Farley? Jack? Get up here now!”

Adrian edged her way closer to the set of front doors, hoping to make a sudden run for it.

Giselle bent below the top of the counter, and when she straightened, what looked like a machine gun had appeared in her hands.

Pure instinct dropped Adrian to the floor. The windows in the front of the building blew out in a spray of glass as the weapon chattered away, leaving Adrian momentarily deaf. Her limbs felt frozen like she’d seen snake-haired Medusa and turned to stone.

Then all went silent. The sound of her ragged breaths was as loud as a gale-force wind in her ears.

Behind the counter, Giselle was swearing at her weapon, which must have run out of ammunition.

Running footsteps came down both hallways leading to the reception area. We’re dead, Adrian thought, and scrunched her eyes shut.

A sudden commotion of voices made her jump.

“What’s going on out here?” A man, elderly by the sound of it.

“God, Giselle, why’d you blow out the windows?” This, from a woman.

Giselle panted her reply. “Intruders were trying to run off with Vincent! Look on the floor. I think I hit one of ‘em.”

Adrian’s heart skipped a beat as footsteps approached where she lay. Bobby’s friend couldn’t be dead. They were going to get out of this place together and run for help.

Her mind raced. If Randy really was dead beside her, there was no use in sticking around. She would have to get out on her own, call for help, and send the cavalry back here to rescue the children—because she couldn’t make the assumption that Bobby would escape unscathed.

She cracked open one eyelid. Three feet away from her, Randy trembled as blood seeped down his left arm. Vincent’s glassy eyes stared up at the ceiling. His left arm had shoved up against Randy’s right one when they fell, and as Adrian watched, the flow of blood from Randy’s other arm ceased and a bullet popped out of the wound and rolled to a stop on the floor.

So Vincent had the magical ability to heal others, but not himself.

A woman in a black one-piece bathing suit came up to Adrian’s side. She looked like Carol, the woman from the video they’d all been forced to watch down in the office. “You missed this one,” she said, wearing a smirk.

Adrian launched herself to her feet, drew back a bony fist, and planted it squarely in the woman’s astonished face before she could put up a hand to block the attack. Carol staggered backward as blood flowed from her nose.

Adrian hadn’t felt so satisfied in ages. She bent down, snatched up the knife she’d dropped, and poised herself to spring.

Carol just laughed as she wiped away the blood with the back of one hand. The three other people who had entered the room at the sound of gunfire stood off to the side looking amused. And why wouldn’t they? This sort thrived on violence as if it were food.

Giselle remained behind the counter with her arms folded tightly across her chest. Her face was troubled. Poor dear was probably worried about why poor, dead Farley wasn’t showing up to take care of those who had survived.

Suddenly Adrian no longer felt afraid. Carol wasn’t holding a weapon—neither were the other new arrivals.

“If you don’t let me out of here,” she breathed, “I’ll slit your throat.”

Carol smirked again. The sight of more blood running from her nose turned Adrian’s stomach. “You think you have it in you?”

I do now. Adrian lunged at her with the blade pointing outward.

“Stop!” a voice said from behind her.

She halted and gave her head a slight turn.

Randy was standing up, his face white. The skin where a bullet had so recently penetrated his arm looked smooth and new. “Vincent’s dead,” he said. “You do know who that is, right?”

Two of the new arrivals, Carol included, nodded while the others simply looked puzzled.

“And do you know why he’s dead?”

Silence.

He pointed a shaking finger at Giselle. “Because this woman thought she could save him by shooting at us. She’s clearly never used a weapon like that in her life. By trying to save him, she murdered him.” Randy paused. “Your Domus no longer has a healer. I’m afraid you’re out of business.”

One of the guests fidgeted and glanced down at her feet.

Randy continued. “You’re all going to end up behind bars now that word’s getting out about what went on here.”

The Domus guests swiveled their heads toward Giselle, who took an involuntary step in reverse. She clasped her hands together in a pleading gesture. “It—it was an accident,” she said lamely. “Farley told me to use the gun in case of emergency.” Her face twisted into an unexpected grin. “But some of them are out looking for someone else like Vincent. Where there’s one, there’s another, as they say. So we won’t be ‘out of business’ for long.”

“Are you sure?” Randy said, eyebrows raised.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because you don’t know what happened downstairs.”

Carol snickered as she wiped more blood off her face. “Giselle, he’s just stalling. Ignore him.”

But it seemed Giselle was going to ignore her, instead. “Enlighten me,” she said to Randy.

Randy put a finger on his chin and pretended to think. “I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t. You probably wouldn’t believe me if I did.”

“Just what did you do?”

“It was Jack, not us. He killed Troy. I think he wants to take this place over for himself.”

A flush of excitement warmed Giselle’s pale cheeks. “Jack killed Troy?”

“Did you want him to?” Adrian saw Randy’s confidence waver for a moment.

Giselle didn’t answer. “Farley is going to be thrilled!”

“About Farley,” Randy said, a note of genuine sorrow entering his voice. “We had to kill him.”

Adrian was grateful he didn’t mention anything about Bobby. As far as she knew, three of the Domus people who knew about Bobby were dead and the fourth was trussed up in the basement office, hopefully still out cold.

The guests glared at Randy. Uncertainty had filled Giselle’s eyes once more. Her finger hovered near the intercom button but she must have realized there wasn’t anyone else for her to contact because she drew it back. “Is Jack…?” she said, leaving the sentence unfinished.

“I don’t know,” Randy said. “He took an awfully hard hit on the head. For all I know, the blow killed him.”

“Where is he?” Giselle screeched, her eyes shooting daggers at Randy.

“Troy’s office. We—”

Giselle darted out from behind the counter and ran wailing down the hallway in a pair of black stilettos. “Oh, please no, not Jack…”

Randy cleared his throat. “Adrian?”

“Yes?”

“I need you to help me.”

The guests who’d arrived to observe the commotion hadn’t moved a muscle in the past sixty seconds. One of them, a man in his seventies wearing a crisp black suit, had coal-black eyes that bored into Adrian as if he were entertaining sick fantasies of which she was the subject.

The guests claiming no knowledge of Vincent looked afraid.

“What do you need me to do?” Adrian asked in a low voice.

“Go behind the counter and tell me what you see.”

Keeping an eye on the others in case one made a move to stop her, Adrian hurried past Vincent’s lifeless form and passed through an opening between the counter and the wall. Half a dozen drawers had been built into the counter. Adrian yanked them open one by one and recited the contents to Randy as she rummaged through them. “Binders, a stapler, some kind of log book, something that looks like pepper spray—”

“Give it to me and drop to the floor. And the knife, too.”

Adrian fumbled with the small black device and passed it over the top of the counter into Randy’s hand along with the knife.

Two of the guests had already started running toward the shattered windows.

Randy ran after them with the pepper spray in hand. Adrian wouldn’t have to duck for cover after all.

Adrian stared at the two who remained—Carol and the old man. “Are you just going to stand there, or are you going to run like cowards, too?”

Enraged, the old man lunged at her over the top of the counter. Adrian picked up a metal waste can and in one fluid movement brought it down on his head. Tissues and empty Sun Chips bags scattered across the countertop and floor.

The man swore at her and backed off, but now Carol was coming at her, fists curled.

Adrian prayed that the commotion wouldn’t draw the attention of anyone else who might be on the premises.

The can crashed down onto Carol’s head with a glorious clang. The old man was sitting on the floor a few feet away rocking back and forth gripping his bleeding forehead, the skin of which appeared to have split open upon impact.

Righteous rage seemed to have turned Adrian into Super Woman. “This is for Monique!” she screamed, bashing Carol again and again until she staggered away in a daze. These people were pathetic. They could torture children for fun but couldn’t even put up a decent fight to defend themselves.

Her eyes stung. Outside the broken windows, Randy blasted the other women with the pepper spray and dashed out of sight, and the wind wafted some of it into the building. From Adrian’s vantage point she could see that the women had their hands clapped over their eyes as they staggered blindly out of sight.

Now if only there was a way to tie them all up before they recovered.

Trying to keep at least part of her attention on the injured guests, Adrian began another frantic search behind the counter but found nothing that could be used as bindings. “Randy?” she coughed. “Can you hear me?”

No reply came. Maybe Randy had run for the road in order to flag down a passing vehicle.

Carol moaned from where she sat hunched over on the floor. “Oh, my head…”

Adrian wanted to kick her. Again the thought that Adrian was really no worse than these people flitted through her head but she quickly batted it away. No, she wasn’t like these people. Something important set her apart from them: regret.

Her chest lightened. I regret what I did to my children. That makes me the better person.

Adrian strode around to the front of the counter gripping the knife and came to stand between Carol and the old man. “If either of you try to get up, I’ll kill you,” she said, unsure if she was bluffing or telling the truth. Then, “Randy?”

The sound of rapidly approaching footsteps made Adrian’s heart skip a beat. To her relief, Randy clambered through a now-empty window frame with a tangle of what looked like shredded netting piled in his arms.

“Tom and one of the women got away,” he explained, panting, as he dumped the netting on the floor. “I tied the other one to one of the chairs by the swimming pool.” He refocused his attention on Carol. “It’s best if you give me your full cooperation while I tie you up. I don’t want to have to hurt you.”

Carol glowered at him.

“Adrian, give me a hand here and make sure she doesn’t try anything.”

Adrian held the woman’s arms in place while Randy tied the strips of cut netting around her wrists. Randy clapped her on the shoulder when he finished. “That wasn’t so bad now, was it?”

“Go to hell.”

Randy’s face grew solemn as he regarded her. “I’ve already been there.” Randy proceeded to tie the old man who, due to his injury, was far less coherent.

He stood up and brushed his hands together when he was finished. “We’re lucky they have tennis courts out there. I cut up the nets.” Randy’s gaze traveled to Vincent’s motionless form, and his hazel eyes filled with tears. “I wish we could have saved him.”

Adrian’s throat felt too choked with emotion for her to speak so she just nodded. The young man did not look peaceful in death, but frightened as if he saw something unbearable the split second before he passed.

Adrian shivered. “We should go look for the children.”

“Good idea.”