Then I started to pull myself together.

I felt something sharp poking me painfully in my breast, and I remembered that I had stuffed Tarr’s little key-chain flashlight into my bodice. I pulled it out, flicked the switch—and could have wept with relief when it worked. As soon as the tunnel was illuminated, my surroundings—though eerie—started to settle into a normal, prosaic pattern.

Being able to see again calmed me down enough to start thinking rationally about other things.

I realized that Mad Rachel must be the woman I’d heard screaming—and, knowing her, she was simply having a hysterical reaction to the frightening, implosive thunder of the cave-in.

If she was up ahead in this tunnel, then so were my other colleagues. I just needed to catch up to them. And then we would find an exit.

Now that I had survived the cave-in, the thick barrier of brick, rock, mortar, dirt, and sediment behind me mostly meant that I didn’t have to keep running from vamparazzi or vampire hunters now. And getting away from them had been the point of coming down here, after all.

So I felt calm, collected, and optimistic as I painfully scraped myself off the wet tunnel floor and examined myself for injuries. I was scraped and bleeding in a few places, and feeling twinges of pain in others; but there was no serious damage.

Well, not to me. My costume was another matter. No amount of cleaning and ironing would ever make this dress presentable again. It was utterly filthy and in tatters.

I felt some anxiety about Fiona’s reaction when she saw it; but, after all, it wasn’t as if I had planned to be caught in an underground cave-in while wearing my costume. Sometimes these things just happen.

To me, anyhow.

Poor Leischneudel! He didn’t have a flashlight, he must be all alone wherever he was, and he was claustrophobic. I needed to get out of here quickly so I could call Lopez. He seemed to know this underground area well, so he’d come up with a good search strategy if Leischneudel hadn’t emerged by then. We needed to get him out of the tunnels.

I started walking ahead, relieved that my limbs were in good working order. Still, I wouldn’t catch up to my colleagues unless I sprinted, so I’d better see if I could get them to wait for me.

“Hello?” I called. Then louder. “Hello?”

Rachel screamed her head off. For the first time since meeting her, I found that a reassuring sound.

“Esther!” she shrieked. “Esther! Is that you?”

I waited for the echo to stop bouncing off the walls. Then I responded.

“Yes! Can you guys wait for me?”

“Esther!” she screamed. “He’s mrgh vrungh oong!”

“What?”

“Esther?” Tarr called. “Are you okay? Did you hear that before?”

More bouncing echoes.

“Cave-in!” I called. “I’m fine, but Leischneudel and I got separated! Wait up! I’m coming!”

“Okay!”

“Esther!” Rachel screamed. “Hurry!”

Yeah, yeah, whatever.

Since I was sloshing through water, on uneven ground, in shoes that were never intended for this sort of thing, it seemed as if I walked a long way, though it was probably not more than two hundred yards.

Mad Rachel was weeping and wailing hysterically now, howling inarticulate pleas, and babbling nonsense syllables. The noise floated and echoed eerily through the dark tunnel as my feeble little light guided me through the murky gloom of this old, abandoned, forgotten place ... until I reached what seemed to be some sort of underground intersection.

There was a wide, high-ceilinged chamber, and the tunnel I was emerging from was one of three that met here, all coming from different directions. I smelled dirty water, wet old brick and cement, rotting garbage, a hint of sulfur ... and also a strong whiff of sewage.

I choked a little, hoping the air quality wouldn’t get any worse before we found a way out of this system.

I flashed my little light around, wondering which way to go from here. Rachel’s sobbing seemed very close now, almost as if I should be able to reach out and touch her. I was about to call out to my colleagues when I was startled to see Rachel appear in the beam of my light.

What was she doing weeping here alone in the dark? Had the men abandoned her? I could understand the temptation, but it didn’t seem likely.

She was sitting on a stony protrusion that had been worn smooth and shiny with time and erosion. Her gown was wet and filthy, though not as tattered as mine. Her eye makeup had turned into dark, thick, ugly streaks that flowed down her puffy, weeping face. She rocked back and forth, sobbing brokenheartedly, her eyes squeezed shut, apparently not even aware that I had emerged from the tunnel and was shining my light on her face.

Unnerved by the sight of her huddled alone in the stygian darkness, wailing inconsolably, I flicked my light around the room—and fell back a step and gasped when I saw Tarr, standing perfectly still just a few feet away from me in the dark, staring at me in silence.

“Jesus, you scared me!” I snapped.

“Esther!” Rachel stood up and stumbled through the water, which was deeper here than it had been in the tunnel, to reach me. She flung herself against me, making me stagger, shrieking and sobbing.

Trying to hold Rachel away with one hand, I shone the feeble light around the chamber, looking for Victor, Daemon, and Bill. There was no sign of them. Which explained why mine was the only light here.

Raising my voice to be heard above Rachel’s noisy sobbing as she clung insistently to me, I asked Tarr, “Where’s everyone else?”

“They went the other way.” He nodded in the direction from which I had just come.

I didn’t understand. “Why did you guys split up?”

“I came this way on my own.” He shook his head and looked at Rachel in exasperation. “She followed me. I didn’t ask her to.”

Rachel howled louder.

Oh, great. I was stuck down here with the only two people I knew who could make me think fondly of Daemon’s company, by comparison. He, Bill, Victor, and Leischneudel were probably all discovering an exit and going topside right now, even as I remained lost underground with Rachel weeping hysterically on my shoulder and Tarr—I could have sworn it—ogling my tattered neckline.

I was about to suggest we proceed and search for a way out of here when Tarr suddenly grabbed Rachel by the hair, yanked her away from me while she howled in pain and clutched her head, and then threw her across the chamber. With much more raw strength than I would have suspected he possessed.

Rachel screamed loudly, then started crawling through the water on her hands and knees, scrambling to get farther away from Tarr.

I shouted at him, “Have you gone insane?”

“She’s just so noisy,” he said wearily.

Rachel screeched, “He’s going to kill us!”

“Shut the fuck up!” Tarr’s shout startled me so much I nearly dropped the light.

Rachel curled up into a ball and started rocking back and forth again, sobbing with her eyes squeezed shut.

“All right, you need to calm down,” I said sharply to Tarr, horrified by his behavior—and more than a little scared.

“I’m hungry,” he said casually. “It’s making me cranky.”

“It’s making you nuts,” I snapped. “Don’t touch her again!”

“You are a tough one,” he said with admiration. “I’ve liked that about you since we met.”

“Let’s get out of here,” I said coldly.

“He’s gonna kill us!” Rachel shrieked at me. “Don’t you get it? He’s going to kill us!”

“Of course he’s not,” I said firmly to her. I looked at Al again. “Er, right?”

“Well, her I’m going to kill,” he said matter-of-factly. “But you and me . . . we could work something out.”

I studied his face to see if this was another of his tasteless jokes—gone way too far in this case. But he wasn’t grinning now. His shadowed face was relaxed but humorless.

“What do you mean you’re going to kill her?” I demanded.

“I didn’t ask her to come. In fact, I told her not to. But she followed me instead of going with them.” He shrugged. “I could eat.”

My head was spinning. I wondered if a rock had hit it during the cave-in and I just didn’t realize it. My eyes were stinging from the foul air, and my throat was starting to itch. There was a disgusting taste in my mouth.

“Oh, my God,” I said slowly, feeling cold shoot through my bones. “You killed Angeline.”

“I don’t really want to kill you,” he said. “I like you.”

“I’m so flattered.”

“You and me, we could have some fun together.”

“No, we couldn’t.”

“I thought for sure you’d stick with the others. I didn’t expect to see you here. And I don’t really want to drink you.” He grinned. “Well, okay, maybe I want it a little.”

“A vampire lurking at the Hamburg,” I said, trying not to let him see how much his words frightened me. “And plenty of access to Daemon’s dressing room. You’ve been pilfering his blood supply since you started hanging around.”

I also realized now why Nelli had sneezed so much in Daemon’s room; Tarr had been there.

“You know, it’s funny—even Daemon’s blood tastes phony.” Tarr guffawed and added, “Oh, this is even funnier. He’s so stuck on himself, he thought the blood was disappearing because the cast and crew were sneaking ‘personal mementos’ of working with him. What an asshole.”

I thought it would be unwise to comment on the irony of Tarr’s assessment. I said, “You know your way around underground, so you thought you could get away from the vampire hunters once we came down here tonight.”

“Hey, you really impressed me with that one, Esther.” He sounded almost flirtatious. “I mean, whoa! I had no idea that entrance was there! This whole area here is new to me.”

“You turned the opposite way and tried to go off on your own when everyone entered this tunnel because you know what a Lithuanian vampire hunter is—what he’s capable of,” I said. “You knew he’d recover, track us, and catch up. And you didn’t want to be with the rest of us when he did.”

“You don’t mess around with a vampire hunter, toots,” he said. “They’re serious business.”

“I’m told they also err on the side of thoroughness. Let’s say Edvardas does kill Daemon, just to be on the safe side, since you’ve worked so hard to smear him for Angeline’s death,” I said. “Do you really think a vampire hunter will just get on a plane and go back to Vilnius then? Come on, Al. Do you imagine he’ll be gullible enough to believe that Daemon killed Benas Novicki?”

Certainly not after the way Daemon had cowered, flailed, and wailed “I’m an actor” in response to Edvardas’ attack.

Tarr drew in a sharp breath. “How the fuck do you know about Novicki?”

My supposition was now certainty. “I know that Novicki was murdered by the same vampire who killed Angeline and two local urban explorers.”

“Hey, what’s with that tone, kiddo?” he said in a cajoling voice. “I’m just following the natural instincts of a predator. No reason to go all judgmental on me.”

“Al,” I said in exasperation. “You’re a murderer! In fact, you’re a serial killer!” And I was trapped underground with him, and nobody knew it.

“Oh, come on,” Tarr said. “People wander around beneath the city in tunnels and vaults that haven’t been used in a hundred years. What do they think is gonna happen to them?”

“Probably they weren’t thinking they’d be eaten by a vampire,” I said coldly.

“They got what they deserved.”

“And what did Angeline deserve?” I said angrily.

“Don’t try to pretend you’re grieving for her,” he said.

“Why did you kill her?” I demanded.

“I was hungry.” His tone suggested I was slow on the uptake. “Look, she bothered me at work around four in the morning to tell me she had a hot scoop about Daemon, so I met her—”

“Why haven’t the cops traced that?”

“Prepaid cell. I got rid of it.”

Four in the morning. Dead time. No one knew Tarr had left the Exposé building, and no one saw him or Angeline.

He said with disgust, “Her ‘scoop’ just turned out to be some time-wasting bullshit she was making up as she went along because she was mad that Daemon kicked her out.”

So that’s what happened after she was last seen by witnesses. Following through on her threat to Daemon to ‘expose’ him, she connected with Tarr, the nosy tabloid reporter she’d met in Daemon’s car. “Jesus, Al, she didn’t deserve to die for wasting your time!”

“She didn’t die for that. She died because I’m a vampire, and it’s what I do, baby.”

“You were doing this in Hollywood, too, weren’t you?” I blurted as the realization hit me.

“Things got a little hot there. It was time to leave. That jerk Novicki followed me here. Persistent bastard, but I took care of him.” He grinned, and it was disturbing to see that familiar, cheesy, tabloid reporter’s grin on this brutally amoral killer’s face.

“How did you become a vampire?” I asked, wondering if he was an example of why the council was so stingy with permits.

“Born that way. Really didn’t get into it that much until I turned forty, though.” He added with a guffaw, “What is that? A mid-unlife crisis?”

Rachel continued wailing loudly as I said, “Can I just say, Al? A vampire becomes a tabloid writer? And here I thought Daemon was a walking cliché!”

“Just going with my strengths.” He said with nauseating enthusiasm, “Hey, as long as you know about Novicki, which is something I don’t really get to talk about, can I just say? Killing a vampire hunter? What a rush! And the blood? Amazing.” He added after a pause, “To be honest, though, once was enough. They’re tough guys to kill. So I’d prefer if this one would just go back to Vilnius without bothering me. But if not ... we’ll see what happens.”

“Do you think you can keep doing this and the Council of Gediminas will just allow it?” I said incredulously. “You’ve made it worth their while to end you.”

“Hey, you do know a lot!” he said cheerfully. “That could be good. You know, it could be some common ground for us. Something for us to talk about.”

“And do you think the cops will just walk away from this?” I said.

“The cops think Daemon did it,” he said dismissively.

“Not all of them,” I said. “And none of them think he killed the other victims.”

Tarr went still. “What?”

“They’re connecting the dots, Al. Maybe, if you got really lucky, you could’ve pinned one murder on some attention-seeking celebrity vampire.”

“Did I ever tell you how much I really didn’t want this assignment? Me, covering that phony jerk pretending to be a vampire?”

“But the cat’s out of the bag, and you’re not clever enough to smear all your murders on Daemon.”

“You not making that up? The cops really know about the others? Shit.”

“Game over,” I said triumphantly.

“Not yet,” he pointed out. “I’ve still got my double-tasty treat to finish down here before I get the hell out of Dodge.”

“Your double-tasty . . . Oh, dear God.”

Rachel heard this exchange and responded accordingly. “We’re gonna die! No, no, no!” The echoes bounced all over the chamber.

I started backing away from Tarr. “Or you could just flee now, Al. Killing two more people would slow you down. Is that really a good idea? After all, there are vampire hunters and a whole team of cops after you—”

“The cops got no idea about me, and no idea where you are,” Tarr said, his faintly illuminated expression eerily amused as he watched me sloshing backward, trying to put distance between us. “And the vampire hunters are gonna be slowed down for a while, with the cave-in down here and the stampeding vamparazzi everywhere else.” He chuckled. “Hey, I love that word, by the way. You’re fun, Esther. I’ll miss you.”

“Because you’re getting out the hell of Dodge and we won’t meet again?” I prodded, hoping for the best.

“I like you,” he said kindly. “So I’ll try to make this quick.”

I was shocked by how fast he moved. One moment, he was about ten feet away; the next, his arms were wrapped tightly around me and he was breathing in my ear. The chamber went pitch black as my light fell out of my hand and into the water at my feet.

Rachel started screaming her head off. All out of other ideas, so did I. Trapped underground in total darkness, wrapped in the deadly embrace of someone who was a blood-addicted, murdering vampire and a tabloid leech, I pitched my screams with the deliberate intention of shattering Tarr’s supersonic eardrums.

His whole short, stocky body stiffened, and for a moment, I thought maybe the combined screaming of two hysterically terrified women was more powerful than I had seriously hoped. But then he clamped a hand over my mouth, trying to shut me up, and I realized from his alert posture that he was listening to something.

“What the fuck is that?” He snapped at Rachel, “Shut up!” This had no effect of course. She kept screaming and wailing.

Since he evidently wanted us to be quiet, I—naturally—wanted to be as noisy as possible. He intended to kill me anyhow, so not annoying him seemed pretty pointless. I bit down as hard as I could on his hand, and although blood addiction had made him enhanced and powerful, it had not, I was pleased to discover, made him completely impervious to pain. He yelped and snatched his hand away. I started screaming again.

Tarr picked me up as easily as if I were a paperweight and threw me across the chamber. I flew through the dark, bounced hard off a stone wall, and then hit the cement floor of the tunnel with a lung-emptying thud. The filthy water didn’t do much to break my fall, and I laid there, disoriented and gasping with pain, trying to figure out if anything was broken.

A moment later, Rachel’s entire body weight fell on top of me with unerring accuracy, nearly making me pass out. That was when I realized that seeing in the dark was one of Tarr’s enhancements.

I also realized I saw faint streams of light flashing through this chamber and, even above Rachel’s shrieking, I heard voices echoing through the tunnels.

“Someone’s down here!” I gasped, shoving at Rachel, trying to get her weight off me. “On this side of the cave-in. Someone’s here! Help! Help!”

“Esther! Is that you?” called a blessedly familiar voice.

I was climbing to my feet in the dark, dragging Rachel with me. I couldn’t see a thing except for the lights flashing around the chamber.

“Lopez!” I cried with relief. “Yes! I’m here! I’m here!” I clamped my hand over Rachel’s mouth to stifle the noise of her wailing. “Lopez!

“I’m coming! Stay right where you are!”

He wasn’t alone. Multiple lights were flashing into this chamber now, and I could hear a number of voices echoing along the tunnel where his voice came from.

I was huddling in terror with Rachel, expecting Tarr to pounce on us at any moment. But as the beams of light got stronger and the voices drew near, I realized that he must have decided to flee rather than stand and fight. And he could disappear much more quickly down here without dragging along a noisy hostage or two.

Emboldened by my conviction that our vampire captor had run off without us, I dragged Rachel with me and stepped into the beams of light now pouring into the chamber. I squinted and raised my hand to shield my stinging eyes as the flashlights shone directly on me. Sobbing, Rachel clutched me and huddled against me.

“Esther!”

Lopez ran the final length of the tunnel he was in, then sloshed quickly through the water of this chamber, his headlamp beaming in my face. With Rachel still clinging to me, I staggered into his arms, and—by default—he embraced us both. I clutched him tightly, digging my fingers into the fabric of the sweater he wore.

“Are you okay?” he asked against my hair.

I nodded, feeling too emotional to speak for a moment.

That was really, really close.

I had nearly been the next exsanguination victim.

Four more men entered the chamber. I lifted my head and took a look at them. They were uniformed cops, carrying flashlights.

I found my voice. “Oh, thank God.”

Rachel switched from clinging to me to clinging to Lopez. She sobbed against his chest and hugged him tightly around the waist—elbowing me out of her way to get a better grip.

“Do I know her?” Lopez asked me uncertainly.

“Mad Rachel.”

“Whoa.” Apparently he hadn’t recognized her. Given her horror-movie appearance right now, and the fact that they’d only met once before, that was understandable. “What happened to you two? What are you doing here?”

“What are you doing here?” His presence seemed miraculous.

“I heard what’s happening at the Hamburg. Everybody heard. The whole block is a madhouse above ground,” he said. “I thought we could get inside faster and help out if I brought in a few cops through the basement—since you haven’t had that door sealed yet, Esther.”

“Is this really the time to criticize me for that?” I said shrilly.

He grinned and hugged me again—using the arm Rachel had left free. “Since you made your escape that way, I stand corrected.”

“We didn’t just escape,” I said urgently. “We wound up as hostages!”

He looked bemused. “What?”

“Al Tarr is the killer! He was just here! I think he ran off a minute ago when he heard you coming.”

“Tarr’s here?” Lopez quickly set aside Rachel, ignoring her shrieks of protest and fervent attempt to cling to him, and handed her over to an officer who accepted her with noticeable reluctance. “Where is he?”

“I don’t know.”

Lopez took my shoulders and spoke calmly. “There are only two tunnels here besides the one we just came in. Did you see which way—Oh, no, of course not. Were you able to hear which way he went?”

“No, I didn’t.” I was panting with a riot of agitated emotions. But his firm hold on my shoulders and his calm voice brought my careening thoughts into focus. “Wait! I think I know. The tunnel that goes near the theater caved in a little while ago. Almost on top of me, actually.”

“Jesus.” His grip tightened.

“Tarr knows that. He wouldn’t go that way. It’s a trap now.”

Lopez gave my shoulders a squeeze, then said to the four men. “We’ve got him. He must have gone that way.” He gestured to the remaining tunnel. “And it’s a dead end.”

“What?” I blurted. “You’re sure?”

“Yep. Sealed off a long time ago.” He pointed at two of the men—including the one already burdened with Rachel. “You two, get these ladies out of here. And you two—” He gestured to the other two. “On me. Let’s bring this guy in.”

“No! Wait!” I grabbed him. “Lopez, he’s very dangerous!”

“I know.” He firmly set me away from him. “It’ll be all right, Esther. Go with the officers now.”

“No, you don’t know! Really dangerous! No! Don’t go! No!”

I spiraled into hysterics at the prospect of Lopez confronting a cornered rogue vampire.

The cop who’d been assigned to escort me out of here was, in fact, forcibly restraining me and dragging me through the exit tunnel as Lopez and two cops went after Tarr down the dead-end tunnel.

“No! You don’t know what you’re dealing with!” Bullets wouldn’t work. Lopez didn’t know that! While being dragged to safety, I kept screaming, “Fire or decapitation! Nothing else will work! Fire or decapitation!”

“Miss, you must calm down!” said the beleaguered cop who was restraining me.

Realizing there was no other choice, I went limp in his arms.

The cop relaxed and said in a relieved voice, “Thank you, miss. Now let’s get you out of here, and—Agh!”

I poked him in the eye—just enough to disorient him. Then I grabbed his flashlight, saying, “Sorry, sorry, sorry!” I ran back down the tunnel, tripping on my long skirts, and re-entered the chamber he’d dragged me out of moments ago.

I had no idea how we could manage either of those things now, down here, without a vampire hunter; but I at least had to warn Lopez that nothing else would work.

I ran across the main chamber, sloshing through the water, my long skirts dragging on me. Then I entered the dead-end tunnel, which curved around and turned a corner up ahead. Even with a good flashlight in my hand now, I couldn’t see any of the men who were somewhere up ahead of me. I staggered forward as fast as I could move, slipping on the damp brick floor in my flimsy, ruined shoes, my legs tangling with my long, wet skirts.

I heard two shots fired and a lot of shouting coming from farther down this tunnel. There was a horrible roaring sound, like an explosion. I paused, and then I heard Lopez’s voice—heading back in this direction.

“Move!” he shouted. “Move!”

A bright glow emerged ahead of me—and Lopez and the two cops appeared, all racing straight toward me, trying to outrun the wall of fire that was right behind them, spreading fast in this direction.

I stopped in my tracks and stared, dumbfounded.

“Run! Go! Go!” Lopez was shouting at me.

I turned to run back the way I had come, my wet skirts a burden, my slippers sliding on the bricks. Then something heavy hit me like a speeding train, and I went flying headfirst into the central chamber, where I landed facedown in the water ... with Lopez’s entire body weight on top of me as he shielded me from the fiery blast that roared into the chamber over our heads and then withdrew.

Lopez rolled off me and hauled my head and shoulders out of the filthy water we had plunged into. I immediately looked over my shoulder. The tunnel behind us was smoking and a little charred, but the fire was gone.

“Are you all right?” he asked me frantically, breathing hard.

“Yes,” I choked out. I still had the wind knocked out of me.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“You’re all right?”

“Good.” He seized me by the shoulders and shook me. Hard. “When I tell you to go to safety, go to safety!”

“Is he dead?” I croaked.

“Are you listening to me?”

“Is he dead?” I asked again.

One of the cops said. “Oh, yeah. He’s dead. Oh, yeah. Dead.”

Lopez’s gaze dropped to my chest. He drew in a sharp breath as his eyes widened, and he grabbed me again, this time to turn me away from the other two cops. He grimaced anxiously and made a frantic gesture with his hand. I looked down and saw that I had fallen out of my precarious neckline during that headlong dive into the chamber to escape the fire. I tucked myself in, tugged the filthy and tattered neckline upward as best I could, then looked over my shoulder at the cops.

“You’re sure he’s dead?” I asked again.

“In that explosion? Burned to a crispy critter,” said the younger of the two uniformed cops. “Sorry, miss. Sorry. But, yes, he’s dead, all right. Oh, yeah.”

In the light of Lopez’s headlamp, the young officer’s face was wide-eyed with shock as he continued babbling. “I shot him. I know I shot him. I could swear I shot him. And then he took my gun away. Just took it away! And grabbed me like a rag doll—my God, he was strong. He was about to kill me! He was going to rip my head off! I know it. I saw it in his eyes. He took my head and ... And then ... Jesus, that explosion. Jesus.” He looked at Lopez. “How did we get out of there alive?”

The other cop asked, “How did we get out there alive, detective?”

Lopez looked at me. “And you wonder why I go to Mass every week.”