"What are you doing?"
Snake Eyes stopped abruptly. His eyes lost the rage that had fired up earlier, and he slowly turned around to confront his boss.
"He killed them, I know it," he said in a sulky voice, his eyes now downcast.
"I very much doubt that, but so what if he did? Do you not think he would do the same to you?"
"I'll kill him first," muttered Snake Eyes.
"You will do no such thing," said Anne, her eyes on me now. "He belongs to me, and you know how I feel about my possessions being damaged, don't you?"
"Yes," he said shortly in a subdued tone.
"Get out." She spoke without violence or inflection in her voice, but Snake Eyes scurried out as if he'd been released from the gates of hell.
"You smell delicious," she said softly when we were alone, her eyes caressing my face. "Not long now."
I was so horrified by the implication of her words that I forgot to try and kill her before she left again.
Angus
A flash drive was all that was needed to store everything that Hugo had collected over the years. Each and every piece of information he'd sourced had been meticulously collated and cross referenced, and then reduced to a few essential sets of data.
There was a massive section containing maps. A total of eighteen different bases were detailed, with lists of nearby resources, and the approximate numbers of blood feeders as well as humans involved in each. I was shocked at the sheer size of Jack's setup. A quick glance suggested a total number of just over six hundred human and vampire males manning these posts. All were geographically remote from human habitation, many were situated in old forts and castles. Jack hadn't been lying when he'd spoken of his army.
Fergus was suitably impressed both by the comprehensiveness of Hugo's information, as well as the scale of the force we were up against.
"Nice work," he gushed as his eyes sped through the reams of information. "They're holding Mark here. Twenty bloodsuckers, maybe six or so men. Plus whatever Anne took with her when she transported him there. Maybe thirty, thirty-five in total. We could easily handle that with a bit of planning."
"And a tank, apparently," smiled Hugo. "This information was up to date three months ago. She could have changed things a bit," he cautioned.
"Possible but unlikely," said Fergus dismissively. "It's just a dirty great warehouse in the middle of nowhere. What's to change?"
I gazed pensively at the map for a minute or so, frowning.
"Angus?"
I glanced at my brother.