The sunlight streamed in through cracked, broken, and vacant windows. This would be a hard place for a sleeping vampire to get any shut-eye. Last time we’d discovered Jagger’s hideaway he was holed up in a freight elevator.

But with so many vampires now in his company, that would be too small for all their coffins.

I found the two-flight staircase we’d once taken when Alexander and I had originally found Jagger here months ago. As I ventured down the rickety staircase, less light streamed in and I dug into my backpack and grabbed my flashlight. My free hand got tangled in several spider-webs.

“Sorry,” I said to a grizzly-looking spider who stared back up at me.

I walked down a darkened hallway. It was straight out of a horror movie. There were no windows here in the sublevel hallway, and I only had a flashlight to show my way. My imagination transformed it into a mental institution, with screaming inmates. Not sure who or what might jump out at me, I had to fight my own will just to open a door.

I opened a few doors that led nowhere — empty rooms with no sign of life. . or the undead. At the end of the hallway, I came to the last two doors — one across from the other. At this point I wasn’t sure how much daylight I had to keep me safe. I decided to try the one on the right.

The door was secured, but not with a lock. It felt like something was wedged in front of it from the other side. To me that meant there was something behind it worth securing. I pushed against the door with all my might, and the wedge shifted just enough for me to slip through the opening. I stepped inside and cast my light around the room.

There they were — one right next to the other. Five coffins in a row. The first one, black with band stickers, was Jagger’s. The second, baby pink, was no doubt Luna’s. The third one was embellished with stickers from countries and cities across the globe, and I recognized it as Sebastian’s. The fourth was black onyx stone outlined in white, and the fifth was adorned with shiny beads. Those were certainly Onyx and Scarlet’s. Each had dirt around it in a circle. Five sleeping vampires, only a few feet away from me.