Extraits

I shook my head. "This is insane. A Sunwalker? As in vampires who can walk in sunlight? You do know they're not real, right? Sun walkers are just a myth."

I shrugged. "Depends on what you know. Did you know Darroch is connected? As in government connected?" He shook his head, so I quickly ran down my conversation with Kabita for him. By the end, he was frowning even harder than he'd been before, which I hadn't known was possible. His blue eyes were like twin shards of ice, so coldly angry. This was beyond furious. "OK. Inigo, now what do you know that I don't know?"

The Key was closing. I could feel the protection of its power slipping from me little by little. Soon it would be beyond my reach and the sickness would take over. The last High Priest of Atlantis would be no more. Instead there would be a ravening beast, hungry for blood and for violence.

Chapter One

“You’re dripping blood on my carpet. Again.” The voice was as expressionless as the face. Only a slight glint behind deep brown eyes betrayed the fact that Kabita Jones, my boss and best friend, was extremely peeved.

I could sort of see her point. Last time she’d had to replace the carpet. This time the blood only went up to my elbows and it was mostly dry already. There were just a couple of drips. It wasn’t like she couldn’t get the place steam cleaned.

“That’s what you get for calling me in right after a hunt.” I dropped into one of the two chairs in front of her massive mahogany desk. She scowled at me. She didn’t like me getting blood all over her fake leather chairs, either. Bad for business, having a client sit down in a pool of vampire blood.

“Here.” She tossed me a box of wet wipes, only semi-effective for cleaning blood off things, but certainly better than nothing. I grabbed a wipe and scrubbed at my arm. That’s when I noticed a few drops of blood in my cleavage. Gross.

Kabita leaned back in her chair. “How do you like weird?”

As though killing vampires and demon spawn and other creepy crawlies for a living was normal. I tried to raise an eyebrow at her, but I was no Mr. Spock; both went up. “Define weird.”

“Weird. As in: ‘up your alley’ weird.”

Ah, she meant blood suckers. Nightwalkers. Minions of Darkness. Otherwise known as vampires. Right.

Friday night I had a date. I hadn't had a date in quite a while, so I admit to being a bit nervous. OK a lot nervous. Despite the fact that deep down I'd really love to be in a relationship, dates were so not my thing. I didn't do well on dates, I mean, small talk was bad enough to begin with, but how on earth do you answer questions like "What do you do for a living?"

I turned to go. "Remember," her voice stopped me, "look beyond the obvious. Not all of those who walk the dark path are evil."

I shook my head. "This is insane. A Sunwalker? as in vampires who can walk in sunlight? You do know they're not real, right? Sun walkers are just a myth."

Kabila ana a private investigation firm which specialized in hunting down things the government liked to pretend didn't exist. Creatures that would give most normal people nightmares. The government paid us decent money to track and kill the monsters that did nothing more exciting than investigate cheating spouses. We got excitement and fortune, if not fame. The government got plausible deniability. We all went home happy.

Chapter One

“You’re dripping blood on my carpet. Again.” The voice was as expressionless as the face. Only a slight glint behind deep brown eyes betrayed the fact that Kabita Jones, my boss and best friend, was extremely peeved.

I could sort of see her point. Last time she’d had to replace the carpet. This time the blood only went up to my elbows and it was mostly dry already. There were just a couple of drips. It wasn’t like she couldn’t get the place steam cleaned.

“That’s what you get for calling me in right after a hunt.” I dropped into one of the two chairs in front of her massive mahogany desk. She scowled at me. She didn’t like me getting blood all over her fake leather chairs, either. Bad for business, having a client sit down in a pool of vampire blood.

“Here.” She tossed me a box of wet wipes, only semi-effective for cleaning blood off things, but certainly better than nothing. I grabbed a wipe and scrubbed at my arm. That’s when I noticed a few drops of blood in my cleavage. Gross.

Kabita leaned back in her chair. “How do you like weird?”

As though killing vampires and demon spawn and other creepy crawlies for a living was normal. I tried to raise an eyebrow at her, but I was no Mr. Spock; both went up. “Define weird.”

“Weird. As in: ‘up your alley’ weird.”

Ah, she meant blood suckers. Nightwalkers. Minions of Darkness. Otherwise known as vampires. Right.

Except for Kabita and me, vampires weren’t weird. They were normal, everyday stuff. Or maybe I should say every-night stuff. It was like saying that baking bread was a weird job for a baker.

Kabita ran a private investigation firm which specialized in hunting down things the government liked to pretend didn’t exist. Creatures that would give most normal people nightmares. The government paid us decent money to track and kill the monsters while maintaining a cover as private investigators that did nothing more exciting than investigate cheating spouses. We got excitement and fortune, if not fame. The government got plausible deniability. We all went home happy.

“And how is this weirder than any other ‘up my alley’ case?” I asked as I cleaned off the last of the blood.

She pushed a file gingerly across the desk. Despite being one of the best demon spawn hunters in the business, Kabita found vampires extremely distasteful, not to mention creepy. Go figure. “It’s not an ordinary vamp,” she said. “It’s a Sunwalker.”

I checked to make sure my jaw wasn’t lying on her desk. Nope, still attached to my face. “A Sunwalker? You’re kidding, right?”

“Our new client wants us to hunt this Sunwalker and kill him, but more importantly, he wants us to retrieve something the Sunwalker stole from his family. He’ll fill you in on the details. You’re to meet him at this address.” She shoved a piece of paper across at me while carefully tucking a strand of long, ink black hair behind her ear.