Prologue

Three Years Ago

Every breath that I took was a struggle. I couldn’t feel my body. My brother lay next to
me, and I watched as he his breathing stopped. I could hear my bastard of a father crashing
through the house trying to find her. I could feel myself slipping. He stormed out of the hallway
and went to the kitchen. I watched dully, my mind not being able to cooperate with me anymore.
It wasn’t like he hadn’t cut me before. I had the scars to prove it all up my leg.

“Tell me where that little bitch is now Catherine!” he hollered at me.

My name was Haidyn, but he liked to call me Catherine, like he called all of the girls he
beat. He called them pet names. Arianna, my sister, had been taken to pay for a debt that my
mother owed. She was probably dead, or being whored out, I thought with dismay. My whole
body hurt, and I could feel myself slipping… slipping. I figured if I was going to die, I might as
well do it in style. I could still talk.

“Names Haidyn, you piece of shit,” I croaked.

By 14 the pain didn’t bother me anymore. The humiliation did though. He kicked me,
flipping me on my back.

“Bitch!” he hollered.

He grabbed my hair roughly, and I smiled bitterly when I saw the knife in his hand. My
miserable life would finally be over. He put the tip of the knife to my throat, and started to cut. I
could feel the cold metal slicing through my muscle. I know that I should have felt pain, and felt
panicked that I was going to die, but I didn’t. Suddenly the pressure was gone, but I hardly
noticed.

“Do you want you and you sisters to live kid?” someone asked.

I barley registered my brother’s pained whimper of agreement, before I blacked out.

Chapter 1 - Haidyn

I, Haidyn Daniels, held onto the passenger’s seat, as my brother Archer swerved through
the freeway, past honking cars. Our little sister had called right in the middle of one of our
missions and I was pissed. Apparently she needed some help with a couple of vampire bitten
cheerleaders at her school. I briefly wondered when the hell middle school became so
complicated. I mean it was her first day of school, and she was already locating supernat shit that
I needed to do damage control on? Archer finally settled on the fastest lane, and was driving at
break neck speed; I prayed to god that he wouldn’t crash the car. This one was the 2nd in the last
8 months. I caught a police car, coming from the corner of my eye.

“Police!” I shouted.

Archer abruptly slowed down, causing the black very expensive looking Porsche behind
us to come dangerously close to bumping the back of our car. Archer glanced impatiently at the
police car, his foot tapping. I looked in the review mirror, back at the Porsche who was too close
to our car for comfort. I turned around, and noticed that there was a gorgeous looking guy, about
my age in a tux, and another equally gorgeous girl next to him. It was about 7 p.m., so no
surprise that some people were going to a party even though it was Monday. No surprise around
here, this town consisted of the over the top rich, who ruled this town, and the rest of us. The guy
seemed annoyed, but tough, so was I. I knew my sister could hold her own until we got there, I’d
made sure of that, but that didn’t keep me from worrying. I shot him a glare, warning him to
back the hell up. He stared back as if he understood but wasn’t planning on moving any time
soon. My head started ringing an alarm of danger. This man was dangerous, and everything in
me screamed to turn around. I was about to do just that when a memory hit.

It was my dad; he was drunk as usual, my mother crying in the background. My brother
knocked out bloody by the wall. My dad had slapped me across the face, and I begged him to
stop. Opening my eyes I shook my head. No, I thought angrily. Never again would I be so
helpless. With more resolve, I glared right back at the guy. He seemed stunned. I didn’t give him
a second glance, just turned back to my brother. I looked around for the police car. He was on the
side of the road, handing out a ticket.

“You think we can get out of here before we get caught?” I asked Archer somewhat
reluctantly.

He glanced over and smiled, “Hell yeah!”

With that he hit the gas, and resumed his reckless swerving. I leaned back in my seat, and
calmly closed my eyes, praying that we wouldn’t get wrapped around in a pretzel before we got
to Arianna.

Chapter 2 – Jasper

I stared at the car in front of me annoyed. All I wanted to do was get this stupid banquet
over with, so I could get out of this tux, and get away from this girl. Her name was Ashley, talk
about original. Anyway, ever since I had picked her up, she’s been driving me crazy with all her
senseless flirtation, and chatter. I mean, I don’t think she even pauses to breathe!

Anyway, two teenagers had been recklessly racing through the freeway almost as fast as
me, and then all of a sudden, they stopped. I glanced over and noticed the police car. I guess they
didn’t want to get caught. Of course that’s understandable if they’re human and can’t wipe the
policemen’s mind like I can. I sighed, my hands flexing over the wheel, impatient. I drove close
to the car, hoping it would make them go faster, and as a little bit of revenge for almost making
me get into an accident making me late for the banquet. The girl in the passenger seat turned
around and glared at me, annoyed, impatient, and with a concerned protectiveness in her eyes.
She glared at me, as if saying; I do not need this right now. Back. Off. I glared back, letting my
more animal vampire instinct show on my face. She hesitated, looking like she would turn
around like any other normal human, so we could both get on with our lives. Something
changed, her eyes became haunted, and she quickly closed her eyes relaxing her face. When she
opened them again, there was this fierce determination on her face. No this girl wasn’t going to
back down. I felt my hands relax on the steering wheel, surprised. Either that girl had some
serious guts, or she had no survival instincts at all! The urgent concern came back, and she
turned back around. It was different though. She didn’t turn around scared; she turned around
like I wasn’t worth her time. I just stared at the back of her head, unaware that Ashley had just
asked me a question. Suddenly the car sped off, I watched it go. Hmm, my day had just gotten
more interesting.

Chapter 3 - Hayden

Finally, we got to the middle school that only this morning we’d been dropping off my
stubborn little sister at. She’d been mad at us because we were skipping out on our first day at
our new high school to find out who was snatching teenage guys and girls. No more specifically
beautiful teenage guys and girls. Anyway, she wanted to come with us, but both my brother and I
agreed that no way in hell were we letting her in on a serious mission yet. Apparently she had
found some action on her own at school, when Archer and I had spent most of our day following
a hunch. We had just started actually making some real progress when my sister called to tell us
that she had gotten herself way in over her head. Ugh, stupid little teenagers thinking their old
enough to handle themselves, now she might get her freaking ass kicked by some crazy, vampire
bitten , back flipping, cheerleaders. And to make it more cliché it’s in the girl’s locker room.
Ugh!!

Arianna, my little sister, hadn’t mentioned how the cheerleaders had gotten bitten, but
how and when they did doesn’t make a difference. Those cheerleaders are still out of their minds
right now.

When a vampire bites a human, and doesn’t leave the person unconscious with their
memory wiped, the human gets a little bit of a vampires blood lust. Most vamps. are careful
when they feed, but those who don’t, usually untrained newly turned vampires, don’t take these
precautions leaving some very dangerous humans. The humans need to fight, or in more serious
cases kill. It depends on how little the vampire took. The closer to unconsciousness the weaker
the blood lust is. When a vampire first bites it sends a little bit of their strengths to the human to
help them heal faster afterwards.
 From my sister’s panic, I’m guessing that my sister interrupted a feeding and the
vampires left the girls they were about to snack on with my sister as payback for ruining their
feeding. So the girls were probably crazy with the need to kill since the vampires had probably
only bitten down and thanks to that short bite, they also had a little taste of the vampires speed
and strength. Leaving my sister stuck in a room with two little more than average girls who
really feel like they need to kill and my sister the only one in sight.

Arianna knew that they would follow her out if she ran and if these two found more
killing sources other than turning on themselves, they’d go for them. No way in hell would she
endanger innocent humans, so that left her in a locker room with two vampire bitten cheerleaders
and with no weapons? I had her carry a switchable blade in her bra and another in her shoe, but
she had said that she had taken them out for P.E. and had forgotten to strap them back in.

All in all it was a rookie situation, and she wondered why we wouldn’t let her in on our
more dangerous cases. Arianna hadn’t mastered the ability to think through panic or to be patient
yet. She probably hadn’t thought about the situation all the way through before jumping in to
save the girls from the feeding. She hadn’t thought about what would happen afterwards or that
she was totally unprepared to fight. Come to think of it, she’d been lucky that the vampire hadn’t
decided to feed off her instead.

Archer and I jogged in through the front of the school, there was a play tonight and
Arianna had said that she wanted to stay and watch it. I had been kind of surprised that she did
predicting that she was going to try to talk me into letting her have a part in the mission tonight.
Now that I look back, that was probably a lie. She had probably been following the vampires and
hadn’t told me because she knew that I’d tell her not to get involved. Annoyance and worry went
through my mind forcing me to move faster. This girl was sooo grounded when this was done, if
she was seriously injured so much more.

Archer and I slowed down when we got to the locker room. We crept up to the door
Archer groaned. I looked over giving him the “?” look.

“Last time I was in a girls locker room, I got my ass kicked by the girls hockey team,” he
said under his breath.

I stifled a chuckle but gave him an eye roll. There was a muffled crash from the inside. I
turned back and carefully opened the door, we stopped to listen.

“Ok Alyssa back the hell up, you so don’t want me to give you a black eye,” Arianna
yelled, “all the cover up in the world won’t be able to help you.”

I heard two males chuckling in the distance. My hands curled up into fists. The vamps.
were actually watching this. Oh they were so dead. I palmed my knife at my back, but didn’t take
it out I needed to knock out the girls without giving them any serious damage. Archer and I
locked eyes. We had been partners for so many years, we knew exactly what the other was
thinking. We crept in. There was some crashing in the back isle, so we went towards that one. I
looked up to the sound of snickering. As soon as they saw us they would bail, I so was not going
to let them bail. I turned to Archer, and pointed up. He looked up and nodded. He would take
care of the vampires. From the looks of his seriously pissed off face, he would probably rough
them up a bit too. He slowly took out his knife. I made a slashing motion on my wrist then shook
my head. I wanted them alive, and not seriously injured. He reluctantly nodded. I made a
twisting motion with my hand telling him to lock the door. Archer nodded and went to quietly
lock the door.

There was a quiet click but the vampires heard it, they turned. I ignored them and went
for the cheerleaders. They had been slowly walking up to my sister who was trapped in the
middle of the two girls. I jumped on the one closest to me, and hit her temple hard. She dropped
to the floor unconscious. I other turned to the other and stalked me instead. I mentally shrugged;
I guess she got tired of stalking my sister. The remaining cheerleader came at me with a little
more than humanly possible speed. I ducked and she missed clawing my in the face, screeching.
I got up wrapping my arm around her waist. She scratched my arm hard. I gave out a slight hiss
and knocked her out. I let her fall to the ground, instead of laying her down gently. The bitch
deserved it. I glanced over at Archer, both of the vamps. had dried blood around their arms but
were know sitting on the benches on their cell phones. I rolled my eyes these were the rich
vampires. Ugh, snobs. Archer glanced at me disgusted; I guess they were calling their mommy. I
walked over to Arianna.

“You ok?” I asked, my eyes taking inventory on her.

She looked fine, there was a bruise blossoming on her ankle, but she was walking fine,
other than some minor scratches she looked good.

“Yeah,” she said sounding annoyed.

“Good.”

Grabbing her arm I dragged her towards the vampires and Archer. The vampires were
both in tuxes which was a little strange but not too much. Archer looked at my little sister and
when he saw that she was ok, the tension left his shoulders but his face turned tomato red.

“What the hell were you thinking Arianna?” Archer asked.

She opened her mouth to respond my I shook her and pushed her down on one of the
benches.

“She wasn’t thinking,” I told Archer.

“Rookie situation my dear,” I said.

She didn’t respond, so I made my voice firmer.

“And that is why we didn’t let you go on our hunting today, your still a rookie.”

Tears welled up in her eyes as her furiously tried to put them down. Those tears made me
furious at the vampires. I softened my face, and gently shook her chin so she would look at me.

“You grounded,” I said softly, “no more of this, I’ll train you harder if you want me too,
but I won’t let you go on your own no matter how minor the mission.”

“I made a mistake and royally screwed up, but it’s a onetime thing I have enough
training.”

I raised an eyebrow, “Oh and so where are your weapons?” I asked.

She looked down tears sliding down her face.

“Part of being ready is knowing when a situation is too much for you. What if these
weren’t prissy vampires, and were actually rouges?” I asked, “What if they decided to feed on
you instead.”

She looked up, at the alarm in my voice. I searched her face worriedly.

“I’m sorry,” she said holing back her sobs.

I smiled weakly, “It’s ok to make mistakes.”

She nodded, and I made my face hard.

“But it’s not ok to make mistakes that may cost you your life,” I chastised, “Now go help
Archer with the cheerleaders, I’m going to have a nice chat with our two friends here about
terrorizing 8th graders.”

Arianna shot daggers at the vampires who had just clicked off on their cell phones. She
stood up without protest and walked up to Archer whose face softened when he saw her tears.
Everyone knew that he couldn’t stay mad at her. Sure enough he enveloped her in a hug and
steered her towards the unconscious cheerleaders.

I turned back to the very annoyed slightly scared vampires. I stood in front of them arms
crossed over my chest.
 “Ok you bastard what in your twisted blood sucking mind makes you think it was ok to
set loose two girls set on a killing rampage at my sister?” I asked.

“The brat deserved it. She interrupted a very good snack,” the one on the right said.

I punched him in the nose, hard. Thanks to me being vampire kissed (which thankfully is
another story) the punch was hard enough to break his nose. I smiled at the very satisfying
crunch. Both of the boys hissed at me, and started to get up when the girls locker room door
swung open and in came the girl and the boy vampires who I had seen behind me on the freeway.
The girl looked glued to the guys side blissfully ignored by the looks of it. The guy seemed
surprised and I was too giving the guys I had just punched my moment’s hesitation to attack. The
boy whose nose I’d broken tackled me to the ground. I used the momentum to roll, and to take
out my knife. He ended up on top, his fangs to close to my neck for comfort. I put the knife at his
throat, and the vampire froze. I looked down at my shirt, it was new, and no way in hell was I
getting it blood stained. Instead I made a swift knee to the guy’s groin. He rolled off holding his
bruised manhood. I stood up and put my knife away. Archer had just come back from taking care
of the two cheerleaders and was standing with my sister by the door looking amused.

“Why didn’t you cut the bastard up?” he asked.

I looked down at my shirt, “It’s new, I’d didn’t want to get it blood stained.”

“Then why’d you wear it to go tracking?” he asked.

“I had a black sweater in the car,” I said.

He snorted, but dropped the subject. I turned to the out knew guests.

“Hello I’m Jasper,” the new guy said, “And you are?”

I crossed my arms over my chest again.

“A very pissed off big sister.”

He grinned. I motioned for them to take a seat. They did, and when the guy who attacked
me recovered, he sat down too, looking royally pissed. Jasper was gorgeous. My breath hitched
when I got a good look at him. The girl next to him looked annoyed and looked at me with
distaste. Ugh, prissy girl vampires were the worst. I rolled my eyes at my thoughts, and only
noticed that I’d physically done it when Jasper raised an eyebrow. I motioned for Archer and
Arianna to come over and they did. We sat across from the team of vampires, Arianna in the
middle of Archer and I. The vamps. were all outfitted in formal wear. Jasper had black hair and
the brightest green eyes I had ever seen, and strong features. His tux showed off his broad chest,
and from the looks of it, I guessed he was well muscled. All in all very hot. The girl, his date was
gorgeous but you know vampire gorgeous there was nothing special, so were the other two boys.
Of course vampire pretty was prettier than I was. I was average, curly black hair that stopped 6
inches past my shoulder in a V cut. I had brown eyes, my skin tan, (thanks to my mom’s Spanish
heritage). My boobs were average, not too big or too small. The only thing unique about me was
that I was fairly tall, about 5”9. Of course Jasper looked about 6”3 so it didn’t matter much.

“What happened, Alex?” Jasper asked.

Alex, the one that attacked me, sneered over at my sister.

“Well, we were going to snack on these totally gorgeous cheerleaders, when this little
brat-”

He was cut off my by sister who sounded a lot more confident and put together.

“Oh hell no!” she said, “How ‘bout you start at the part where you lured the girls away
from their families at the play. What the hell were you idiots thinking?!”

Both guys looked at her like she’d just brought hell on earth to them. They gave her the
same look that Jasper had given me on the freeway. Arianna looked away almost instantly.
Vampires had a way to make people cower, with good reason. They were practically the head of
the food chain. I was the only one that I had known not to cower when that look was aimed at
me. Jasper turned to them, his green eyes turning black. His hands curled into fists.

“How could you be so careless?” he asked slowly.

Alex looked at him, “We were going to call you afterwards. The girls were just too hot to
pass up.”

The girl vamp. snorted in disagreement, but nobody paid attention to her.

Jasper grabbed him by the throat.

“I’m you brother not your fucking cleanup crew!” he exclaimed.

Ah, so the boys hadn’t called their mama, instead they called their brother to clean up
their mess. I snorted quietly, pussy’s. Alex nodded quickly. Jasper let go.

“Wait until Dad hears about this,” he muttered.

That brought me back to my own abusive past, and I tried to shake off the memories. He
was gone now, never to hurt me again, it doesn’t matter. I felt Archer and Arianna’s hand over
mine, we all knew each other’s emotions when we didn’t have the energy to put up mental
shields, thanks to all three of us being vampire kissed. I looked up and slipped my hand from
theirs, forcing myself not to show any weakness. I shook the memories away and looked back to
the vampires. Ari looked at me smug.

“See, I needed to do something,” she said.

She cowered hurt and I softened up, “Sorry, but you could have gotten yourself killed.”

Jasper snorted, “Hardly. Vampires aren’t allowed to kill humans.”

I looked between Alex and his friend, who squirmed and Jasper.

“No, they don’t kill humans, they just set two vampire bitten girls on my little sister,” I
said.

Jaspers eyes bugged out. Alex and his friend moved away from Jasper.

“I knew the girl had called her older siblings, and we were there to stop them if it became
too serious,” the nameless vampire defended.

I jumped up and punched him in the nose too. He had been too distracted to block. I stood
over him, my body shaking with protective fury. The only thing holding my back was Archer
hand on my shoulder.

“And you think that’s ok!” I nearly screamed.

The guy stood up hissing, and tried to pounce but Jasper came and held him back. After a
few tense moments all of us sat down again.

“Oh, you two deserve to get your ass whooped,” Jasper bit out.

The girl vampire looked annoyed, “I don’t see what the big deal is. That girl shouldn’t
have been interfering with vampire business.”

“The hell I didn’t those idiots could have ruined you carefully hidden secret. They didn’t
even lock to door!” Ari exclaimed.

I turned to her and yanked her arm hard.

“Sorry,” she muttered.

“Bro, go take her to the car.”

He looked reluctant.

“Don’t worry; you’ll know if something goes wrong which I doubt. The vamps. need to
get to their high class banquet soon.”

Archer nodded and then hurried Arianna out of the room. The girl vampire stared after
my sister but wisely kept her mouth shut.
 “How do you guys know that we’re vampires?” he asked.

I thought back to that mysterious vampire who saved us at that house so long ago. The
night when we became vampire kissed. Vampire kissed is what happens when you lose a lot of
blood, and a vampire replaces it with their blood, but there’s technically no exchange. The
vampire had to be very old in order to have that kind of control over their bloodlust, so few ever
survive it.

“I just know. My brother and I have been hunting down rouge vampires for a couple
years now.”

His looked mildly surprised, “And your parents have no problem with this?”

“Their gone, we have to make a living somehow. The money pays for fake enrollments,
rent, fake ID’s ect.”

“You live on your own?” he asked.

We had been living on our own just recently, after leaving the training when my brother
turned 18, we took our earnings from our missions and left, of course under an agreement that
we had with our ‘supervisor’ Daren. Of course I didn’t tell him that.

“I hope this doesn’t happen again, my sister called at a very bad time,” I said changing
the subject, as I stood.

He stood too.

“Understood,” he said.

He smiled and winked, “See you guys at school?”

“West Ridge?” I asked.

He smiled and nodded.

“How can you go in the sun?” I asked curiously, the power he was projecting seemed
young.

“Why didn’t I see you at school today?” he countered.

I started towards the door, “My little secret.”

He whispered something that I could quite understand but I think he said ‘I bet.’

As I walked to the car, I stopped abruptly. Did I just flirt with a vampire? I remembered
back and realized that the answer is yes. I resumed walking astounded. I don’t usually flirt; I
mean I’m not exactly the most likeable girl. Archer says I radiate a back off vibe. To me it’s
more like a ‘if you can’t take the challenge you not worth my time’ vibe. I mean those who can
see past that are the ones that matter, not the ones who can’t.

I continued my stroll to the car, with the surprisingly genuine vampire I’d ever met stuck
in my mind. I’d never met a vampire who wasn’t rouge or a very arrogant bastard. I finally got to
the car, wary with the knowledge that I wouldn’t get this confusing vampire out of my head.