Gail’s eyes fluttered open as she found herself lying in bed in a brand-new negligee, surrounded by silk sheets. She rubbed her eyes, and smacked her lips before having a glorious stretch. “Was it all a dream?” she asked as she saw Javier lying next to her.

  She frowned as she smacked her lips again and felt little pinpricks in her dry skin. She reached a finger into her mouth and felt her canines poking further than ever. She shivered uncontrollably at the tiniest touch.

  “Those are an erogenous zone, you know,” Javier explained. “You haven’t lived until you’ve felt them sink into warm flesh.”

  Gail’s eyes glazed over as she looked at him. In the soft glow of the lamp, his eyes seemed darker, his skin more luminous. She ran her hand along his arm and marveled at the similarities in their temperatures. “What happened?” she asked as she leaned closer.

  “Oh, I made a deal with Dama Jaeger to help her with her problems, and in turn she gave me the answer to mine,” he cooed as he returned the touch.

  Gail purred. “I want more,” she said as she nuzzled against him. Her fangs traced along his skin.

  “Oh, yes you do, mi amor,” Javier confessed. “You see, you were very young and very thirsty, and now part of me is buried deep inside you, mixing with all the little pieces I left in you before when you were human, and they are telling you to trust me, to follow me, and to love me unconditionally.”

  Gail just moaned and curled against him. She wrinkled her nose and licked her lips. “I’m so hungry,” she whined.

  “I know, mi amor, but I am hungry, too, and I cannot feed you any more of myself just yet. Oh, you are rather beautiful like this,” he said before kissing her. “But you will be even more beautiful when you’re well fed.”

  He rolled to the side and revealed a middle-aged man in a wife-beater and torn jeans. The guy stared in horror as Gail ogled him. He tried to cry out but his mouth was covered in tape and his hands cuffed over his head.

  “You see, this man thought it was OK to beat his esposa and his niños within an inch of their lives. I think it is only fair that we teach him a lesson, no?”

  An hour later, Gail lay curled in Javier’s arms, her skin flushed and body warm. She licked the last dribbles off her lips before kissing him passionately. “I’ve never been so happy,” she cooed.

  “You have never been so high, mi amor. In time, this will pass. In time, you might even resent me for what I had to do, but you see, your madre is the only heir of Brynjulf Jagäre, head of the Jaeger Clan, and your blood tastes like nothing but royalty. If I can figure out who your father is and prove your lineage to the council, you are my seat back at the table, mi amor. She just wants her serum to fix those who have lost memories. She was willing to have to deal with you later, just to get my help. Otherwise, she would have just left you for dead.”

  “I don’t like her,” Gail grumbled as she began nuzzling at Javier. This time, he let her sink her fangs in his wrist again.

  “She could have killed you and killed me and hidden it so the sheriff would never find us, so don’t be too hard on your madre. One day we will need to show her how strong you can be, and she will help us get what we want.”

  “And what do we want, mi amor?” Gail asked sweetly.

  “We want the council to listen to us, or we want them destroyed,” he said before kissing her. “Lorcan has his lob hombres, and I have you and all those precious little secrets in your head. I have my princess at last.”

  “Just the fairytale ending I always wanted,” Gail cooed as she slid on top of him. “Many happily ever afters.”

  As she laughed, the lights in the room began to flicker. Javier looked around in confusion. “Mi amor, that wasn’t me,” he said.

  Gail looked at her fingertips in curiosity. Tiny sparks leapt from tip to tip as the lights flickered again. Javier’s eyes widened in horror.

  “I don’t think I ever . . .” Javier muttered as he watched the lights flicker again. “There is only one other vampire with . . . Jesuchristo! I know who your father is.”

  Epilogue . . . a.k.a. Meanwhile, The Sheriff’s Back in Town

  “I see you were left in charge for less than a week and the building ended up on fire,” Dr. Isang said as she surveyed the team mopping up the charred remains of Lori Patterson. “That’s impressive even for you, Kevin.”

  “Just who do you think you are?” Kevin Vasquez asked as he peeled off his shades to reveal inhumanly dark eyes.

  Dr. Isang took a few long, slow strides across the lobby, her designer heels clicking on the scorched tile. She let her hair down and ran her manicured talons through the dark waves while Kevin puffed out his chest and leered at the much smaller woman. Dr. Isang smiled sweetly and straightened her glasses before she spoke.

  “I am the eyes of the sheriff, and you would do well to remember that, Kevin. Now, you can either help me with my investigation or get out of my way,” she said coldly.

  “Or else what?” he dared.

  She took another slow step towards him, and this time, she tipped her glasses so that she could stare at him with her own inhuman eyes. “Or else I tell Mr. Sugar that you caused trouble. He is on his way, after all.”

  Kevin took a slight step back. He gave a sweeping motion towards the blackened pile of bones, the scorched walls, and the puddles on the floor where the sprinklers had discharged.

  “That is all that remains of one of the sheriff’s other sets of eyes. We have three meatsacks stashed upstairs, all on the verge of biting it. I was going to have them as lunch, but only after we got statements for the boss lady, of course.”

  “Oh, of course,” Dr. Isang said with a taut smile. “Tell me, how many valuable assets were lost? Exactly what was stolen?”

  “You’re the eyes. Why don’t you go see for yourself?” Kevin sniffed before sweeping his coat and making a dramatic exit. His drama was lessened slightly, however, as he slipped on a puddle just before he got to the torn open door.

  Dr. Isang noted the solid steel door blasted from its hinges and the deep gashes and fist holes all along the hall. “Clearly, this must have been a mighty battle between two giant men . . . or maybe not,” she muttered, as she picked a fake pink nail out of one of the gashes. She zeroed in on a shard of glass lodged near the baseboard. Dr. Isang squinted to just make out the remains of, “—ent Ze.” She pressed her fingers together and let out a low, exasperated sigh.

  Kevin whirled around and dared to point a finger at the intruder. “You can’t blame this on me. I was the one sandbagged with two meatsacks as help. It’s their fault they couldn’t keep tabs on some bimbo. Hell, they were nothing more than experiments anyway—”

  “Valuable experiments,” Dr. Isang corrected.

  “Well, you’re the eyes. Weren’t you supposed to keep an eye on the broad?”

  “The test subject was as stable as could be expected. One could argue that you were too disruptive. You also failed to report the erratic behavior in the other Lethe subject in your care and perhaps indirectly caused this unfortunate incident.”

  Kevin bit his lip and narrowed his eyes. “You really want to get the blamethrower all ready for when the bitch is here, don’t you?” he asked with a sneer. “Well listen to me, sweetheart: if you try to play dirty, I’ll play dirtier. You got it, Eyes of the Sheriff?”

  “Oh, yes, I do,” she said sweetly. “Now, is it possible to get upstairs and see just how much damage your incompetence has caused?”

  Kevin glowered and muttered every possible misogynist comment he could under his breath. He waved to show that most of the labs had escaped the flames and escorted Dr. Isang to the second-floor lab. There, folding tables had been converted to cots. Two hapless humans remained unconscious and hooked up to IVs while a flurry of doctors and assistants looked over them.

  “Greg Lewis and Stanley Dean,” Dr. Isang read from the charts. “Both in medically induced comas following a vampiric histamine reaction. I see you are still giving treatments to Mr. Dean, so you aren’t entirely heartless, Kevin. Now tell me, where is the third human?”

  Kevin motioned to the biohazard sign. “Dr. Antonova wanted him locked in there in case he was exposed to whatever made that Patterson meatsack go mental, but I don’t think it will matter,”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, that guy’s innards were soup and his neck broken. It doesn’t take a doctor to know that he ain’t gonna make it, sweet cheeks. He’s in a coma without any drugs required.”

  “I see,” Dr. Isang said softly. “Still, I would like to see him.”

  “Be my guest.”

  He took his time futzing with the door. By the time he got them both through, the doctor’s jaw was taut and her eyes cold. A lone human in a biohazard suit stood guard over the bloody pulp of a human lying in the examination table within. She immediately gave a salute to Kevin and the doctor.

  “Dr. Antonova still thinks this is Soviet Russia,” Kevin noted with an eye roll. Dr. Isang, on the other hand walked right over and took the tablet the Russian was holding and began flipping through information.

  “Is this correct?” Isang asked as she saw the lump on the table twitch a few times. Dr. Antonova nodded. The pair seemed to communicate through a series of meaningful glances and nods, until the human finally pointed to the door. Dr. Isang nodded deeply.

  “I’ll return when you are done,” the Russian said before heading to the airlock, still in her suit. Dr. Isang smiled and took off her glasses next, tucking the modern frames into her breast pocket. She wandered over to the computer and pressed her finger to the sensor.

  “Hey, that won’t . . . whoa!” Kevin exclaimed as the computer came to life. Dr. Isang typed furiously in Hangul script while the computer gave her blisteringly fast lines of feedback. She seemed to take it all in stride and sighed deeply as she saw some flashing red script at the end.

  “Really, they got into the system and stole all of the Project Zero information while you were in charge?” Dr. Isang said.

  “Project Zero? I thought it was Project Leaves or something like that.”

  “Lethe,” Isang snarled.

  “What?”

  “It was Project Lethe,” she said slowly. “Not that I’d expect an imbecile like you to understand.”

  “Oh, I’ve had about enough,” Kevin snarled as he pulled back his fist. Much to his surprise, the tiny woman not only caught his hand, but began crushing it with the force to drive the much larger vampire to his knees in a matter of seconds. She didn’t even break a sweat as the bones began to pop. “What are you?” Kevin squealed.

  “I told you, silly boy,” she said, shaking her hair. As the light hit it, the jet black shimmered and turned icy white. The skin began to sag around her eyes and jaw, crinkling and morphing into decidedly Caucasian features. Age spots rose to the surface while laugh lines deepened until finally, a wizened old crone stared at the whimpering young vampire.

  “No, no, this can’t be,” Kevin whimpered. “You’re . . . you’re . . .”

  “Surprise,” the old woman said as the airlock door opened behind her. Another Dr. Isang and the towering figure of Mr. Sugar squeezed in. The crone reached her hand back, and Mr. Sugar set a much more sensible set of silver spectacles into her free palm. She finally let go to slide on her delicate glasses and loop her hair into a matronly bun. “I told you that I was the eyes of the sheriff, didn’t I?”

  “You can . . . you . . .”

  “Yes,” the sheriff said, a twinkle in her eyes as they shifted to a lovely light shade of blue. “Now, I know what you must be thinking in that pea sized brain of yours. You’re thinking, ‘I’ve really disappointed my boss, and I want to know exactly how to make it up to her’.”

  “What are you?” he asked as he clutched his broken hand to his chest.

  “I am one of those ancient, horrible monsters that your sires tell stories about to scare little pissants like you,” she said with a sweet smile. “I am also the bitch that pays your salary and gives all the free reign you could want to be an adorable little thug.”

  Kevin looked up meekly. “So, what happens now?”

  “What happens now is that I am going to give you one last chance to make up for your epic failure here. You are going to get cleaned up and get back to work finding Lorcan Darcy and that bitch wife of his. You will bring them back alive, even though the little runt killed your brother, and you will do it before the end of the year . . . or you will be the latest head on a pike in my garden. Am I clear?”

  Kevin nodded quickly.

  She leaned down and smiled her best grandmotherly smile. “After all, you never know where I’ll be, and if you tell anyone about my little ability . . .”

  “Head on a pike?” he offered.

  “Exactly. Now, run along and finish up the clean-up. I have some unfinished business here. Yu Na, help him please.”

  Kevin scrambled for the door, followed by the taciturn actual Dr. Isang. Once the sheriff and Mr. Sugar were alone, the giant let out a deep sigh. “How much did they get away with, my lady?” he asked softly.

  The sheriff paced around the helpless human. She stopped at the computer again and gave it a few lackadaisical taps. “Oh, just about everything,” she said distractedly. “I mean, it really couldn’t have gone any better if we had tried.”

  “That is the point, my lady. Why go through all this trouble when you could have given the research directly to . . . ?” Mr. Sugar started.

  “He still doesn’t know, Kane.” She sighed.

  “Well, perhaps you should tell him. The reports I’ve received from my sources are not good. You know where he and the pack are going. The prognosis—”

  She walked over and shushed the giant with a gentle finger to the lips. He looked on the older lady with grave concern. “Livia, please listen to me. They have taken him to Arce Monstrorum, just as you predicted, but the early reports are that even the Beast’s personal physician cannot save him. He wishes to know if it is time to call upon . . . drastic measures.”

  The sheriff pensively surveyed the bruised face of the human tied to all manner of machines and tubes. She slipped her keys out of her designer purse and flipped open a small blacklight. As she ran the beam along one of the human’s limp arms, a kanji character shaped like a star glowed on his bicep.

  “Why is it always number six?” she asked softly as she watched a bruise lighten and turn slightly green on the subject’s neck.

  “My lady?” Mr. Sugar asked with a raised brow.

  The sheriff turned over the human’s hand and smiled as she saw jagged lacerations and tiny specks of glass dug into his forearm. She then lifted up his lip to see most of his teeth missing, but with tiny white stubs already forming in his gum line.

  “I was just thinking of some of the nonsense my brother used to spew about fate,” she muttered. “I don’t believe in that claptrap. I believe in science and a thousand years of careful breeding. What’s this one’s name again?”

  “He’s one of the old group - a John Doe moved over to Project Lethe after he developed an incurable phobia of blood. I think his last identity was Jonathan Dean, a hunter under Vasquez’s command. Yu Na was hoping repeated exposure would cure him and leave him viable again for Project Zero.”

  “Oh yes, the broken toy,” the sheriff muttered. She leaned over and studied his face. “The resemblance isn’t as extraordinary as, say, Number One, but the survival instinct, the ferocity, and the determination . . . that reminds me so much of . . .”

  Mr. Sugar put his hand on the sheriff’s, completely dwarfing it. “My lady, please, this one is broken. I will have them send one of the others.”

  The sheriff squeezed his hand and leaned against his hulking form. “No, broken is exactly what we need. That which is broken always becomes stronger in the end. Write to the Beast and tell him that the wheels will be in motion and that instructions will come in person.”

  “Should I prepare transport to Florence, then?” he asked.

  The sheriff shook her head. She paced around the room again until she found a strip of tape lying by one of the cabinets. She picked it up and gave it a sniff. She rolled her eyes before tossing it back to the floor. “No, my dear Mr. Sugar, this is not the job for a sheriff. It’s the job for a spy, and I know just the one to do it. After all, Lorcan and his pack cannot know the truth yet.”

  “But . . . Livia,” Mr. Sugar pleaded. “Surely Lorcan has the right to know what happened to his mother. That . . .”

  “Say no more, Kane, say no more. Now it is time to let the pieces fall where they must, or my father and Arthur will win. We simply can’t have that, can we?”

  “No, my lady,” Mr. Sugar said softly.

  The sheriff wandered back to Jonathan’s body and took a deep breath before leaning over to kiss him full on the mouth. “You will not remember any of this. You are Jonathan Dean, hunter of monsters. A group of werewolves killed your only brother, and now you will do whatever it takes to hunt them down. You will survive, and you will find the pack’s alpha. Find Paige DeMarco. Find her and kill her,” she whispered.

  “My lady?”

  “Tell that worthless brute that he has a new partner.”

  “But, how—?”

  “There is only one rule: the strong rule and the weak fall,” the sheriff snapped. “Either he will be too weak, or he will be exactly where I need him to be. Now, get me that Azarola asshole on the phone, and let’s get to work saving my son before it’s too late, my love.”

  To be continued in Zero, the next installment of the Rules Undying Series . . .

  Acknowledgements

  The author would like to thank her amazing Bite Club, without whom this book simply wouldn’t be possible. The author would also like to thank the talented Reginal Atkins for another awesome cover, and a very special shout out to the lovely ladies who edited so there are actually commas in places where they should be. Megan Harris, you even make me sound good, and darling AussieMandyus, you keep my florid prose in check!

 

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