Series Firsts Box Set

by Laken Cane

  I had to adjust to the changes, and I needed rest to do that. I needed sleep. But during the times I was awake, the supernaturals visited me. Clayton would stand in the shadows of the room, awaiting Miriam’s command.

  I couldn’t look him in the eye.

  Part of the reason was because I was ashamed of how I’d behaved, but some of it was because I didn’t want to see him go back to being Miriam’s thing.

  I’d seen him as the man he was.

  Angus had hemmed and hawed while explaining to me that it wasn’t my fault that I’d gotten hot and bothered and naked and jumped Clayton. Miriam had laughed, but when she glanced at Clayton, I saw him flinch from the corner of my eye.

  “She won’t allow it, Trinity.”

  Had she punished him because of my lack of control? Because I’d been naked in his arms?

  I hadn’t cared at the time—I’d been too far gone on lust lotion. What had he called it? The Foam of Aphrodite. But now…now I cared very much.

  They hadn’t explained anything other than the fact that the lotion was a forbidden substance in the supernat world, not because it affected them—it didn’t—but because it would get them all exterminated by the human government.

  Because the foam affected humans.

  But it even more intensely affected those humans who were…different. Humans with a little something extra inside them. Humans like me.

  The supernaturals minded their manners for the most part. They controlled themselves. They didn’t kill humans. They went out of their way to offer something that would make them accepted in our world—protection, money, entertainment.

  That’s why they were accepted.

  Not the vampires, of course, but that was a whole different thing.

  The Foam of Aphrodite would change all that, and it wouldn’t matter which supernatural or group created it.

  For that reason, it was more dangerous to the supernat community than it was to the humans.

  And they had to figure out who possessed it, and they had to contain the situation.

  It wasn’t like the foam was readily available, sold in supermarkets or restaurants and handed out on Halloween. It was nearly impossible to find or create, and not even my little group of supernaturals knew exactly how it was made, though they tossed uneasy glances at each other when I asked.

  They might not know how to make it, but they knew more than they were telling me. I got the feeling sex had something to do with the process. Big surprise.

  “The question is,” Miriam had said, tilting her head quizzically, “why you? Why does this man want you?”

  I’d shrugged. “I’m a fun girl.”

  But I had no idea why the stranger had attacked me.

  I’d woken up that morning pretty much back to normal, so I’d gotten dressed, gone downstairs for breakfast, and then, it being an unseasonably warm and sunny day, I’d walked out into the large, fenced backyard to sit on the patio and watch Angus’s kids play.

  Miriam had joined me half an hour later.

  “You’re up early,” I said. I glanced behind her, automatically searching for the hulking shadow of Clayton, but he didn’t appear. That was unusual, as Miriam rarely went anywhere without him at her back.

  “I know.” She gave the chair beside mine an angry kick before she sat down. “But we have to sleep less and work more, now that we’ve got this foam hanging over our heads. If word of this gets out, we’ll be rounded up and…” She shuddered, and it took her a minute to continue. “Bad things will happen to us. We have to gain control of the situation, Trinity. Human women are being murdered, and now this.”

  “I know.”

  “Do you? Do you really know?” Her eyes blazed. “Because you’re one of us now. They will take you, too. Your sad story won’t sway them, not anymore. You’ve left the city and moved to Bay Town. You’re not only working with us, you’re living with us. And when they decide to persecute the nonhumans once again—and they will—you may not be immune from their hatred and fear.”

  I swallowed the dread I felt at her words. I was one of them. I’d been stabbed by a magical sword, chomped on by a mad master vampire, and…

  “No,” I realized, suddenly. “You’re wrong. I’ll be vital to the humans once they understand what I can do. I’m a hunter. I can kill vampires. I can kill them. No one else can do that.”

  “That,” someone said behind me, a bit dryly, “isn’t entirely true.”

  I twisted in my chair and craned my neck to look up at the speaker, startled.

  “Trinity,” Miriam said, “meet Shane Copas. He’s the hunter I told you about.”

  I stood and automatically held out my hand, giving Miriam’s former brother-in-law a nod hello as I looked him over. That would have been impolite except he was doing the same to me.

  His grip was hard and firm, not the gentle squeeze most men were inclined to give me, and he didn’t hold my hand a second longer than necessary.

  He wore a thin black jacket, a black shirt, and a pair of faded khakis. His boots were dark brown and very scuffed, and he wore a holstered gun at his side.

  His hair was dark and very short, and his eyes were beautiful—light blue, ringed with a darker blue, and shot through with bits of silver—but a person had only to look into those pretty eyes to know Shane Copas was a man who used his fists a lot…and liked it.

  Scars, mostly small and old, decorated his face. One at the edge of his right eye, like a tiny, silver crescent, a small, almost perfectly round one over his temple, a thin slashing line of scars over his left cheekbone, and a jagged chunk of scar on his chin.

  He had a healing cut over the bridge of his nose, a cut dissecting his left eyebrow, and a fading bruise covering his right cheekbone. The knuckles of his right hand were battered, broken, and mottled.

  “I guess I should see the other guy?” I joked.

  Shane’s cold stare went right through me. “She’s not a hunter,” he told Miriam. “She’s a liability. Find someone else to protect her.”

  Shocked by his rudeness, I took a quick step back. What the hell was his problem? He didn’t know me.

  “Shane didn’t want to help us out.” Miriam kept her voice light, but it held a note of eagerness, as though she were spoiling for a fight. She settled back into her chair. “I had to twist his muscled arm to get him to agree to meet you.”

  I curled my lip and grabbed onto my anger. “I don’t need his help or his protection. I have my sword, and I have the ability to give the true death.” I turned away, dismissing him. “This man can go home. Or to hell,” I added, snarkily, “for all I care.”

  She laughed. “He’s not going anywhere.”

  Shane turned and strode away without another word.

  “Hey,” Miriam called. “Where are you going? Shane!”

  But her former brother-in-law was not her golem, and he didn’t pause. We watched him until he disappeared through the kitchen doorway, and then I turned on Miriam. “You shouldn’t have brought that banged-up thug here.”

  “I knew you two wouldn’t get on, but that’s not important. The important thing is that he doesn’t let you die, and you…” She shrugged. “Maybe you don’t let him die, either.”

  I left her there with the children and the sun and stomped back into the house. Copas was nowhere in sight when I got there, and I figured I’d probably never see him again.

  I slipped my fingers into my jacket pocket and felt for Silverlight, breathing easier when I touched the warm sheath. I’d rested long enough. The urge to hunt was growing stronger, making me impatient and fidgety, and I needed to get out of the house and get some exercise.

  And kill.

  Maybe I was a little uneasy at the pleasure that thought gave me. Maybe I wasn’t. I wanted to kill the creatures who stole the very blood from unwilling bodies. There was nothing wrong with my need to end them. And if I were a hunter born, then wanting to kill vampires was coded into me—Amias’s attack had just awakened it.


  “Tonight,” I whispered, squeezing the sword as I ran up the stairs to my borrowed bedroom.

  That night I would take my sword, and I would do what I needed to do. What I craved. I would kill vampires.

  I would hunt.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “I’m not saddling myself with a virgin hunter.”

  “She needs help,” Angus said, his voice a low roar—he couldn’t seem to help but roar, no matter the volume of his voice—“and she’s our responsibility.”

  I pressed myself against the wall outside Angus’s study, clenching my fists as they discussed me like I was a helpless burden they had no choice but to bear.

  “She’s not my responsibility,” Copas said.

  “The vampires are going to come after her,” Angus said. “And there’s something else. A stranger attacked her with the Foam of Aphrodite. That’s bad news.”

  “Again,” Shane said. “Not my responsibility.”

  “She’s one of us,” Angus bellowed. “She’s one of you. Take some pride in what you are, man.”

  “Shane,” Miriam murmured, a little less combative, “you won’t have to protect her in the field. Amias Sato gave her a gift.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?” His voice went hard and cold, and I recoiled because there was death in that voice.

  “After he slaughtered her family, he became obsessed with her. Out of guilt, I’d imagine. It wasn’t really his fault he killed them, you know.”

  “It’s always their fault,” Copas growled. “You don’t give excuses to a vampire.”

  “Damn right,” I whispered.

  “He gave her Silverlight.” That was Clayton’s voice. He was okay then. I’d begun to wonder.

  The silence was thick and dark and heavy, and when Shane spoke, I had no idea what I heard in his voice. Disgust? Shock? Envy? Certainly disbelief.

  “No.” I heard a chair scrape across the floor as he stood. “That can’t be right.”

  “It accepted her,” Angus said. “She has the scars to prove it.”

  I pressed my fingers to my chest, ignoring the slight pain. The wound was nearly healed, and the scar was beginning to resemble a cross. Silverlight had carved a cross into my chest.

  “He wouldn’t give a vampire-killing weapon to a vampire-killing human.” There was a cold certainty in Shane’s voice.

  “But he did,” Miriam told him. “He’s claimed her. He’s part of her. So is the sword. And she said the master hopes she’ll kill the infected, who are going to end up killing them all. The virus is spreading more rapidly than ever.”

  “And he knows she can’t kill him,” Angus growled. “Not even with a magical sword. Much as we might want her to, it’s impossible. He’s her…”

  But not even he could say the word or admit the truth. Not aloud.

  Master.

  “He hopes she won’t kill innocent vampires,” Miriam said.

  “There are no innocent vampires,” Shane told her.

  Another point I agreed with.

  “Why don’t you admit the real reason you don’t want to partner with her?”

  That was Rhys Graver’s voice, and I stiffened in surprise. I hadn’t been aware he was in the room.

  Shane said nothing, but he must have looked at Rhys because Rhys continued after a slight pause. “You don’t care if she’s a baby hunter. You care that she’s got some nasty vampire blood running through her.”

  “You don’t have to like her to work with her,” Miriam said. “Help her. Stay with her as she learns and grows. Humans are dying, Shane. You can work with us to wipe out the carriers. You can work with her.”

  “Not when she’s one of them,” Shane Copas said. “She belongs to Amias Sato. Let him take care of her.”

  I shoved open the double doors and stepped into the room, shaking with anger. I strode to Shane Copas, praying I’d be able to control myself enough not to hit him. He’d surely kill me.

  “I am not,” I said, my voice as dark and hard as his had been, “one of them. I will kill them all.” And then, unable to resist, I slammed the palm of my hand against his chest. He barely moved. “You stay out of my way, asshole.”

  I turned to give them all a sneer of contempt. “You, with your secret meetings, discussing me like I’m a dumb kid to be handled and managed and coddled. Fuck all of you.”

  Angus walked toward me, his hand out. “Trin…”

  I glared at him. “Get away from me.”

  “You’re not ready to hunt on your own,” Miriam told me, calmly. “You’re going to need a partner.”

  My smile nearly cracked my face. “It won’t be this son of a bitch.” I jerked my thumb in the direction of Copas, who never said a word. Most likely he thought speaking directly to me or acknowledging my presence was beneath him.

  “Calm down, Trinity,” Angus said. “There’s no reason to get upset. We want to do what’s best for you.” He glanced at his watch. “I need to get back to work. It’s our busiest night and they’ll burn the place down without me there.” He squinted at me, then added, “You’ll come back to work soon. That’ll make you feel better.”

  Miriam nodded. “I have a job tonight as well. Trinity, would you like to come to the graveyard with Clayton and me? You can watch me work.”

  They continued treating me like I was a child or a wild thing to be handled delicately. No wonder Copas looked at me with such blistering condescension.

  I’d have to prove myself to all of them. And that would start tonight.

  I gave one last, disgusted look around the room and then walked toward the door. My flare of rage was lessening, and I let it go.

  “Where are you going?” Miriam called. “Wait, darling. Where are you going?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Hang on, Trin,” Angus ordered, but I ignored him as well.

  I left the doors open and jogged down the carpeted hallway, heading for the stairs that led up out of the basement. The basement was Angus’s domain, and the children and household staff were expressly forbidden from going down there. I didn’t know what lay behind the three other doors on the basement level, but the entire space was quiet and dim. I didn’t like it. It felt too…cold. Too alien.

  There was an exit door in the opposite direction of the stairs, but it was locked, and Angus hadn’t offered me a key.

  When I opened the door and stepped out into the main floor, it was like a different world. Angus’s kids and their friends yelled and played and scampered, adults scolded like angry birds, and bright colors splashed a cheerful calmness across the walls.

  It was Saturday, and apparently, every little kid within a fifty mile radius wanted to weekend with the Starks.

  I took a deep breath of fresh air when I left the stifling house, jogged to the trunk of my car, and lifted the lid. Amias had said I wouldn’t need any weapon but Silverlight, but I didn’t want to go out there without my silver, my holy water, or my vest. I didn’t know Silverlight enough, really, to trust her with my life. Not yet.

  I was calm, and I was confident. I’d killed the vampire behind the bar. Sure, he’d kicked my ass, but I’d killed him. I’d won. I was meant to be a hunter and that knowledge lay like an impenetrable wall around me.

  I was afraid, but that didn’t worry me. Of course I was afraid.

  But part of me knew with deep certainty, even if I wouldn’t admit it aloud, that I had my supernats, I had my Silverlight, and I had Amias—even if I didn’t want him. I wasn’t alone.

  I glanced around as I put on my vest, wondering if he crouched somewhere in the shadows, watching me.

  The vampires were everywhere.

  Despite my bravado, I began to shiver as I slammed shut the trunk. Maybe because I felt that Amias was near. Maybe just because I was scared. I knew what it was like to have a gang of infected vampires attacking me.

  And now I had something new to add to the mix—the man who’d attacked me with the foam. I really, really didn’t want that st
uff touching me again.

  I felt for Silverlight, holstered at my side, climbed into my car, then drove toward the city.

  I hadn’t been back to my apartment since the attack, but Angus had assured me they’d taken care of everything. My lease would have been up in a month. The few pieces of furniture and clothing I had were carted to a storage unit.

  They’d done it all, my supernatural friends. I hadn’t had to worry about a thing. Perhaps that was why they thought they had the right to manage me. To take care of me. I was letting them. I was taking advantage of them, wasn’t I? So I couldn’t very well bitch and moan when they treated me like a six-year-old.

  A cold, light rain began to fall as I drove into the city. The moon was a white crescent high above, but the stars were dimmed because of the many lights of the city.

  I had no specific destination in mind, so I drove to the center of Red Valley and parked in the lot of a 24-hour convenience store. The city was alive, bustling with frenetic activity and discordant sounds of impatient traffic, shrill sirens, and honking horns.

  I donned a cap, pulled the bill low, and left my car. What foot traffic there was ignored me as they hurried along, heads down, bundled against the brisk cold and steady rain. Once, a woman met my eyes, then dropped her gaze immediately and hurried by me, and I wondered what she saw. Did I look like a hunter? Did I look like someone on the prowl, searching for vampires to kill?

  Or did I look like just another lost soul in a dark city?

  As I walked, the excitement began to take the lead over the fear. The fog trails, with their muted colors and swirling mists, grew heavier and brighter the deeper I walked into the city. They wafted gently, almost lazily, beckoning me on.

  I’d never spotted the fog before the Thanksgiving Day Massacre, but afterward, I’d begun seeing the swirling mists everywhere. But only at night.

  I pulled Silverlight from its sheath as I walked by alleyways and shops and clubs and entered that part of the city that held empty lots, abandoned row homes, and grim tenements. In minutes, I’d picked up a trail of three human men.