“Cutting it a little close, don’t you think?” Colin asked from where he lay sprawled out on the couch watching SportsCenter.
Campbell did a quick survey of himself to make sure he wasn’t on fire. “Just took me longer to check on some things than I expected.”
Colin snorted. “And how was the lovely Miss DaCosta?”
Campbell didn’t answer. Instead he stalked to the other end of the large main living area, the rubber soles of his boots squeaking on the smoothly polished concrete floor. He rounded his desk and stared at the pile of paper work.
“You know, you’re welcome to help me out with all this anytime instead of being a couch potato.”
Colin spared him a raised-eyebrow glance. “Oh, no. I’ve done my time in that chair. You get paid the big bucks now.”
It was Campbell’s turn to snort. “Yeah, I think I’ll take my piles of cash and retire to the Caribbean.”
“Yeah, we’d go up like Roman candles in the Caribbean sun. It’d be the coolest Fourth of July ever!”
Campbell snorted again, then rifled through the previous night’s reports from all the New York V Force teams, looking to see if anything out of the ordinary caught his eye. “I’m sure there are still bikini-clad women on the beaches at night.”
Colin nodded. “You make an excellent point. I quit.”
Campbell laughed. “You’d miss us.”
“If there are babes in bikinis involved, I wouldn’t even remember who you all are.” Colin shifted to a sitting position on the end of the couch. “What’s the retirement age for a vampire, anyway?”
“Thirty years shy of forever.”
Campbell continued shuffling papers, also checking out reports from the New Jersey and Connecticut teams so he kept well informed about what was going on in the tri-state area.
And so he wouldn’t think about how beautiful Olivia looked in that window, like a golden-haired princess in a tower, as unobtainable as a walk on a sunny beach. He still couldn’t believe she’d even spoken to him after everything he’d put her through, let alone talked to him until nearly dawn.
“I don’t need to tell you she’s a bad idea,” Colin said.
Campbell looked across the room, realizing he’d stopped reading reports at some point and drifted into daydreaming about Olivia’s lips and how gorgeous she’d be with all that golden hair falling loose across her shoulders.
“You’re right. You don’t.” Colin didn’t know half of the reason why, and Campbell wasn’t about to share that dark part of his past.
Colin shook his head then returned his attention to the ESPN announcers as they commented on the latest Knicks game with the Magic. “Oh, nasty!” he said when they showed a replay of a particularly awesome dunk by the Knicks’ newest player, Deangelo Bruce. “Damn, did you see that? Pretty good for a human.”
The professional sports world was just now getting back on its wobbly feet after the dying from the Bokor virus had ended, though all of its games had to be played early in the day on the weekends, when people could actually attend. It made for fewer games and a shorter season, but at least it was another step toward humanity returning to normal. A new normal necessitated by the fact that vampires roamed the night.
Campbell was usually right there watching with Colin, making outrageous bets, but tonight all he could think about was Olivia. He’d always loved that name, and it suited her. When he’d seen her again after feeding, this time without the red haze of bloodlust half blinding him, the sight of her had stunned him. He’d thought she was beautiful, but he hadn’t been prepared for just how gorgeous she was.
Wide blue eyes. Wavy blond hair that seemed infused with the sun he’d never see again. A body that was made to be held by a man’s hands, that could give his body endless pleasure. And though he might no longer have a heartbeat, some things hadn’t changed from when he did. His hands itched with the desire to explore all those luscious curves and that soft flesh. Her scent she’d left behind on his jacket revealed she smelled like flowers, a deliciously feminine scent. His mouth watered with the need to taste her—not her blood but her skin.
Campbell shook his head and sank into his chair to hide what fantasies of her were doing to his body. He picked up the reports from the Bronx and Queens to give them a closer look. The typical harassment crap perpetrated by pond-scum vamps, real pain-in-the-ass stuff. One vamp dispatched to the great nothingness beyond for killing a woman forced outside because her home was on fire. An all-vamp melee outside one of the Bronx blood banks when the blood supply started running low.
The Caribbean was looking good right about now.
Colin clicked off the TV and sauntered over. “Team 2 found a vamp close to turning a homeless guy. They gave him a good beating to get the message across. Too bad we couldn’t stake the bastard, but the guy he was feeding on will recover.”
“Good. Last thing we need is another hungry vampire roaming the city.” Not for the first time, Campbell wished he could roll back time. And if he couldn’t recapture his human life, he’d at least like to go back to before the pandemic, to when there had been enough humans and enough blood to go around. To when vampires had just been fiction to most of the world.
Travis strode into the living area from his own room, one of several personal living spaces located along the sides of the main living-and-work area. “I might have something worse than one more vamp looking for a vein.”
“I’m afraid to ask,” Campbell said as he leaned back in his leather chair and propped his booted feet on the corner of the desk. He rubbed his temples, wishing he still had the luxury of sinking into the blessed oblivion of sleep.
“I’ve been tracking some online chatter, and it’s looking as if the black market has some new recruits.”
“That’s nothing new,” Colin said.
“It is when those recruits are human.”
Colin swore. Campbell agreed with every air-scorching word.
“Are you sure?” Campbell asked.
“Almost certain. I hacked into a couple of phone calls that were suspicious. And I talked to Mickey over in Jersey, and he’s been hearing rumblings of the same thing.”
Colin cursed again. “So the night isn’t enough for them anymore? They have to stake their claim on the daylight, too. Greedy bastards.”
Campbell sat in silence. When he’d attacked Olivia, he’d thought that would be the worst moment of his week. He’d been wrong. This was so much worse. Huge.
They all looked at each other, the awful truth of what this meant sinking in and landing with a cold, awful thud.
Even the daylight wouldn’t be safe for humans anymore.
Campbell’s gut squeezed.
Olivia wasn’t safe.
Travis’s phone beeped with a text. After reading it, he slipped into his desk chair and started typing on his computer keyboard. A feeling of unexplained dread came over Campbell.
Travis turned in his chair and tapped the computer screen. “It just got even worse.”
“How can it be worse than humans working for Soulless vamps?” Colin asked.
“When they have a kidnap list.” Travis met Campbell’s gaze. “And Olivia DaCosta’s on it.”
* * *
After Campbell left at dawn, Olivia continued staring out the window, still unable to process everything he’d told her. It had to be a trick, some ploy that would lead to her demise. Part of her mind kept asking what had gotten into her, why she’d spent the wee hours talking to a vampire. And not just any vampire, but the one who’d come within a moment of killing her. Dead, gone, forever.