Page 26 of Peacemaker

“Impossible, I know.” I walked to my car, a hunter on either side of me. “Only it’s not.”

I climbed in and sat in the driver’s seat, but made no move to start the engine. Shane stood at my open door, watching me.

“Why are they doing that?” I asked. “How are they doing that?”

“Because they’re different,” Clayton said, getting into the front passenger seat. “We all feel it. Maybe the infection changed them somehow.”

“It’s a mindfuck.” Shane slid his fingers to the back of my neck and squeezed gently. “But we’ll figure it out.”

Nothing was the same. The vampires were healthy, they were eating humans once again, and the humans were turning in hours.

Finally, I started the car.

Shane peered past me at Clayton. “Watch her back.”

Clayton nodded. “Always.”

“You’re staying here?” I didn’t want to leave Shane alone. My fear for him hadn’t lessened. My worry hadn’t gone away. And I wanted him by my side.

“I want to take a drive through the city, make sure everything is quiet. Let me know when you’ve left the hospital.”

“Okay,” I said, but I was no less reluctant.

“I’ll let the others know what’s going on.”

I only nodded.

If the vampires kept attacking, they might turn half the city before the night was over. When the sun came, the humans would have a reprieve. But the night would always return.

No one had really appreciated how well the vampires had behaved before now.

Shane leaned into the open window and brushed my lips with his. “Be safe, baby hunter.”

I had to force myself away from him. “You be safe, Shane Copas.” Please. Please be safe.

And that was all I could say. I didn’t want to be a clinging, paranoid girlfriend. He’d be careful. He hadn’t made it this far without being careful.

But as I watched him grow smaller in my rearview, the knots in my stomach got just a little tighter.

“How are the other cities faring?” I asked Clayton. “It can’t just be us, right?”

“I can find out.” His face was somehow soft and hard at the same time and held all the strength and power and life he’d been denied during Miriam’s reign.

Sometimes something came out in his voice, or his eyes, or his face…something he forgot to hide, maybe. It made ice slide down my spine and turned my limbs to jelly. It caused my heart to stutter and my brain, for a brief second, to freeze.

I was pretty sure he wasn’t aware at all that his darkness was peeking out. And I was quietly thankful that Clayton Wilder was not my enemy.

He pulled his cell phone from his pocket.

“Who are you calling?” I asked.

“Jade Noel.”

Rhys had mentioned that Jade Noel was the supernatural community’s PI. Or cop. Or…something.

I’d never met her. I’d never even talked to her. She was as much a mystery to me as the vampires’ sudden ability to turn humans with a bite.

Clayton explained to her about the turning humans, and I heard her voice coming from the phone like a dozen angry, buzzing bees.