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“Something’s happening.”

Already looking over, the light in Daxon’s room was out and the window had been shattered. Phillip recovered his sword from the backseat, and we both hurried out of the car with our unnatural speed. But I was barely out the door when Daxon hit the pavement, legs and arms bent at weird angles and lifeless eyes staring up at a starless sky.

Shit.

I cursed under my breath and rushed to my classmate’s side. Kneeling, I checked for a pulse even when I knew by the way his neck was bent, he was gone.

Blood swelled like a great puddle beneath him and I moved to avoid its reach, heart in my throat. While I checked on Daxon, Phillip disappeared into the house before he was back outside, eyes on me. I already understood from his expression what he’d found inside the home was beyond tragic.

A painful pang hit my chest.

Fighting myself, I kept my voice even. “Is it gone?”

Phillip’s lips thinned. “I can track it, but the entire family was annihilated. We’ll need to report it to the Organization.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d seen someone dead, and it wouldn’t be the last. People were often killed before I arrived on a mission. Lives stolen before I could even fight to protect them. This time, I was distracted. I silently chided myself for not knowing—for not going inside before it happened.

Careless mistakes as a Hunter in training were unfortunately par for the course. It was the lifeblood of being a Hunter to learn from where you went wrong. Still, it never got easier. Not when it was someone I knew. Not when a life was snuffed out before it really even started.

Teeth gritting, I stood and nodded to show I understood. “We’ll track it first.”

Following the other Hunter, we wove through the undergrowth behind the house and tracked the vampire who’d escaped. The smell of fresh blood guided our path—Daxon and his family’s blood.

But I couldn’t be bogged down by emotions when I had a job to do. If we lost the vampire, we’d be at square one again.

Daxon’s death won’t be in vain.

Phillip headed deeper into the outskirts of town, returning to a place that housed a lot of memories. The same decrepit building where Nigel saved me. The same place where he proclaimed his love for me. The night my life changed forever. A night I’d never forget.

When I paused, Phillip noticed. “What’s up?”

I looked down at the bush where I’d previously crouched and Nigel found me. “Nothing.”

Felt like ages ago when I first discovered Nigel was a werewolf, but it was only five months ago.

The Austrian’s eyes followed my line of sight, clearly confused. “Something weird about that bush?”

Tight feeling in my throat, I shook my head. “Nah. It’s a good bush.”

Phillip looked very close to checking me for a fever. “We don’t have time to dawdle. This one is already aware we’re tailing it.”

“Yeah,” I said, shaking away the memories. “I’m good.”

*

CROUCHED NEXT TO PHILLIP, we stared at a cabin hidden away hundreds of kilometers outside of town. We’d followed the trail all the way to this place, and dawn was fast approaching. The vampire would be desperate, and we’d have to be ready. With daylight only an hour or two away, it was likely to fight.

“It’ll make its move soon if it’s smart,” Phillip said, scanning the ground ahead of us. “This entire place is rigged with traps. It’ll take time to disarm them, but not long enough to get the vampire through daylight. We have the advantage.”

No matter how old or powerful, vampires had one universal weakness.

Daylight.

They kept their places of sleep well hidden and heavily guarded; sometimes with hundreds of fail-safes to avoid being hunted during the day. Most moved their resting place on a daily basis, and a vampire would never rest in the same place twice if they were alone.

So, we’d cornered it.

There wasn’t anywhere it could run with the two of us hot on its heels. It’d be forced to fight before daylight or risk us killing it while it slept. But we wouldn’t. The objective was to capture and question, not kill. We had to play it smart. We’d get one shot at this, and my heart thundered when I thought through the countless ways it could go wrong.