Page 1 of Little Wing (Shades of Fairhaven #1)

I waited until the sounds of footsteps against run-down stairs no longer deafened me.

When they sounded distant, I inhaled sharply and tried to steady my trembling hands.

Crawling to the window, I peered over the decaying frame for any sign of Luca, my once beloved brother.

There—there he was with his short black hair already windblown and his clothes that had seen better days.

I watched him walk away from the condemned building we were to call home, where he left me covered in my blood.

If he was going to stick to his routine of leaving after feeding from me, then I only had a few hours to get as far away from him as I could, until the only indicator of my connection to him would be the numbing pain in my chest, my tether to him.

The eternal reminder that he was my creator, and I was nothing more than his spawn.

I ripped a piece of loose fabric from a shirt thrown onto the unmade bed and quickly wrapped it around my wrist, to prevent my ink-colored blood from dripping onto the creaky wood floors.

Once secured, I dropped to my knees and pushed back a rug that concealed a loose floorboard. With a quick, hard yank, it lifted .

“Shit!” I hissed under my breath as another fingernail ripped unevenly, despite already being trimmed to the skin.

I practiced this entire maneuver for weeks without believing I'd ever have the opportunity to use it.

Suddenly, nerves erupted as I could almost taste my freedom.

With no time to nurse my wounds, I reached down to pull out a tattered backpack that I found in a dumpster in the alley behind our building.

I quickly unzipped it and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper with information about vampire-safe housing on the other side of the country that I kept as hope—hope that I would one day have the chance to run.

I stuck the paper in my jacket pocket and rushed to the garbage bag full of clothes Luca had scavenged for me over the years.

Hurriedly, I pulled out pants, dresses, and long-sleeve shirts that covered me modestly before stuffing them sloppily into my backpack.

Though I had little time, I ran to the broken-down table where I kept my makeup: a few vials of mismatched foundation and other necessities that I accumulated over the years.

Through unsteady breaths, I knew this was it.

I had to go.

Without looking back, I zipped up my jacket, whipped my backpack onto my back, and ran.

The sun in downtown Charlotte had set. Shadows cascaded over buildings, allowing me to move swiftly without drawing attention to myself.

With my hood pulled over my head, I rushed down empty streets further away from “home”; if that shithole could even qualify as one.

After all these years, I had lost track of how many run-down places we hid in.

Leaving terrified me, but had I stayed, I didn’t know if I could take another moment being on the receiving end of my brother’s wrath.

Whatever would come next, it would have to be better.

Pulled towards hope, I reached into my bag and pulled out the digital camera I had claimed as my own.

On it was a single recording of a TV screen from nearly seventy years ago.

It was all I had that helped me endure. I believed that if I could hold on a little while longer, then I could finally be free.

The grainy recording illuminated my face, and despite the image being distorted and dated, I memorized every sound, every word.

The days of darkness are over! Vampires emerge from the shadows to rejoin civilization! Rejoice as the treaties are real! A new dawn has come; one that won’t burn!

The long-debated treaty allowing humans and vampires to coexist was signed, and for years, many believed it to be a trap that would make it easier for hunters to pick us off like vermin.

But nearly a century into this “new dawn” and not a single vampire was hunted the way we had been for centuries.

This treaty was real. We had the chance to walk among humans and have opportunities to live in their world once again.

Vampires could hold jobs, own land, and homes, and even have access to synthetic blood to keep bloodlust in check.

It all sounded surreal, but as more vampires came out to rejoin society, I wanted to be included.

I wanted this second chance after my first life was ripped from me, cruelly, at the hands of my brother.

The treaty's benefits were slow to spread as the world needed to figure out how it would all work. Once the United States embraced vampires into its population, the rest of the world was quick to follow.

As the announcement ended on my camera, I stuck it back in my pocket and walked down the streets that would eventually lead me to the train station.

It took me months to learn the schedules, but I knew one of the trains at the station would take me to the other side of the country, from North Carolina to the town illustrated on the crumbled piece of paper I held onto. To Fairhaven in Washington.

If there was a place anywhere on the map that would allow me to push my past to the darkest corners, then that would have to be it. Fairhaven would be my second chance to live a life free of Luca’s clutches—free of the crimes that plagued the Everett family name.