Page 59 of Taste of Blood

“No. What is it?”

“An unsanctioned vamp.”

“Unsanctioned? What does that mean exactly?”

I step in, explaining to Elaine that it’s when a vampire is made without the approval of the Clan.

“Jesus, so you guys have your own government to deal with? Kind of takes all the fun out of being an immortal creature of the night, doesn’t it?”

“We have rules for a reason,” Cord says. “To keep from harming humans.”

“Okay, I guess that makes sense. So these unsanctioned vamps, they don’t follow the rules?”

“No,” Cord replies. “They often kill indiscriminately without any regard for the fact that they could be exposing all of us. When that happens, people like me are responsible for hunting them down.”

“So you’re like a bounty hunter?”

He shrugs. “Among other things.”

“And this guy, the Python?”

“He’s the leader of a gang of Outliers who are kidnapping people and either turning them against their will or using them as blood bags.”

“Shit. Okay, so important that you find him, got it.”

“So what do you have?”

She pulls up the map with the coordinates of the place we found. “I got this through a chat room. I’m still crawling the web, looking for any other references to him.”

Cord leans closer to study the screen. “I know that area. I’m guessing those buildings around it are warehouses.”

“I can pull up the street view,” Elaine says. “Gotta love Google Maps.”

We watch as the scene unfolds before us. She clicks on the arrows to move us around the map.

“Definitely warehouses,” Cord says. “Nothing too tall so we can put people on the roof with a crossbow.”

“A crossbow?” Elaine asks. “You don’t use guns?”

“Guns will only piss a vamp off. Plus they’re loud and easy to trace. The Clan is all about stealth.”

“You don’t think anyone would get suspicious of a guy with a crossbow bolt sticking out of him?”

“We don’t leave it there. We’ll load a bolt with sedative to knock a vamp out.”

“You guys are way cooler than I thought,” she muses. I have a feeling Cord just created a fan.

He pulls out his phone and enters the address in his GPS. “This is great. We’ve been searching for days and have come up with nothing.”

“Give me your number and I’ll call you if I find anything else.” She looks at me. “If that’s all right?”

I’m not crazy about her going around me to communicate with Cord, mainly because it leaves me with less of an excuse to talk to him, but I know how important any information could be to his safety right now.

“As long as you keep me informed,” I reply.

“Of course.”

“What are you going to do now?” I ask Cord.