A R T H U R S L A D E
2
ADVANCE READING COPY
feet four, so he had a good eight inches on me, and he boasted
enormous arms. For a forty-five-year-old, he was carrying
very little flab. Still, easy pickings. As long as I did everything
right, that is.
Slow and steady
. Mom had drilled that command into
me ad infinitum.
Your prey must never suspect your presence.
Become the wind
.
She actually would say that. Every time. Then she’d giggle
and touch the tip of her petite nose to show she was joking.
I’d inherited that same nose, but not the nose-tapping habit.
She was an odd bird. And I loved her to bits.
In most vampire movies, the prey suffer long minutes of
terror. They scream. They beg. They die. Not so in the real
world—my world, that is. It’s not efficient hunting. The best
kills are silent and over before the food knows it’s dead, before
their fight-or-flight response kicks in. An overtaxed heart
makes the blood spurt with too much force. I’d wrecked a
perfectly good white dress that way a few months back.
Something whirred in the air far above me, but I couldn’t
see exactly what might be making that sound and was too
hungry to care.
My gray eyes provided handy night vision. Rex was a red
outline in the alley. Soon he’d be outlined in chalk, and some
poor cop would be trying to write up his case. Those suckers
didn’t get paid enough.
Suckers. Ha!
Choose your food carefully,
Mom had taught me. My moral
imperative was not to kill innocents. This was the hunting
