Sinaloa, Mexico . . . haunting deserts, hot nights, and
vampires, who’ve been there for hundreds of years, watching from the shadows,
playing their games, manipulating humans, and surviving at any cost.
Vincent Kuxim, powerful and charismatic, was made vampire by
an ambitious leader looking for soldiers to pave his way to the rule of all
Mexico. But more than a century later, Vincent’s Sire is looking over his
shoulder as Vincent closes in for the kill, ready to claim the title Lord of
Mexico for himself.
Lana Arnold is a bounty hunter, smart, beautiful, and
determined to chart her own future. So when the most powerful vampire lord in
all of North America enlists her help in tracking down a very old and elusive
bloodsucker, Lana sees nothing but opportunity. There’s only one catch. The
client wants her to take Vincent—a vampire she neither knows nor trusts—along
on her hunt. Then again, maybe it’s herself she doesn’t trust, because Vincent
Kuxim is sex walking in a pair of tight black jeans.
Thrown together by circumstance, Vincent and Lana soon find
themselves battling an evil they didn’t know existed in a fight that makes
Vincent all the more determined to destroy his Sire, seize Mexico for himself .
. . and keep Lana by his side forever.
Excerpt
Tucson, Arizona
Lana Arnold
spun the dial on her home safe and reached inside. She was heading out on a new
job and needed a backup weapon and cash. Her next job would take her to Mexico
and cash was king down there. And the gun was simple common sense.
She had her usual Sig, and of course, she was
never without a few knives hidden about her person, but more fire power was
always better. That same principle meant she should be taking one of her bounty
hunter dad’s guys along for the ride, but this was her job, no one else’s. She
was a bounty hunter, too, and the contract hadn’t come to her dad’s agency, but
to her personally. Besides, this was the kind of assignment she hoped to do
more of. It was a job for a private investigator, not a bounty hunter. Not that
she didn’t enjoy following in her dad’s footsteps; she just didn’t see herself
chasing criminals for the rest of her life. So when the request had come in
from the attorneys representing Cynthia Leighton and Raphael, she’d jumped on
it.
At first glance, it seemed to be a simple missing person’s
case. But she suspected there was nothing simple about it. First of all,
Raphael happened to be a vampire—a very powerful vampire if rumors were
true—and he wanted a message delivered to some old guy named Xuan Ignacio who’d
been hiding in Mexico forever. Second was the money. The fee they were offering
was significant and would put a nice bump in the fund she’d set up toward
opening her own investigations firm someday. Apart from a desire not to be
chasing skips at forty, she wanted to forge her own path, to be someone other
than Sean Arnold’s daughter.
She also figured the job must be important to Raphael, and
if she did well, maybe they’d send more business her way. Of course, it was
entirely possible that the high fee was only intended to compensate for the
danger she might be walking into. But Lana trusted that Leighton would have
warned her about any specific threats up front, so it probably wasn’t an issue.
Apart from
the money, though, there was a twist to the case that pretty much eliminated
the idea that this was a simple job. And that was the letter from Raphael to a
vampire named Vincent Kuxim, asking him to assist Lana in locating this Xuan
Ignacio. Lana had Googled Kuxim, hoping to find out why Raphael would want him
involved, but she’d come up with nothing. All she knew was what Leighton’s
attorneys had told her over the phone prior to sending the documents. They
assured her that while Raphael’s note to Kuxim might appear to be a request, it
was phrased in a way that all but guaranteed Kuxim would agree to help her.
Lana wrote this off to vampire politics, since the request seemed perfectly
ordinary to her, and no one seemed inclined to educate her any further on the
subject. The lawyer had made it very clear, however, that Raphael wanted
Vincent Kuxim with her when she found her quarry.
Lana wasn’t
sure how she felt about that. She supposed that ultimately, it would all depend
on who Vincent Kuxim was. The only details the attorneys offered were that he
was a vampire—no surprise there—and that he controlled the city of Hermosillo
in Mexico. What no one had come out and told her—but what she’d happily bet
money on—was that Xuan Ignacio was a vampire, too. Supposedly, he’d been hiding
out in Mexico a long time. Lana was guessing “a long time” meant centuries
rather than decades.
She tucked
her backup weapon—a 9mm Glock—into her backpack and put the cash in an outside
zippered pocket. On a whim, she grabbed a couple of flashbang grenades from the
box in her safe, then slammed the safe door, and spun the dial to secure it.
She stood and got ready to leave, activating the alarm on her security system,
then making sure the door was locked behind her. Within minutes, she was on her
way to Hermosillo, Mexico.
She only
hoped Vincent Kuxim was in town when she arrived. And that he was inclined to
do Raphael a favor.
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About the Author:
D. B. Reynolds is the RT Award-Winning author of the popular
Vampires in America series of Paranormal Romance/Urban Fantasy and an
Emmy-nominated television sound editor. She lives with her husband of many
years in a flammable canyon near the Malibu coast, and when she’s not writing
her own books, she can usually be found reading someone else’s.
Visit her BLOG
for details on all of her books, for free stories and more.
D.B. Reynolds Giveaway
1st Prize a copy of VINCENT e or print (signed)
winner's choice,
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winner's choice,
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