Selena ran through the forest, oblivious to the wind and rain because she knew she was going to die. She was sure of it.

If not at the hands of the vampire, then because her lungs were going to burst.

It had been some time after midnight, and she and Brenna were playing their zillionth hand of gin rummy, when they saw headlights coming up the driveway. Her first thought had been that someone was coming to burglarize the house. After all, no one knew Mateo was here, and his car was parked in the garage, so any visitor would have assumed the house was empty. But then she’d recognized the vehicle. A dark blue pickup truck.

It was her father.

Heart racing, she ran outside, Brenna at her heels. Why had her father come all this way at this time of night in this storm? What had happened?

Windshield wipers on full blast, the truck stopped in front of the garage behind where Mateo’s car was parked inside. She started to dash off the porch, but Brenna grabbed her arm. “Hold on.”

“Why?” Selena asked incredulously. “That’s my dad.”

“Something’s not right.”

“I know that,” she snapped, impatience tugging at her natural tendency to be polite with a new friend. “He would never have come all this way if it wasn’t urgent.”

The driver’s door opened, and her father stepped out.

“Dad? Are you okay? What’s wrong?” The wind swept away her words.

He lifted his hand in greeting as the passenger door opened and his girlfriend Marcella got out.

Brenna’s grip tightened around Selena’s forearm, and she took a half step in front of her, partially blocking her view of the truck. “Go into the house and call Mateo,” Brenna said, her voice barely above a whisper.

The tiny hairs on the back of Selena’s neck prickled. “But I don’t have any cellular coverage here.”

“Then you need to get yourself somewhere with coverage.”

“What’s wrong?” she asked, even though she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer.

And then she noticed something odd about Brenna. Her lips looked…different. Fuller. There was a flash of white that hadn’t been there before. Fangs.

A deafening roar sounded in Selena’s ears and she took a step backward. “Brenna?”

“I’m going to do what I can to stall her,” Brenna said, “but you need to go. Now.”

Selena choked. All the questions she had about what was going on paled in comparison to the most important one. “What about my dad?”

“Your father is not the target. You are. His female companion is a Darkblood.”

With Mateo’s car blocked, she’d done the only thing she could do. She’d run.

Arms and legs like pistons, she was oblivious to the blackberry bushes and stinging nettles brushing her exposed skin. With just one bar of service, she had no idea if Mateo had received the text she’d just sent.

She prayed he did, because she didn’t know how much longer she could outrun a vampire.

* * *

“Damn it, Finn. What’s wrong?” Mateo adjusted his headset and stared out the rain-streaked windshield of the helicopter, wishing he had the supernatural ability to teleport like a few members of his race did.

“We can’t get off the ground in this wind,” Finn said, flipping a few switches on the instrument panel. “It’s too strong. We’re going to have to wait for it to—”

Like hell they were. Selena was in danger and needed him.

He took a deep breath, called forth an inner strength that he hadn’t known existed until Selena’s fall, and willed the aircraft to lift. Even with his eyes pinched shut, he could tell they were no longer on the ground.

“Holy shit. We’re airborne,” Finn exclaimed from the pilot’s seat. “Let’s just hope we stay that way.”

The land below them was dark as they flew over the tops of the trees. Although Mateo had no idea what was waiting for him back at Broadmoor, he sure as hell had an inkling, and the thought made his stomach turn.

After what seemed like a lifetime, Finn was centering the aircraft above the clearing near Broadmoor. The moment it touched down, Mateo leaped from the helicopter and shadow-moved through the forest.

He burst into the house to find Brenna in the kitchen, eyes closed and chained to the fireplace. Blood dripped from a fresh wound in her arm, and an older man lay unconscious at her feet. It was Selena’s father. A fresh round of panic coursed through him as he scanned the room.

“Where’s Selena?”

Brenna opened her eyes, a pained expression on her face. “Move him...away from me,” she said haltingly. “I can’t think.”

Wounded vampires had one thing on their minds. Blood. Selena’s father wasn’t a sweetblood, but that didn’t matter. A hurt vampire was a hungry vampire.

Quickly pulling the man out of her reach, he repeated his question.

“I...don’t know,” Brenna said. “I told her...to run.”

And that’s when he smelled it. Darkbloods.

His worst fears had come true.

“How many are there?” They usually traveled in pairs.

“Just...one. A female.” Brenna grimaced. “I tried to stop her…and I held her off for a while, but then…this happened. I’m sorry, Mateo.”

His heart thumped a hammer-like staccato in his ears as he sprinted outside and tried to pick up Selena’s scent. Which way had she run, goddamnit? With the wind blowing as hard as it was and the rain washing everything away, all he smelled was sea air and the earthy, clean fragrance of the forest.

At least the Darkblood was at the same disadvantage. His only hope was that the female hadn’t found Selena yet.