Page 73 of Bloodhunter

When I realized that, when I accepted it, something easedinside me.

I wasn’t a monster, even if I had to play one sometimes.

The captain was waiting. He had some men take the silveredvampire to a cell in the basement, one in which the sunlight couldn’tpenetrate, and then Clayton and I followed him to his office.

“He’ll tell you whatever you want to know,” I said.

“Good. Good. What did he tell you?”

“The vampires are feeding from the bodies. They’re justwaiting for the incubus to finish, then they’re taking the blood. Their tracks wereall over her.”

He shuddered, his lip curling. “The vampires are drinkingfrom corpses.”

“Yes. They’re not killing these women, but they’re…”

“Eating the dead,” he finished, when I trailed off.

“Yeah.” That was somehow much worse than sipping from aliving being.

“I have a press conference in twenty minutes,” he said. “I’llput the word out.”

I sighed. Even though the vampires weren’t killing thewomen, they were drinking their blood. They were drinking the blood of humancorpses.

That story was going to make things just a little rougherfor the vampires.

Maybe it would be enough to keep the supernaturals safe.

I didn’t break down until Clayton and I were once againensconced inside my battered car. Clayton let me cry—he didn’t touch me oroffer meaningless words of comfort. He was just there, patient, quiet, nonjudgmental.

Finally, I stared out the windshield, drained. “I’m a horrible,vicious person.”

“You’re not vicious. You’re fierce. There’s a difference.”

“What difference?”

“The first makes you a brute. The second makes you awarrior.”

Ah, the power of those words.

I straightened my shoulders and started the car.

“Going home?” he asked.

“No. I have to track Gray. Also, we need to find the demonbefore he finds us. Someone has to know where he’s hiding. And we need to finda priest or someone to help us get rid of him when we do find him.”

He took his cell phone from his pocket. “I might know a man.”

And as he murmured into his phone, making plans to meet withthe aforementioned man, I drove us to the country.

Gordon Gray was waiting, and I had a feeling he wasn’t theonly one.

Chapter Twenty-Six

I stood once again on Raeven’s Road, my nose to the wind,concentrating on picking up the thread of Gray’s scent. It danced teasinglyright in front of me, but just as I grabbed for it, we got company.

A truck pulled in behind my car.

Shane Copas’s truck.