The foot came at my face almost faster than I could see, and way faster than I could do anything about. I took the shot straight to my jaw, and if I hadn't seen it coming at the last minute, relaxing my neck to roll with the impact, I probably would have been chewing out of the other side of my face for a while. Except for the fact that I'm on a liquid diet. Forever. But I took the kick to the mouth and was just fast enough to spin away from the uppercut that followed. I delivered a punch of my own to my opponent's ribs and had the satisfaction of hearing a "whoof" of exhalation that let me know my shot hit home even through the body armor.

I grabbed an exposed arm and spun my attacker into a hammerlock, but didn't spread my feet far enough apart. I ended up tossed head over heels as the slippery black-clad figure put some kind of judo hex move on me that left me splayed flat on my back like a retarded box turtle. I lay there helpless as the tip of a wooden stake flashed down at my chest, stopping a hair before it pierced the skin.

"Uncle." I gasped, and sat up slowly, avoiding the oversized toothpick that was a lot closer than I ever figured a mortal would be able to get without my permission.

"You see, Jimmy. It doesn't matter the physical advantages an opponent has, if you're more mentally together and focused, you're unbeatable. All the super-speed and strength in the world is useless against a determined, well-prepared opponent. If this had been a real fight, you'd have been a little pile of dust and fangs in the middle of the living room floor." My opponent, the always-fetching Sabrina Law, helped me up, wincing a little from the punch I'd landed on her ribs.

"As long as the opponent was wearing body armor. If you were in street clothes, I'd have broken a couple of ribs with that punch." I limped over to the couch and collapsed onto it with a huge sigh, propping my feet up on the coffee table.

Sabrina took the armchair across from me and starting getting out of her SWAT gear. I thought she looked pretty good in black Kevlar, but I've been known to have a
Call of Duty
fetish.

"True enough," she replied, kicking off her combat boots and heading towards the fridge. "But any well-prepared opponent is more than likely going to have some type of body armor. You got anything for me to drink in here?"

"Yeah, good point. If not body armor, then it'll be some kind of magical shielding or super-duper force field or something else I can't punch through. Oh, yeah, there's beer in the door. And grab me a bag from the crisper?" She brought two bottles of Miller Lite back into the den and tossed me a bag of blood from the fridge to go with my beer. We both took a long drink, and let out a sigh of pure contentment as our drinks made the bruises feel a little less sharp. I looked over at Sabrina, who glanced back at me and we both cracked up at the synchronicity of it all.

We had almost gotten over our bout of the giggles when my partner, Greg Knightwood, clumped down the stairs into our apartment. "What's so damn funny?" He grumbled as he came over to sit next to me on the couch.

"You had to be there." I said, snorting a little blood out of one nostril. Gross, I know, but what can I say, it's an occupational hazard of being a vampire. "Who peed in your Cheerios?"

"It's this stupid case. I hate divorces." Oh yeah. Greg had lost the coin toss and had to do surveillance tonight. Divorces are the worst thing in the world for private investigators, which is how Greg and I pay the bills. It's a lot of waiting in cars in sleazy parking lots while somebody does something inappropriate with someone they're not supposed to be doing anything with while the person they're supposed to be doing things with waits anxiously at home for us to come back to them with proof of what they wished they didn't already know. I don't know how Greg managed. Divorce surveillance always made me want to bite somebody. I took a little pity on my partner and fetched him a beer.

"Tonight it was the tour of all the Mecklenburg County biker strip clubs with his floozy girlfriend while his wife and mother of five children stayed home and baked four dozen cookies for the PTA bake sale tomorrow." He killed his beer in one long pull and headed to the fridge for another. Sabrina and I both raised our hands for a refill, and he brought three back to the couch.

"I hope she takes him for everything he's worth, the pig." Sabrina muttered.

I nodded, but Greg said, "That's the worst part! She can't even take him for anything, because he's been on unemployment for more than a year! She's the one working overtime to keep their McMansion and helping the kids with their homework and dealing with the bill collectors while he runs around chasing skirts! If I were a weaker man I'd just bite him. If I thought she wouldn't be a suspect I'd make him disappear. He's probably worth more dead than alive with life insurance, anyway."

"Always an option, bro. I'm up for a snack if you are." I finished my beer and made to put my shoes back on.

"No. I don't do that anymore. No matter how bad he is, he doesn't deserve that." Greg was purely a bag-drinker. He didn't touch blood from the tap anymore. I admired his resolve but didn't necessarily share his strength of convictions. Sabrina was well aware of this and shot me a dirty look.

"Okey-dokey. You just say the word, partner, and he's a spot on my tie." I leaned back on the couch.

"You don't own a tie."

"Oh yeah. Good thing I don't have a respectable job, then." That's when Sabrina's cell phone rang and our night took a turn for the spectacularly crappy.

Chapter 2

Sabrina held up a finger to us in a vain hope that we'd be quiet, since it was obviously work on the line. In addition to being my friend and sparring partner, Sabrina is a detective for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, and they have a certain level of prejudice against all private investigators, not just the undead blood-sucking type. So her superiors tolerated her association with Greg and me, but just barely.

"Law." She answered, all no-nonsense cop voice. "Okay, what's your twenty?" Thanks to our enhanced senses, Greg and I could both hear the voice on the other end of the phone describing another attack in an alley downtown. Charlotte's a bit short on alleys, they don't fit into the city's master plans, but lately one or more enthusiastic bigots had been filling up every alley they could find with the beaten bodies of the city's young gay men. Sabrina got the address, and signed off with "I'll be there in fifteen minutes. Have the uniforms corral any witnesses they can until I get there."

She ran a hand through her hair in obvious frustration. These cases had been assigned to her partly out of penance for being friends with Greg and me. We'd been a little noisy in a case a few months ago, and Sabrina's bosses wanted her to keep her distance from us. To her credit as a person, she hadn't done so, but it meant that she got all the cases the good old boys in the department weren't interested in, and a series of gay-bashings in the heart of the New South were tailor made for a young female detective in the doghouse.

"Can we help?" I asked as Sabrina got out of her battle gear and put on a sweater and coat to head out into the December night.

"I think you guys have done enough to my reputation within the department, thanks." She smiled when she said it, but it was the kind of smile that looked like it was stretched almost to the breaking point.

"Alright, but if you need us to come down and sling around a little mojo, just let me know." I wasn't sure what bugged me more, that she wouldn't let us try to help or that our evening's sparring session was going to be cut short. Who was I kidding? I was irritated that another pretty gay boy had gotten his face bashed in and now I was stuck alone with my grumpy partner instead of dancing around the mat with a sexy chick in body armor.

She headed up the stairs into the winter night and I sat down to another night of video games and whining about surveillance with Greg. After about ten minutes he looked over at me and said, "Well?"

"Well, what?"

"Well, how long are you going to mope around here like a teenage girl waiting for the next
Twilight
movie?"

"You heard her. She doesn't want our help."

"And you're suddenly the obedient type?"

"I don't want to stick my nose in where it doesn't belong."

Other books

Chocolate and Italian Wine (Music and Mayhem Book 1) by Lili Porter

April Kihlstrom by The Dutiful Wife

Something Might Happen by Julie Myerson

Think Like a Champion: An Informal Education in Business and Life by Donald Trump

Generation Loss by Elizabeth Hand

Hong Kong by Stephen Coonts

The Secrets of Their Souls by Brooke Sivendra

Fire and Steam by Christian Wolmar

Ashes of Midnight by Lara Adrian

The Rake and the Wallflower by Allison Lane