Be My Vampire
by Myla Jackson
Be My Vampire
Blurb
Elite Paranormal Investigative Agent Reggie Gallagher hates vampires.
After thirteen beautiful women are kidnapped off the streets of Houston,
Reggie and her sister set themselves up as bait to catch the
kidnappers. The mission goes sour, her sister vanishes and Reggie is
surrounded by a rabid pack of vampires only to be rescued by the most
desirable vampire Reggie’s ever encountered. Captivated by his
incredible magnetism, Reggie can’t deny her body’s response to the
vampire’s nearness. When the sexy beast insists on providing protection
and assistance in finding the missing women, Reggie can’t refuse.
After the woman he loved turned Yuri Kovac into a vampire four hundred
years ago, he swore he’d never trust another woman with his heart. Then
he saved a sensuous hellcat from a band of vicious vampires only to find
himself mesmerized by her curvaceous body, hot temper and fierce love
for her family. Together Yuri and Reggie seek Reggie’s missing sister
and face down the evil behind the disappearances while fighting their
growing attraction for each other.
Excerpt
Reggie Gallagher ducked behind the last in a row of
Dumpsters and braced her hands on her knees, dragging in huge gulps of air.
Sweat ran down the side of her face, and the black ribbed tank top she wore
clung to her breasts. The coastal humidity and heat acted like a steam bath
even when she was standing still. For the moment, all she could hear was the
ragged gasps of her breath wheezing in and out of her straining lungs. And
despite the retched stench of the waste beside her, she welcomed the respite
from the chase.
Where was Madison? She’d been right behind Reggie until now.
The quiet of the alley was broken when pounding footsteps
entered and raced toward her.
Risking a stealthy glance around the hard metal corner of
the Dumpster, Reggie confirmed the runner, and she reached out to snag her and
pull her in beside her.
“Can’t…stop.” Madison bent low, her shoulders heaving with
the effort to fill her oxygen-starved lungs.
“Breathe,” Reggie ordered, and tapped the miniature headset
positioned inside her ear like a hearing aid. “I can think of a hundred
friggin' better ways to spend Valentine's Day. ”
“I'd have preferred...chocolates. ”
“Where the hell are Jordan and Mike?”
“It’s…as…if…they disappeared.” Madison sucked in air and
gushed, “Ah, shit! I can’t breathe. I don’t know if those guys saw me turn down
here, but they can’t be far behind.”
“Then let’s go.” Reggie shot another glance around the
corner of the Dumpster. The alley was empty. She waited another second and then
grabbed her sister’s hand, pulling her along behind her.
“There!” The shout of one of their pursuers echoed off the
brick of the multistory structures rising up from their concrete foundations.
The buildings spread over entire blocks, channeling Reggie and Madison through
the worst part of Houston, leaving few places to hide or take cover. How had
the mission gone south so fast? Where was their backup?
“They’ll catch us at this rate,” Madison shouted between
gasps. “Gotta split up.”
“No!” But before Reggie could tighten her grip, her younger
sister pulled free and swung left, sprinting west, away from the downtown area.
Reggie glanced back at the group of six men closing in
behind her. If she played her hand right, they’d follow her and leave Madison
alone. The fastest runner on the team at the Paranormal Investigative Agency,
she could outrun every man, except perhaps the boss. Tanner was made of iron
and muscles. No one could outrun, out gun or outsmart him.
But if she wanted to live, Reggie had better make it her
goal to beat all of his records and then some. She just hoped the hell Madison
got away.
Summoning every last ounce of energy, she punched out,
running straight for two blocks to ensure the bad boys behind her wouldn’t
branch off and pursue her sister. Just as she was about to veer east, a shot
rang out and something hard and fast slammed against her left shoulder,
spinning her around so quickly she crashed into the brick corner of an office
building.
Surprise numbed the pain for the first five seconds until
her heart resumed function, kicking her blood through her body and out the ragged
exit wound in the front of her shoulder. Her stomach lurched, and the pale glow
of the streetlamps dimmed. No. She couldn’t pass out. Not now. Have to run.
Have to get farther away from Madison.
As fog crept in around her peripheral vision, Reggie rounded
the corner she’d been aiming for and set off at a swift jog, her pace slowing
more each time her heels hit the pavement.
No. This couldn’t happen. She would not be another one of
the victims she risked her life to protect. No way would the gang members or
bloodsuckers take her down as they’d done her father.
Heartless bastards! All of them.
Although Tanner said there were good vamps out there, Reggie
had it firmly in her mind that the only good vampire was a dead vampire. She
repeated the words like a cadence, motivating her legs to keep pumping and her
feet to continue moving away from her attackers.
“The only good vampire is a—” With only half a block between
her and the six men, she reached the end of the street and swung a hard right,
running into a solid wall of steel. Her forehead made contact and then her
chest, knocking what little air was left from her lungs. The force of the
collision made her bounce backward, her head snapping up. With no air to
sustain breathing and her vision blurred, the ground sucked her downward. As
her knees buckled, her mouth completed her sentence. “Dead vampire.”
“I like to think of it as the living dead.” A deep voice
with one of those guttural and incredibly sexy foreign accents filled her
senses, and strong arms reached out to catch her before she hit the pavement.
Her brain, cloudy from blood and oxygen loss, Reggie was
thankful for the strength of the man in front of her. But she had to get away.
Those men would catch up and do who knew what to her. How the hell had the
ambush they’d set up for the gang turned into a trap for her and Madison? Where
was the rest of her team?
The gang had been waiting for them as if they knew she and
Madison were the bait and they’d be alone. How had they known? The entire
situation stank. Could there be a snitch on the inside at PIA? Would Reggie and
Madison end up missing like the thirteen young women to date?
Bullshit.
She and Madison weren’t victims. They were the good guys,
sworn to catch the filthy scum taking advantage of lone women.
Reggie struggled against the vise grip holding her chest to
chest with the stranger. When she tried to right herself, her head swam and her
knees refused to engage enough to hold her upright.
“Let me go,” she said with more bravado than conviction that
she could stand on her own once released.
He chuckled, his chest vibrating against hers. “If I do,
you’ll fall.”
Footsteps rang out on the streets behind her, and her body
stiffened. “Let me go!” No matter how strong this guy was, he couldn’t go
against six men and hope to win. For that matter, Reggie didn’t know if he
wasn’t one of them. Had she run right into the enemy?
The men rounded the corner and skidded to a stop, their
leader at the front—Cesar Dominguez, a man Reggie knew from the mug shots on file
at the agency and the snake-dragon tattoo on his right arm. He carried a 9mm
pistol and had it pointed at the man holding her.
That settled one question in Reggie’s numb mind. Her rescuer
wasn’t one of the gang she’d set out to capture. She would have sighed her
relief, but she still didn’t know who the hell he was.
Other Authors Participating in Snippet Saturday:
Lauren Dane
Shiloh Walker
Delilah Devlin
Jody Wallace
Shelli Stevens
TJ Michaels
McKenna Jeffries
Taige Crenshaw
Felicity Heaton
Eliza Gayle
Caris Roane
Myla Jackson
