The Hunter V: The Complete Series

V for Vampire Hunter

Stake. Check.

Favorite lace-up military-style boots. Check.

Holy water. Double check.

All the makings of a great, unoriginal vampire hunter costume. But make no mistake, this one was the real deal. Three hundred years of genetics to be precise. A birthright. One I was never given a chance to grumble about because I was trained to be an elite Hunter from the very moment I was born.

“Sock ‘em like puppets and put the dead in undead,” as my white-haired, angel-faced grandmother often said.

The same lady all the kids in the neighborhood praised as the “Most Lovable Grandmother” was one of the fiercest and deadliest martial artist vampire hunters the Organization had ever employed.

Now seventy-five and basically deadly by mouth only, Grandma Rose merely trained like the devil and took no prisoners when it came to teaching me how to be the next best vampire huntress I could be.

And believe it, the bruises all over my body accounted for all the hard work and dedication I’d put towards this thankless job of cleaning up the trash under the guise of a sweet, unassuming teenager.

Barely over five feet, normal physique, freckles everywhere, ginger hair, and hazel eyes made me appear less than dangerous. Actually, it sort of worked in my favor since I looked more like the prey than the hunter. The countless, blood-thirsty bastards never saw me coming.

While my fellow teens were out partying and making horrible life choices, I was here, stalking prey outside a decrepit farm house because some of us didn’t get a damn night off.

Not even on the most fun, some would argue, spookiest night of the year could I act my age and spend a night out with my peers, living bad decisions and tasting the euphoria of adolescence.

Instead, I was crouched beside a prickly bush, showered by moonlight and eaten alive by bugs. But it was Halloween—a vampire’s favorite night to play.

Imagine a night where you were permitted to let it all hang out: fangs, pale-ass skin, haughty light-colored eyes, and dark circles that would rival any new mother.

It was a feast every year. Every year the disappearances were chalked up to the stupid choices of teenagers who made one terrible choice too many.

Vampires sucked the blood right out of you like the stories said.

Just, they were clever enough to pose each death as a freak accident.

Car crashes, severed limbs, decapitation—you name it, they did it.

Vampires were crafty little devils and figured out over the course of their immortal lives that too much attention was bad attention.

Hell, I learned that in only seventeen years of life.

So, our vast network of vampire hunters kept careful track of freak accidents in all the different regions, watching for patterns and then calling on us special folk—the ones with the blood of the elders—to carry out the kills.

Aka, me and my kind.

Unlike normal people, we were faster and twice as strong as any muscle man. We easily tracked vampire movements and picked up on scents like damn bloodhounds. And to add spice to an already spicy mix, most of us spent our lives honing the gifts we were born with.

Interestingly, females of the bloodline were stronger and deadlier. So, the only female to be born outside of my grandmother in our family line for nearly four generations meant the expectations that I would become a hardcore badass were far and away the worst part about this job.

I never got a damn minute to breathe.

Hence why a seventeen-year-old, decked out to the teeth in weapons and practically frozen, was crouched near an abandoned farm house, waiting in the wings for one wrong step, one wrong move that offered enough of an opening to do the only thing I was good at.

Killing vampires.

I sensed the thing inside, lugging an unconscious teenager over his shoulder.

Decked out in a fitted floral vest, Victorian lace jabot, and ruffled sleeves even I snickered at, the undead bastard really tried his hand at appearing the perfect embodiment of Lestat from Interview with a Vampire.

Even his perfect Shirley Temple curls pulled back into a low ponytail offered an almost iconic sheen in the moonlit painted hay-scape of the barn.

And if not for the unconscious body over his shoulder, no one would be the wiser to what he was or what he was doing there.

To be fair, even with the teen over his shoulder, most would attribute it to a night spent drinking and the designated buddy who had the unfair task of getting the bastard home.

I toed closer before comically catching my shirt on a branch. Clicking my tongue, I damned the bush for stealing my focus and yanked myself free.

I'd tracked the undead bastard all the way from town to this barn thanks to an injury on the teen’s head, likely from being knocked out.

Unlike the stories told, vampires didn’t have any sort of mystical power over humans to turn them into mindless minions.

A head bash was as close as they got to magical compliance.

And unfortunately for me, Lestat was surprisingly popular this Halloween, so finding the undead bastard took longer than it should.

I was already cutting it close with an injured victim taken hostage.

Since Halloween was one of the busiest nights of the year, it was me, myself, and I tonight.

I didn’t have time to call for back-up, so one way or another, this bastard was going down.

“Is that you, V?”

I made a sound in my throat before catching myself. How did I miss the sound of a car parking or approaching footsteps? Amateur move.

I did a full spin and looked up at the beautiful man standing behind me. Then my eyes tracked back to where the vampire had been only seconds before, but to my dismay, there wasn't any trace of the imposter Lestat.

Fuck my life.

“What are you even doing out here?” he pried.

I stood up and slipped the holy water coated dagger into its sheathe, out of sight of normal boy eyes. “Just…you know, admiring this bush here.”

“The bush?”

“It’s a great bush.”

Shit. Shit. Shit.

“Sure…” His piercing dark eyes stayed with me a second before stealing a look at the empty farm house. “Were you waiting for someone?”

I balked openly. “Me? No.” Think fast. “I heard stories.”

“About the bush?”

Damn this persistent, beautiful idiot. If not for being entirely bogged down by the vampire who escaped and its prey likely already killed and discarded, I would’ve taken a minute to admire this stunning six-foot-three upperclassman I’d spent years not-so-secretly in love with.

“No, about the ghosts…because…”

“Oh, that old story.” He seemed to pick up on my poor excuse for an answer and nodded the direction of the farm house. “Want company?”

YES!

“No,” I answered breathlessly, damning my responsibilities. “I’ve already done all of that investigation stuff, and now I’m leaving.”

“After admiring this bush, you mean?” he teased.

Oh, he was funny. And adorable. And beautiful. And so, so forbidden.

“Yeah…right.” I agreed, patting the bush awkwardly. “Good bush.”

Covering his mouth, my new friend’s dark complexion caught the moonlight and gave off a golden hue before his obsidian eyes landed on me with interest. “You’re always so funny, V.”

He called me V, and I was living for it. I hated my old-woman name Vivienne, so everyone just called me V. But I could count on one hand how many times I’d spoken to Nigel. We’d never gotten to the nickname part of the relationship.

We’re practically married already.

“That’s me, the funny one,” I offered lamely, losing track of the whole reason I was trying to hurry the gorgeous man along. “And what about you?”

“What about me, what?”

“Did you also come out here to admire this bush, or are you meeting someone?” I pried shamelessly.

Last I heard, he was single. He had a girlfriend for nearly two years, but they broke up last year, and I’d been a hopeful, invisible admirer ever since.

Not that I was in any position to date or even dream of dating someone like Nigel.

Being a Hunter meant that I spent a fair amount of time nearly dying.

And when I wasn’t nearly dying, I was training to try to avoid dying and nearly dying doing it.

It really was a vicious cycle; one that didn’t leave room for a boyfriend.

“Can I be honest?”

Oh, god.

“Why does it worry me when you ask that?”

Nigel chuckled softly and took a step closer. “I was a bit worried about you. Someone said you dodged in and out of every party going on tonight, asking about a Lestat dressed person. Then it was mentioned you drove this direction.”

I was a bit desperate towards the end, and I guess my desperation caught up with me. Now I’d earned myself a worried bystander.

“Ah, yeah…”

“Is this guy you’re looking for your boyfriend, maybe?”

My mouth dropped open, and I had to catch myself to keep from yelling out in protest. “Um, no. More like this guy is sort of a thorn in my side, but you don’t need to worry about it. We should go ahead and head back.”

“So, not your boyfriend, then?” he asked again, and my heart pounded like this was a rom-com and not an action-horror sort of evening. “Well, guess it doesn’t matter. There’s all kinds of animals out here, and it’s a bad idea to come out here alone even if you think someone else is here.”

Damn this beautiful bastard for making me second-guess my responsibilities towards an injured nobody caught in the slimy clutches of a Lestat imposter.

“No, you’re right. I guess I wasn’t thinking. It’s a little cold and creepy out here. Let’s get going,” I insisted, pretending to be uncomfortable and cold.

Although, to be honest, I was pretty cold. Even in layers, an hour in this wind chill was enough to make my bones freeze.