Page 1 of High Stakes

Chapter One

I’d known Enoch for years, and hadn’t even met him. I’d never seen him face-to-face, but I hated him with every fiber of my being. And because of that hatred, I spent my days training to fight and my nights learning everything I could about him.

His favorite color was a deep shade of red and his favorite flavor was B positive, the type of blood running through my veins. He preferred young women who were tall and fit. Brunettes with full, pouty lips. Women who looked like me.

That’s why I was given the task of killing him.

Maru’s voice came through my communicator, the device that happened to be propped on the pillow right beside my ear because I’d chosen to ignore the two alarm tones I’d set. “Rise and shine, Eve,” he directed. “You’re late.”

I groaned and curled the pillow around my ears. I’d never been late to training. Maru wouldn’t allow tardiness any more than he let me sleep in late. Rolling out of bed, I stood up and stretched my arms into the air, watching as the time scrolled across my communicator’s screen. According to it, Maru would be here in…thirty seconds. Shit.

I scurried around the room, slinging an elastic around my thick hair and grabbing my stakes and holster. Tossing them into a bag with a water bottle and towel, I barely had time to throw the duffle’s strap over my head before Maru knocked.

“What took you so long?” I teased as I stepped into the hallway and pressed my palm against the panel to seal the door. The glass panel slid across the track, changing the door from clear to opaque.

The hallways were empty and dark, with only a dim strand of warm-colored lights lining the pathways. The faint smell of lemon-scented disinfectant and stale water still hung in the air. The cleaning crew scrubbed it from top to bottom every night after curfew.

Maru and I were always first to wake and first to arrive at the training room. He used his clearance to open the door, and once inside, placed his palm over the panel on the wall and announced, “Illuminate.” Bright, fluorescent lights crisscrossing the ceiling flickered to life.

This was one of the last days we’d spend here. I glanced at the back of my hand where the embedded containment cell sat empty, waiting for the tiny disc that would soon sit within. For years, I’d been training and learning how to kill vampires and as much as I could about the science behind time travel, but seeing the containment cell implanted just under the epidermis was jolting and surreal at the same time.

The room smelled like stale sweat, but plenty of blood and tears had been shed in there, too. Champions were made in this room. They were the sum of their highs and lows, triumphs and failures, mistakes and perfection.

Maru walked across the rubber floor, pausing in front of my dummy. “This has Titus’s name written all over it.” He shook his head while I threw my head back in a laugh. Titus had printed and taped a picture of Enoch’s face to the dummy’s head. “He takes nothing seriously,” Maru grumped.

“And you take things too seriously,” I teased.

Maru cocked his head to the side. He was obviously not in the mood for humor this early in the morning. Someone needed caffeine. Or a hug. “This isn’t a game, Eve. What you’re about to do could easily get you killed.”

I bit back a smile and a smart-ass retort. Maru finally turned away, continuing on his mission to get the room ready for the three of us.

He didn’t have to remind me that what we were doing was dangerous, or that it could get us killed. I knew that. I accepted the risk. If it was my fate to die trying to kill Enoch, so be it.

“Sharpen your stakes. We’re going hand-to-hand after warm up,” Maru yelled as he walked toward the mats.

I threw my duffel bag onto a nearby bench and sat down, and then pulled my stakes out and inspected the wood. Fairly new, they were long enough to cut through the rib cage into the heart, but the tips were dull.

I found my knife in the bottom of the bag and slid the blade down the dulling wood. Shavings fell to the rubber mat between my feet. With every scrape, I imagined the look of surprise on Enoch’s pretty face when I appeared in front of him, followed by the satisfying squelching sound of the stake piercing his heart.

Enoch was charismatic, and his beauty could only be described as unearthly. Chiseled features, curled dark hair, green eyes, flawless skin. But beneath the surface lurked a vicious heart and an insatiable thirst for power and blood.

He was the eldest of three vampires believed to be the first created and oldest still in existence. Evidence suggested the three siblings were fathered by the devil himself.

For years, vampires were believed to be a myth, a creature of stories conjured to scare children, but in the last decade, the vampire race emerged from the shadows and ravaged their way across the country. The balance of power between human and vampire, if it ever really existed, had shifted.

Like a plague of locusts sweeping across a field, leaving nothing but broken, stripped stalks rising from the earth, the vampires overtook our country, starting with the major cities and working through the most populated places to the least. It didn’t take long for everything – our government, our security, and our lives – to collapse.

The military opened their bases, taking in as many civilians as they could, but there wasn’t enough room or resources to feed and house everyone, and it quickly became too dangerous for survivors to travel. Humans hunkered down in the hearts of cities, while what was left of our army formed a protective ring around them. For years, it was about as effective as elephants guarding their calves against a determined pride of lions.

In the end, the lions’ bellies were always filled.

But now? Things were changing again. And like all change, only time would tell if it was for the better.

Maru emerged from the locker room wearing a protective suit of armor, one I could strike at again and again and not leave a mark on him, let alone a bruise. It was black, sleek, and deadly-looking, and I was glad the vamps didn’t have access to the hybrid material—part lightweight metal and part advanced plastic. We wouldn’t stand a chance then, no matter how sharp I managed to get the stakes’ tips.

“Victor’s coming to watch this afternoon,” he announced just before Abram and his trainer walked into the room.

My muscles went rigid. My fingers tightened around the knife’s handle.

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