Page 2 of High Stakes

Maru warned, “Don’t, Eve. No trouble today.”

Abram stalked to the corner of the room farthest away from me and began to jog in place, bending his neck from side to side. He was an Asset like me, but we were nothing alike. In the last few years, I’d come to loathe him almost as much as the vampires we targeted.

“There won’t be trouble unless he starts it,” I told my trainer. But if Abram wanted a fight, I’d give him the fight of his life. Gritting my teeth, I refocused on the stake in my hand, whittling more dullness away. Pretending it was Abram’s shin…

When Victor came to watch, it meant there was news. I knew we were going to travel soon, but he’d never given us a definitive date. Maybe he had one now.

Victor Dantone rose above those clambering for power to become the uncontested human leader of what was left of our country. There was a bold presence about him – commanding, fierce, and unafraid. Anyone who could look into the face of the devil without cowering was someone the surviving humans would stand behind. As much as the vampires loved Enoch, the humans loved Victor.

He’d moved up the ranks in the military by leading attacks against the vamps. He was bold when others cowered, and Victor preferred offense to defense. His methods were anything but conventional. He turned to technology, broadcasting his men tracking vampires to their nests and exposing them to the sun. He broadcast his men capturing the creatures at night, staking them, throwing holy water in their faces and watching their skin boil off their bones. Victor showed the people that we could fight back, that we could fight dirty, and they loved him for it.

Ten years ago, Victor was introduced to Kael Frost. Months later, the two began developing a secret program. Kael was a genius, said to be more intelligent than Einstein and eons more inventive. While Victor continued broadcasting himself and his men taking out the vampires, giving the humans hope, he and Kael began developing Assets.

I was proud to be one of the top three, and the only female.

Abram stretched in his corner, lunging, twisting open his spine, moving fluidly from one limber pose to another, staring daggers in my direction. I stared back, silently daring him to cross the room.

Titus, our third counterpart, chose that moment to lumber in, obscuring my view of Abram, looking bleary eyed and half-asleep. His golden hair was matted on one side. He’d no doubt stayed up half the night with his friends.

We had a curfew. The whole compound did, but the Assets’ was very strict. Once in our rooms, we were sealed inside, but Titus wasn’t about to miss an opportunity to socialize. And he was very tech-savvy. Somehow, he figured out how to override his room’s security protocol. He’d slip out after the lights dimmed and return before they flickered back on. He always invited me along, but I’d never taken him up on the offer.

“Did you like the visual I left you?” Titus teased with a proud grin as he walked past, nudging my shoulder. “I thought it’d make training more realistic today.”

“It’s definitely motivating, thank you,” I deadpanned.

“Would you prefer Abram as a target?”

“After yesterday, yes.”

“He seriously needs a psych eval.” Titus flopped down on the bench beside mine and groaned, glancing across the room. “From the looks of it, Maru is going to go hard at it today.”

“Victor’s coming to watch this afternoon.”

That woke him up. His brows raised and he scrubbed his hands over his face. “I need caffeine.”

I rolled my eyes. “Late night?”

“You could say that. I wonder if the timeline’s moving up,” he voiced.

The same thought had been rumbling through my head. “It would make sense. The vamps are getting bolder. Setting traps for the militia.”

“How do you know that?” he asked, squirting a stream of water into his mouth from his water bottle.

I scoffed, “Do you ever watch the broadcasts?”

“Not if I can help it. They’re boring.”

I rolled my eyes again. “They’re important. Don’t you want to know what’s going on outside?”

He yawned. “Not really.”

Titus pretended not to care, but I think he knew more than he let on. He wanted to help the citizens still living outside the compound, but more than that, Titus liked to hunt. Something in him came alive when we started practicing on real vampires, captured by Victor’s men. I wondered if that was where he slipped off to every night...

We knew that if a vampire was staked, any vamp they’d sired dropped dead with them. Even Kael wasn’t sure why, but the why didn’t really matter. If we could kill Enoch and his two siblings, the entire vampire race would die with them. It sounded simple enough, but in this time, nothing was simple.

“Let’s go, Eve!” Maru shouted. Titus chuckled and wiggled his fingers as I strapped my stakes to my side. I jogged across the room to my trainer, who had a strangely wicked gleam in his eyes, one I knew by heart. Today was going to be hell.

It didn’t matter that it was the crack of dawn, Maru never went easy on me. He threw a punch as soon as I got near. I barely ducked in time to avoid his fist.

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