Free Crimson Vengeance by Sheri Lewis Wohl Page B

said was true. Not once in all the years they’d known each other had Ivy done one single thing to jeopardize either Riah’s secret or their friendship.
    “Do you?” Ivy demanded of her, fingers firm on Riah’s arm.
    She stared at her for a long moment, then sighed. “No.”
    Ivy nodded and relaxed her grip. “All right then, give the man ten minutes, and if you don’t think he can help, you can do whatever you want with him.”
    “Hey, wait a minute.” Colin took a step back. “I didn’t agree to that.”
    Ivy shrugged. “It was sort of implied when you got in the van.”
    He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
    “You don’t have a choice. I’d suggest you start explaining.” Ivy crossed her arms over her chest and stared at him with an expectant expression on her face. “We don’t have all night, you know.”
    Riah raised an eyebrow and stared at him too. Against her better judgment, she’d humor Ivy and give him ten minutes. “That’s a very good suggestion.” She looked up pointedly at the clock on the far wall.
    Colin looked from Ivy to Riah, then held up his hands. “Okay, okay. My name is Colin Jamison.”
    “And you’re one of the church’s vampire hunters.” Riah didn’t mean to sound bitter but couldn’t help it. Five hundred years of hiding from his kind didn’t exactly nurture feelings of goodwill.
    Talk about vampires being killers, these guys came in droves and they killed first, asked questions later. They always struck her as more than a bit hypocritical.
    “I’m the last vampire hunter,” he said pointedly.
    Okay, now that did surprise her. When she was turned, it seemed as though there were as many hunters as vampires. Possibly more.

    Of course things change, especially when it involves a time period of five centuries or so, give or take. Still, it seemed impossible to Riah the man could be the last hunter. Then again…
    “The church having trouble recruiting these days?”
    “No.”
    She tilted her head and studied him. A handsome man, his eyes told her he’d seen the black side of the universe. Like her, darkness had touched his soul somewhere along the line and left its undeniable mark. Still, she didn’t understand why he now stood alone in a crusade as old as the church itself.
    “Explain.” Riah could hardly wait to hear this story.
    He told her then of an army of soldiers that the church recruited to hunt down and destroy all who had been turned to the darkness.
    He told her of the battles and the victories. Some she knew of. Some she didn’t. He held back nothing, including their failures, and by the time his words trailed off, she was astonished.
    “You’re telling me your church has wiped out all but two of us?”
    Riah would call few vampires her friend, yet theirs was a world insulated because of their fundamental difference to mortals. It made them all a strange sort of family. She’d know if they were all gone, wouldn’t she? Yet, if he was to be believed, they were indeed. Had she removed herself that completely from the world of vampires?
    Colin Jamison nodded slowly. “Actually, three, counting yourself. I wasn’t aware of you.”
    “What are their names? The other two.” Riah was almost afraid to find out. Though she despised her dark existence, to think so few were left gave her a feeling of loneliness. It was one thing to choose to be alone; it was another altogether to find herself an endangered species.
    “The one I’ve tracked here, the same one who killed Jorge, is known only as Destiny. She’s a beautiful woman with pale hair and green eyes. She’s also deadly. The other, we know very little about, other than she was the last child of Henry VII . He announced to the world that the infant, known as Princess Catherine, died at birth. The truth was, his wife died in childbirth and the king, not interested in raising another daughter, willingly gave her up in a game of cards. A favored duke, childless and wanting to please his