#SpotlightSaturday this week comes from Alexandra Keillor. Bad Blood is the first in the Vampires of London series. Featuring a vampire hunter forced to work with those he would usually hunt, and in the process falling for one, this sounds so good. The book is out now once you've enjoyed the excerpt.
From the blurb:
The vampire clan has a problem. They want me to help solve it. But what can one human do?
Only, it doesn’t seem like they know why fledglings are running around either, and killing me may start a war. I’ll have to work with the clan—with the pretty, wounded vampire Lucien—to get to the bottom of things because no matter what I think of vampires, I’ll do whatever it takes to keep the people I care about safe.
Working with Lucien brings a whole new set of dangers, and not necessarily the biting kind. I’m drawn to him in a way I’ve never experienced before, and I’m sure he feels the same. But he has secrets too, and I can’t trust a vampire, especially if I can’t be certain where his loyalties lie.
As the threat looms closer, and my past comes back with a vengeance, I have to make a choice: Let Lucien in, and let him help me the way he swears he will, or keep him at a distance and take care of this myself, even if it means sacrificing my own life.
Excerpt:
We enter the hall, and the room falls silent. Donors and our human staff line the walls, vampires between them and the circle of space in the centre. The chieftains have clustered together, awaiting Vasile’s entrance, and I see Njáll already has his head lowered, a flush colouring his neck and the tips of his pale ears.
Adelaide and Tristan stand under the chandelier in the centre of the room, along with two other vampires who wear the same glassy-eyed look Florence did earlier. Anton and Leo. They also live in Njáll’s district, I believe.
The human kneels at their feet.
He is facing us, though he surely cannot tell because there is a bag over his head. His arms are fastened behind his back and my eyes roam over him for a moment too long, taking in the breadth of his shoulders and the strong muscles in his thighs.
Something has caught my attention, and it takes a moment for me to realise that it is not only the spicy scent of his blood.
His heartbeat.
It is steady in a way I would never expect for a human thrown into a room full of vampires.
I follow Vasile through the crowd at a sedate pace, trying to temper my eagerness to get a better view of this stranger. Elle stands with the other chieftains, but when she sees me, she slips back into the crowd, no doubt going in search of Adam.
Vasile pauses when he reaches Chieftain Njáll, who raises his pale eyes for a second, takes in Vasile’s arch expression, and lowers them again. Vasile moves on and I remain at Njáll’s side.
He glances at me, and the storminess fades from his pale blue eyes. “Good to see you back, Lucien,” he murmurs.
I incline my head in greeting. I am the last person to be in a position to judge his guilt. “I am not certain I have been reinstated yet.”
Njáll snorts softly, and when he turns his head, the beads in his braids knock together. “Who knows. You might end up with two districts by the time this is over.” He looks at Adelaide and Tristan. While they both live in his district, neither is his turn. He has a duty to them, but there is no bond he could have leveraged to discover what they were doing.
“Whatever they have done, they bear the weight on their own shoulders.”
“Sure,” Njáll mutters. “Though, I can’t lie. It’s nice to see a hunter on his knees for a change.”
Bad Blood is currently available as an e-book and paperback and can be read as part of your Kindle Unlimited Subscription
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