Read Online Good, the Bad, and the Vampire by Sara Humphreys - Free Book Online Page B

about ten years of being turned. So why now, after all this time, had he started dreaming again? He’d bet his best pair of boots it had something to do with the scent he’d detected in the woods. That girl, Chelsea, was mixed up with gargoyles. She had to be.
    The two incidents had to be connected.
    Frustrated and more than a little concerned, Dakota strode to the bathroom and turned on the shower. He stripped off his boxers and tossed them into the hamper before stepping into the almost painfully hot streams. He turned the dream over and over in his mind as the water poured down on him, but he kept coming back to the same conclusion.
    A gargoyle was involved with a human woman. But why?
    He was a sentry and he’d messed with gargoyles before. So it was up to him to find the creature and put it down like the rabid beast it was. There was almost no chance that Trixie had any idea what Chelsea was messing with, and hopefully the human wouldn’t get in the way of what he knew he had to do.
    Taking out a gargoyle permanently would require more than his usual arsenal. That meant he’d have to pay a visit to the local weapons master, Xavier.
    A deadly smile spread across his face as he rinsed the soap from his body. He’d waited over fifty years to get more revenge; it looked like his wait was finally over.
    * * *
    â€œHello, my friend!”
    Xavier’s enthusiastic voice boomed through the cavernous space of his workshop. He may have been small in stature but he had the biggest, most enthusiastic personality of anyone—human or vamp—that Dakota had met in all his years. A dwarf who’d been turned about a century ago, he looked like a tiny Albert Einstein. A shock of white hair stuck out from his head in a thousand directions, and a pair of wire-rimmed glasses perched precariously on the tip of his nose. Garbed in a white lab coat with a pen tucked behind each ear, he looked like the nutty professor. Brilliant, but scattered.
    â€œHey there, Xavier.” Dakota squeezed the smaller vampire’s hand and glanced at the ceiling where all kinds of weapons dangled like a macabre mobile. A moment later, a fluttering noise filled the air. A ghost, a pretty young woman with long dark hair, materialized and floated high above them. “And hello to you too, Bella.”
    â€œWhat can I do for you?” Xavier flew to a stool behind one of the many stainless-steel tables, all of them covered with one experiment or another. “Didn’t I just give you and Shane more ammunition last week? I thought it had been quiet lately. I’m surprised you need more so soon.”
    â€œYeah, it has.” Dakota nodded and strolled slowly around the lab, surveying the different weaponry suspended overhead. “But I’m in need of something a little different. Let’s say…it’s for a secret project that I’m working on, and I’d be much obliged if you’d keep this little visit between us.”
    Xavier pushed his glasses on top of his head and nodded, not taking his keen gaze off Dakota. Dakota tried not to squirm beneath the weapon master’s inspecting stare. He’d only known Xavier a couple of years, and by all accounts, the man was not only intelligent but Doug and Olivia trusted him implicitly.
    â€œI see.” Xavier slipped his pudgy hands in the pockets of his lab coat. “Is Olivia aware of this secret project ?”
    â€œNo.” Dakota stilled and met the smaller vampire’s eyes. “And for now, I’d like it to stay that way. I wanna confirm my suspicions before I get everyone else’s knickers in a twist.” He kept his voice light and waved one hand. “No need to get the czars or the other sentries all worked up if I’m wrong.”
    â€œAre Shane and Pete aware of what’s going on?”
    â€œNot at the moment.”
    â€œI don’t know about this, Dakota.” Xavier shook his head.