“We’ve been here for hours even though it’s daylight. Vampires don’t come out in the day, genius. I’m bored,” he complained.
“And I’m annoyed, but do you notice how I’m not strangling you, even though I want to? Also, vampires sometimes have people do their work for them, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“Drink more coffee, McQueen. You’re mean without it.”
“Don’t tell me what to do, Sirruner, I know how to dispatch your kind.” We mock glared at each other across the center console, but he grinned first.
“It’s not nice to threaten a demon with their true name, you know.”
“I never promised to be nice to you.” I sipped my coffee, and we both smiled. “One of those donuts better be chocolate glaze.”
“Or what? You’ll send me back to Hell?”
“Worse,” I said. “I’ll make you do all the freeway commuter runs for the next month.”
He groaned dramatically then handed me a chocolate donut.
I just managed to finish licking the last of the glaze off my fingers when a big white truck rolled up and parked in front of the blood bank across the street.
Three vampires jumped out of the back, wearing white balaclavas.
I set the donut down on the dash and checked my weapon. “You ready for this, rookie?”
“Lady, I spent seven thousand years flaying humans alive. You think a couple vampires are going to scare me?”
I winked. “Don’t damage that body. I like this one.”
We got out of the car and headed into the night.
Thanks for reading Secret Lives! I hope you enjoyed the return of Secret McQueen and her crew! Rest assured this won’t be Secret’s last adventure!
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Can’t wait to start another Sierra Dean book? Wondering how Lucas came back to life? Pick up Black-Hearted Devil, the third Genie McQueen novel. Keep reading for a sneak peek.
Black-Hearted Devil (Genie McQueen #3)
Chapter One
I’m not sure how most people would react when their once-beheaded mother returns from the dead, but I ran.
My mission had been grim but simple: dig up my mother’s head and give it to Beau Cain as payment for services rendered. What I hadn’t counted on was finding her makeshift grave empty.
What I really hadn’t counted on was turning around to find the formerly dead Mercy McQueen standing behind me, head planted firmly on shoulders, telling me what a naughty, naughty girl I’d been.
Frankly: fuck that.
I took off running into the trees, the sound of her laughter crackling like wood in bonfire, echoing in my ears as I tried to put enough distance between us to feel safe again.
How much distance would that be? I wasn’t sure I could run all the way to Australia.
I had some experience with encountering nightmares when I was awake. For over a year the specter of a burned woman had been appearing to me at very inconvenient times, doing her part to convince me I was losing my mind.
Except I knew she was real because I could smell her.
If there was one sense a werewolf learned to trust implicitly, it was their sense of smell. And much like that charred ghost, I’d smelled my mother with such clarity the scent of her was in my nostrils even now.