Bring On the Night

  JERI SMITH-READY

  “… is one of my very favorite reads!”

  —P. C. Cast, New York Times bestselling author of the

  House of Night series

  Bad to the Bone

  Nominated for the Pearl Award

  “Smith-Ready pours plenty of fun into her charming, fang-in-cheek urban fantasy.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  “Offbeat and hugely entertaining.”

  —Romantic Times

  “Believable, captivating characters abound.… By turns funny, sexy, and gripping.”

  —Library Journal

  “An entertaining, fast-paced, toothsome tale wrapped around an eclectic playlist of six decades’ worth of hot music.”

  —The Green Man Review

  “Equivalent to the best hot chocolate you have ever tasted.…”

  —Para Normal Romance (A Top Pick)

  “Bad to the Bone’s action-packed plot, realistic characters, original vampire mythology, sinister secret societies, and shadowy government organizations make it a great read for both vampire fiction and urban fantasy fans.”

  —Love Vampires

  “A solid and fast-moving tale.”

  —Darque Reviews

  “Filled with edge-of-your-seat suspense, hot love scenes, and plot twists that you never see coming. Jeri Smith-Ready has scored another hit.”

  —Bitten by Books

  Wicked Game

  Winner of the PRISM Award

  A nominee for the American Library Association Alex Award

  “An addictive page-turner revving with red-hot sex, truly cool vampires, and rock ’n’ roll soul.”

  —Kresley Cole, #1 New York Times bestselling author of

  Pleasure of a Dark Prince

  “Smith-Ready’s musical references are spot-on, as is her take on corporate radio’s creeping hegemony. Add in the irrepressible Ciara, who grew up in a family of grifters, and the results rock.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “A colorful premise and engaging characters… a fun read.”

  —Library Journal

  “Just when I think the vampire genre must be exhausted, just when I think if I read another clone I’ll quit writing vampires myself, I read a book that refreshed my flagging interest. Jeri Smith-Ready’s Wicked Game was consistently surprising and original… I highly recommend it.”

  —A “Book of the Week” pick by #1 New York Times bestselling

  author Charlaine Harris at charlaineharris.com

  “This truly clever take on vampires is fresh and original.”

  —Romantic Times

  “Jeri Smith-Ready has created a set of strikingly original, fascinating characters, rich with as much style and rhythm as the music her vampires love. Lyrical and uncompromising, Wicked Game is a winner I’ll be reading again.”

  —Rachel Caine, bestselling author of Thin Air

  “Wicked Game is clever, funny, creative, and way too much fun.…A sure-fire winner.”

  —The Green Man Review

  “A wicked delight.…Urban fantasy that makes an irresistible playlist and an irresistible read.”

  —C. E. Murphy, bestselling author of Urban Shaman

  “Sharp and smart and definitely not flavor of the month, Wicked Game is wicked good.”

  —Laura Anne Gilman, bestselling author of Flesh and Fire

  “Jeri Smith-Ready’s vampire volume Wicked Game will make your corpuscles coagulate with corpulent incredulity. It’s for young bloods and old jugulars alike. Whether you devour it on Sunday Bloody Sunday or just before Dinner with Drac, simply turn off the fifty-inch plasma, lay back, and ‘Let It Bleed.’”

  —Weasel, WTGB 94.7 The Globe, Washington, DC

  “Original and unique… a fantastically good read.”

  —Love Vampires (Pick of the Month and

  one of 2008’s Best Vampire Books)

  “An imaginative tale that adds new dimension and limitations on the otherwise long-lived lives of vampires.”

  —Darque Reviews

  “A unique and lyrically entertaining story.… Excellent dialogue, skillfully crafted characters, and unique plot.”

  —Romance Reviews Today

  DON’T MISS THE SEXY BEGINNING TO CIARA’S TALE.…

  Wicked Game

  Bad to the Bone

  Available from Pocket Books

  The sale this book without its cover is unauthorized. If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that it was reported to the publisher as “unsold and destoryed.” Neither the author nor the publisher has received payment for sale of this “stripped book.”

  Pocket Books A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  1230 Avenue of the Americas

  New York, NY 10020

  SimonandSchuster.com

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2010 by Jeri Smith-Ready

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book

  or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books Subsidiary Rights Department,

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  First Pocket Books paperback edition August 2010

  POCKET and colophon are registered trademarks of

  Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact Simon & Schuster Special Sales at

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  Cover illustration by Don Sipley

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  ISBN 978-1-4391-6348-1

  ISBN 978-1-4391-6349-8 (ebook)

  To my husband, Christian, who means more to me

  than the rest of the world put together

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thanks as always to my family and friends, who continue to wait patiently for me not to be on deadline. Thanks to my beta readers—Patrice Michelle, Cecilia Ready, Rob Staeger, and Rob Usdin—for their honesty and sharp eyes. It’s a foolish author who works alone.

  A hundred and fifty (and counting) thank-yous to the WVMP Street Team, for their phenomenal support and enthusiasm.

  Thanks to the hardworking folks at Pocket Books who brought Bring on the Night to life: Louise Burke, Erica Feldon, Don Sipley, Martha Schwartz, Renee Huff, Nancy Inglis, and Lisa Litwack.

  Thanks to my brilliant editor, Jennifer Heddle, for keeping Ciara and her friends “alive” and well for more adventures, and to my agent, Ginger Clark, who is a rock star to her clients for a million damn good reasons. They deserve the best toffee and chocolate, respectively, the world has to offer.

  Most of all, thanks to my husband, Christian Ready, for his love and patience and for getting me Subway when I’m on deadline. I don’t need much, but I need him.

  By the sad silence which

  eternal reigns

  O’er all the waste of these wide-stretching plains;

  Let me again Eurydice

  receive,

  Let Fate her quick-spun thread of life re-weave.

  —Ovid, Metamorphoses, Book X

  PLAYLIST

  “Looking After No. 1,” Boomtown Rats

  “O
range Crush,” R.E.M.

  “Bring on the Night,” The Police

  “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean,” Dream Syndicate

  “Sheena Is a Punk Rocker,” The Ramones

  “Here Comes Your Man,” Pixies

  “Clocks,” Coldplay

  “I’m an Asshole,” Dennis Leary

  “I Know I’ll See You,” A Place to Bury Strangers

  “Goo Goo Muck,” The Cramps

  “When Doves Cry,” Prince and the Revolution

  “Bad Romance,” Lady Gaga

  “Sweet Dreams,” Marilyn Manson

  “Keep on the Sunny Side,” The Carter Family

  “6’1",” Liz Phair

  “Otherside,” Red Hot Chili Peppers

  “Ripple,” Grateful Dead

  “Ciara,” Luka Bloom

  “Symphony number 7 (second movement),” Ludwig van Beethoven

  “It’s a Sunshine Day,” The Brady Bunch

  “Endless Sleep,” Jody Reynolds

  “Watusi Zombie,” Jan Davis

  “No, No, No,” Dawn Penn

  “Just Walkin’ in the Rain,” The Prisonaires

  “Until the End of the World,” U2

  “Bitter Sweet Symphony,” The Verve

  1

  My My, Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)

  I’m okay now.

  Just so you know.

  I mean, just so I know.

  Not that I wonder.

  (deep breath)

  2

  Welcome to Paradise

  I could smell my own fear, bitter and tangy as an overripe orange. I crept down the night-shrouded alley and wished for eyes in the back of my head. Even eyes on the sides of my head would’ve helped, though that would’ve required some strategic barrette placement.

  Adrenaline spiked my senses. My eyes caught faint flaps of newspaper shreds tossed by the chill evening breeze. My ears filtered every scratch of twig and creak of plywood, singling them out from the background roar of the distant highway. My feet felt each pebble of industrial-grade gravel through the soles of my boots as I slunk toward the dark warehouse.

  Beyond it lay freedom.

  I’d been in the clutches of more than one vampire, so I knew what it was like to be prey. But I’d never been hunted. Never had a chance to escape, to match wits with my predator. To fight back.

  At the end of the alley I passed an overstuffed Dumpster, where the odor of cat piss snagged my attention. I wrinkled my nose and glanced at the bin. The lid was clamped on a discarded pizza box, pinching it open to reveal a leftover slice inside.

  My feet stopped, as if the brilliant (or possibly stupid) idea had passed through my toes on the way to my brain.

  I opened the Dumpster, trying not to creak the rusty hinges. The grease-splattered pizza box slid off a stack of bulging, green-black trash bags. I trapped it against my leg to keep it from hitting the ground.

  Before I could reconsider, I flipped up the cardboard top (“Enjoy your delicious moments!”) and grabbed the remaining slice, grateful to be wearing gloves. I held it up to the moonlight leaking in between the charred brick buildings.

  Jackpot: white pizza. Gooey splotches of ricotta oozed over a smooth layer of mozzarella. The whole affair was slathered in garlicky olive oil, with no tomato sauce to dilute the scent.

  Holding my breath, I smeared the pizza slice over my throat and face, trying to convince myself the green stuff was oregano. I repeated the process on my arms, then my torso, keeping nervous ears and eyes out for an approaching attack.

  Reeking like a frat house, I scurried to the warehouse door. It was ajar just far enough for me to slide inside without touching the frame.

  The vampire was waiting.

  I didn’t see or hear him, just sensed him deep in my frightened little soul, the way a rabbit senses a fox. But unlike a rabbit, I couldn’t outrun my hunter.

  The door behind me slammed shut, its clang echoing through the hangar-size warehouse. Above my head, the red Exit sign flickered, then dimmed.

  I will not flee. I will not scream. Such panic could trigger the killer instincts of even the most serene vampire.

  Cold sweat coated my skin, thickening my garlic aura. I stretched my fingers and willed them away from the sharp wooden stake in my hip holster. Cooperation before coercion, I chanted in my head like a mantra. Cooperation before coercion.

  Something shifted on the far side of the warehouse. Something big.

  The vampire shot forward in a dim blur, his long leather coat fanning out behind him, making him look like a linebacker with wings.

  I stood my ground. (Or by some accounts, I froze like a deer in the proverbial headlights, but who’s to quibble?) Before I could blink, he was almost upon me. My hands came up to defend my throat.

  Then the bloodsucking behemoth slid to a stop. His nose crinkled. “What the—?”

  “Hiyah!” A figure in black dropped between us, feet and fists blurring. Bone cracked against bone.

  The vampire grunted and lurched back, then wiped his face and reset his stance. His attacker shrieked again, her black ponytail dancing behind her as she hand-springed into a double kick to his face.

  He blocked her next blows easily. I sidled around them, waiting for her to distract him enough for me to escape.

  Finally the vampire dropped his arms. “Okay, time out.”

  The girl leaped forward and stabbed his chest with her wooden stake. He gaped at it protruding from his shirt.

  “I did it!” she gasped. “You’re dead.”

  His thick brown hand flashed to her neck. “After you, sweetheart.”

  He drove her backward, her heels slipping on the concrete, until she slammed into the crate. She gurgled and squeaked, clawing at his wrist. Her eyes popped wide as her error no doubt dawned on her. Vampires don’t die until you pull out the stake.

  Which I swear I was about to do when the whistle blew.

  Sergeant Kaplan stepped out from behind another crate, scribbling on her clipboard. Her slicked-back gray-blond hair glittered in the faint ceiling light.

  “Recruit!” She stalked toward my partner Tina as the vampire released her. “What’s the first precept of the Control?”

  Tina massaged the front of her throat and coughed out her response. “Cooperation before coercion. But he was—”

  “Were you asleep the day we taught defensive maneuvers?”

  “I was defending her!” She pointed at me. “He was about to attack.”

  “Captain Fox was clearly slowing down. Your blows were sufficient to stop him, but the staking was overkill.”

  “Overkill without the kill.” The hulking vampire yanked out the stake and tossed it at Tina’s feet. Then Captain Fox unbuttoned his shirt to reveal a thick flak jacket. The first two-inch layer was penetrable, to simulate a real staking. A red oval was drawn on the dark gray vest, indicating the location of his heart. Tina’s stake hole lay outside the oval. Swing and a miss.

  In real life, she’d be dead. If I’d tried to pull out the stake to finish the kill, I’d be dead. But if I’d run while he was taking a victory sip, I’d probably have survived.

  I was mentally filing this information when the sergeant turned to me. “Griffin.” Kaplan scrunched up her face. “Good God, what’s that smell?”

  I offered my wrist to her nose. “This new Italian fragrance, all the rage in Milan.”

  Kaplan took a swift step back. “That’s why Captain Fox slowed down as he approached you.” She gave me a begrudging nod. “Good thinking.”

  Tina shook her finger at me as she spoke to the sergeant. “Agent Griffin didn’t have her stake deployed.”

  “She’s not an agent yet, recruit, and neither are you.” Kaplan turned her ego-piercing gaze on me. “Why was your stake in its holster?”

  I straightened my posture to answer, banishing all remnants of smirk. A little piece of me died every time I gave in to the quasi-military bullshit. But if I didn’t fulfill my duties, they could
take away a much bigger piece of me, the piece that made life complete.

  “Sergeant,” I said, “a direct threat can provoke an otherwise harmless vampire to attack. I lack the fighting skills to defeat him, so if we engaged in combat, I’d be killed. I therefore concluded that the best strategy would be to deter an attempt to drink my blood.” I glanced at her. “Hence the pizza wipe.”

  “And if that strategy had failed?”

  I paused. “Offer him a bib and a straw?”

  “Yoosie lover,” Tina hissed.

  Captain Fox sent her a look that would freeze an open flame. I tried not to laugh at Tina’s bureau slang for vampire. “UCE,” pronounced “yoosie,” stood for undead corporeal entity. She’d never used the slur when she and Captain Fox were secretly sleeping together, back before she joined the Control and he broke up with her, per agency rules.

  “No one asked your opinion,” Kaplan growled at Tina, then spoke to me again. “Your flippancy is not appreciated.”

  I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. After three and a half weeks of orientation with the Control (shorthand for the International Agency for the Control and Management of Undead Corporeal Entities), I had failed to give it a sense of humor.

  “Furthermore,” Kaplan continued speaking to me, “you abandoned your partner in the middle of a fight.”

  “I was just about to step in and—”

  “Step in? He would’ve killed her before you could ‘step in.’ You must act without thinking. Defending your fellow agents must be a reflex, not a decision.”

  Tina and I exchanged a look, and I knew she’d never risk her ass for me unless she knew she’d get a medal. All the trust-building teamwork exercises in the world couldn’t overcome the fact that she hated what I was—and what I wasn’t.

  “However,” Kaplan continued, “you’re right about one thing. Losing a bit of blood is better than losing your life.” As Tina began to voice her disapproval, Kaplan cut her off. “Do you have a problem with our mission?”

  That shut Tina up. For centuries, the Control had been little more than a band of vampire hunters, bent on extinguishing the undead. But since 1897 (according to the IACMUCE field manual), the agency’s mission has been to balance the safety and well-being of humans and vampires.