He’d massacred a man like a butcher slaughtered a pig and felt no remorse. He’d done what was necessary, even if most people would never understand it. Evil had to be eradicated instantly, before it had a chance to grow bigger and turn into a festering cancer that could destroy an entire people. As it had once done while the world had stood by and watched.

They’d stood by until it was too late, until the worst had been done.

“I’ll make you forget,” Zane promised the scared girl and allowed his mental powers to take hold of her mind, erasing everything that had happened tonight, including the rape. When she woke tomorrow, she wouldn’t remember anything about the man who’d attacked her, nor the man who’d saved her from this monster.

Or was Zane the monster? Was he the one to be feared, the one who was evil for wanting to avenge what had been done to him and his family?

As he stalked through the night, the warm blood of his victim rapidly drying on his skin and clothes, once again the face of his torturer hovered before him, taunting him. He had to close this chapter of his life and find him, otherwise peace would elude him and happiness remain a foreign word.

Chapter Two

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Samson, the founder of Scanguards, slammed a newspaper on the massive desk in his study and rose. He was over six feet tall and slightly broader than Zane who was leaner but not any less lethal than his fellow vampire. He’d rarely ever seen Samson angry, but tonight his boss was fuming.

Zane glanced at the headline: ‘Monstrous killer cuts heart from innocent partygoer.’ What a load of bull! He hadn’t cut anything—those reporters should get their facts straight.  And his victim had been far from innocent. “He had it coming.”

“Did I say you could talk?” Samson snapped, his fangs descending in the process and peeking past his lips. “You weren’t thinking at all, were you? What was it, Zane, bloodlust? You couldn’t stop this time? You couldn’t confine yourself to just feeding from him?”

Zane’s heartbeat accelerated as Samson hurled wrong accusation after wrong accusation at him. “I didn’t feed off him.”

Samson blinked in surprise. “You murdered him in cold blood?”

Zane swore he could still hear the guy’s screams of pain and fear. The recollection caused his gums to itch, a sure sign that his fangs were eager to descend and come out to play. “And I enjoyed every single second of it.”

“My God, you have no heart.” Samson took an instinctive step back, clearly taken aback by his admission.

“I wouldn’t say that. For a while there, I had two.”

Samson pounded his fist onto the desk, apparently not enjoying Zane’s sense of humor. Zane didn’t care; he wasn’t Samson's court jester.

“Do you have any idea what risks you were taking? This could expose us!”

Zane lunged for the desk, bracing his hands on it. “What would you have done, huh? That fucking asshole was raping an innocent girl! At knifepoint!”

With satisfaction, he noticed the widening of Samson’s eyes. “Yes, that’s right. But you always assume the worst of me, don’t you?” Just as everybody else did.

“She was an innocent, and he raped her, just put a knife to her throat and violated her. What if that had been your wife, or your sister? What if somebody did that to your daughter? Would you then stand here, self-righteously talking about exposure? Or would you rip the jerk a new one?”

Zane thrust his chin up in challenge, and knew he’d won this round.

As a blood-bonded vampire, Samson was fiercely protective of his human wife, Delilah, and their two-month-old daughter Isabelle. He would gladly give his own life to protect theirs and wouldn’t think twice about killing anyone who threatened them.

When Samson closed his eyes for a moment and raked his hand through his raven black hair, Zane relaxed his aggressive stance.

“You could have made it a clean kill. There was no need to butcher him.”

“There was need.” He’d needed it. He’d needed to see him suffer. A clean kill wouldn’t have satisfied him. “Breaking his neck wouldn’t have hurt him. I had to set an example.”

“An example of what?”

“That evil will be eradicated; that rapists will pay for their crimes.”

“You can’t make an example of someone when nobody knows why you did it!”

Zane let out a sharp breath. “The fact that he had his pants down to his ankles didn’t tell you enough? What do you guys want, a sign around his neck that says ‘rapist’?”