Outcast: Dante's Redemption: Universal Law, #2

By Ashlyn Mathews

A disgraced Demon Knight in search of redemption. A thief willing to do anything to avenge her family's murders.

When her grandfather and father are murdered in cold blood, vampire Slayer River Redding will do anything to avenge their deaths, even strike a bargain with the sexy-as-sin Outcast, Dante Everton.

As a common criminal, River can picture a life with an Outcast, the lowest of low in the hierarchy of creatures. But with Dante's regal posture and knack for commanding any situation thrown their direction, is he truly who he portrays himself to be? Or is he more off-limits to River's heart than she could ever imagine?

Stripped of his title as a Demon Knight, Dante will do whatever it takes to redeem himself in the eyes of the other Knights and their leader. Yet to get the evidence that will bring down a gang rumored to be trafficking children and killing Slayers, Dante needs a thief.

He finds help in the form of small-time thief, River Redding. Now he just needs to stick with his original plan without the complication of falling for the fiercely independent, secretive, and mouth-watering River.

Once his title is restored, he'll be required to marry a woman with money and influence. As a criminal, River doesn't fit the bill. Or does she?

• Language: English
• Publisher: First Bite Publishing
• Release date: Oct 5, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393456780

Ashlyn Mathews

Ashlyn Mathews is a registered nurse with an overactive imagination. Her interests and activities include taking a lot of pictures of her golden retrievers and flowers and posting them on social media (occasionally she’ll post pictures of her kids and hubby), binge-watching funny and romantic Netflix shows, reading books and magazines of various genres, eating a lot of carbs, and drinking A LOT of coffee. Hot, iced, blended… it doesn’t matter as long as it has coffee. For more on her romance series, visit ashlynmathews.com.

Book preview

OUTCAST

DANTE’S REDEMPTION

Ashlyn Mathews

First Bite Publishing

Copyright © 2019 by Ashlyn Mathews

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Cover design by Jacqueline Sweet

Edited by Adam Luopa

Outcast: Dante’s Redemption/Ashlyn Mathews -- 1st ed.

A disgraced Demon Knight in search of redemption. A thief willing to do anything to avenge her family’s murders.

When her grandfather and father are murdered in cold blood, vampire Slayer River Redding will do anything to avenge their deaths, even strike a bargain with the sexy-as-sin Outcast, Dante Everton.

As a common criminal, River can picture a life with an Outcast, the lowest of low in the hierarchy of creatures. But with Dante’s regal posture and knack for commanding any situation thrown their direction, is he truly who he portrays himself to be? Or is he more off-limits to River’s heart than she could ever imagine?

Stripped of his title as a Demon Knight, Dante will do whatever it takes to redeem himself in the eyes of the other Knights and their leader. Yet to get the evidence that will bring down a gang rumored to be trafficking children and killing Slayers, Dante needs a thief.

He finds help in the form of small-time thief, River Redding. Now he just needs to stick with his original plan without the complication of falling for the fiercely independent, secretive, and mouth-watering River.

Once his title is restored, he’ll be required to marry a woman with money and influence. As a criminal, River doesn’t fit the bill. Or does she?

Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.

~ Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

One

River

River sprinted down the narrow alley of Chinatown. The vampire she chased glanced over his shoulder and flipped her the finger. Smirking, she upped her pace and vaulted into the air, landing in front of him. He skittered back and stumbled into a vendor’s merchandise stand.

Grabbing him by his shirt collar, she hauled him against the wall of a building. I’ve heard whispers of you threatening the merchants.

Not true, lovey. They’re jealous. He pried her fingers from his dress shirt. My business is doing well and theirs aren’t. You’re new here. They think they have a sympathetic ear in a female Slayer. Why don’t you work for me? I’ll make it worth your while.

He skimmed his palms over her chest. River smacked them aside. Sympathetic? Or someone who can smell your filth under the sweet talk?

His canines elongated and his face contorted into something ugly and sinister. She clicked the heels of her boots together, and her swords shot out of their sheaths. She reached back for her weapons.

I suggest you leave the merchants alone. She shrugged. Personally, I’d rather you leave the city.

And if I don’t?

She took too long to answer. He shoved her aside and barged past her.

Yeah, that’s what I thought. Nothing, he said over his shoulder. You’re only one of a handful of Slayers left, lovey. There’s not enough of your kind to make a difference.

He swaggered down the street and disappeared into the night.

River gritted her teeth and let go of her swords. The vamp was wrong. There were enough of her kind to make a defining difference, but she wasn’t ready to play that card. Not until she separated truth from rumors, though the city of Huntington spiraled into further chaos with her delay.

After the king of Huntington was murdered a week ago, various gangs from outlying cities stormed Huntington and fought for control. Their first order of business: kill everyone that was loyal to the king.

The day after her grandfather’s murder, her father was dragged above ground and exposed to sunlight. He burned to death. In her nightmares, she could still hear his screams as she hid in a secret compartment he created for her.

Just in case, he’d said.

More than his screams haunted her sleep. She heard one word, spoken by her father in anger and disbelief.

Red.

Red. He was the reason she was in Huntington. She had come to get answers from Red about why he betrayed her father, his business partner.

Tears stung the corners of her eyes.

Her father might have been a criminal, but he was a good parent, encouraging her to spend time with her grandfather, though Grandfather had disowned River’s mother, his only daughter, for falling in love with a vampire. Grandfather demanded his bloodline be as pure as snow falling from the sky. Unfortunately for him, love had a way of messing with the best laid plans.

But Grandfather had done right by his only granddaughter. He made certain River would never want for a legal way to make money when he trained her in the crucial skill of hunting and apprehending any type of prey. If push came to shove, River could register as a Slayer with the Federal Oversight Agency of Recoveries, or FOAR, and work for retrieval agencies that had boomed after the Third World War.

Fifteen years ago, the Third World War started after Others—demons, werewolves, vampires, and everything else in between—revealed their existence with a live broadcast. The world plummeted into violence and turmoil. Four bloody years later, and with casualties in the tens of thousands, the war ended.

Vowing that history would not repeat itself, governments banded together, drew up pacts between the various creatures, and universal law came to be.

One important law was that no one should be turned, bitten, or transformed into a monster against his or her will. With the governments of differing countries overburdened by too many cases and not enough qualified personnel, private companies had sprung up to meet the demand.

Retrieval businesses hired vampire Slayers as well as Others, and humans with specialized military training to track and recover Changelings, while law enforcement dealt with the Damneds.

Damneds were those who went past the three-day mark, their chances at keeping their memories and personalities intact lessening as they evolved further into dangerous monsters, incapable of controlling their powers or their thirst for blood and destruction.

That was why the first seventy-two hours were the most crucial. If that Changeling was taken to a facility able to handle them, there was a chance they would regain their identity