COUNTDOWN TO CRISIS   A serial killer strikes every twelve hours. A vampire takes lives at random. At first glance, these tragic incidents seem unrelated. But Special Investigations Unit agents Sam Ryan and Gabriel Stern trace them both back to a military base known as Hopeworth. Is the murder spree part of a cover-up? And are the vampire killings less by chance and more methodical?   The investigation takes an eerie, personal turn when Sam discovers a connection between herself and the victims—and a clue to her own mysterious origins. With the violence escalating and the danger drawing closer to home, the stakes are raised and the mission changes from seeking justice to ensuring Sam and Gabriel’s own survival. And the one person who seems to hold all the answers—about Hopeworth, about Sam’s past—is a mystery man she isn’t sure she can trust. They share a psychic link through her dreams, and he once saved her life, but he may just be the greatest enemy humankind has ever known. Keri Arthur , author of the New York Times bestselling Riley Jenson Guardian series, has written more than two dozen books. She’s received several nominations in the Best Contemporary Paranormal category of the Romantic Times Reviewers’ Choice Awards and recently won RT ’s Career Achievement Award for urban fantasy. She lives with her daughter in Melbourne, Australia. One Being a spook wasn’t at all what Samantha Ryan had expected. Long nights, sleepless days, yes--she’d faced that, and worse, during her ten years as a state police officer. In her time with State, the agents of the Special Investigations Unit had breezed in and out of situations, always on edge, always on the move, always looking like they loved what they were doing. So the sheer and utter boredom that filled ninety percent of her new job with the SIU had come as something of a shock. She sighed and shifted slightly, trying to find a comfortable position on the icy metal step. Watch the back door, Gabriel had said. Make sure the vamps don’t hit the blood bank from the alley. This despite the fact that, in the five previous robberies, the vampires had always gone in through the front door. So why the hell would they change a successful MO now? They wouldn’t. He knew that. She knew that. She rubbed her eyes wearily. She could hardly argue, though, as he was her senior and in charge of the investigation. And with intel stating that this blood bank would be the next one hit, she couldn’t argue with orders that were little more than covering all the bases. What the intel wasn’t saying was whether it was actually vampires doing these robberies. Hell, with recent estimates saying that at least thirty percent of newly turned vampires were unable to control their bloodlust, human blood had become a hot commodity. Combine that with the recent spate of deaths brought about through infected blood in all the major hospitals--leading to a proliferation of private blood banks where people could stockpile their own blood--and you had the perfect opportunity for those wanting to make a quick buck. So here she sat, in the cold night, on a cold step, waiting for robbers who weren’t likely to appear, while her goddamn partner watched the front door from the warmth of the car. Bitter? Oh yeah. He was certainly making good on his statement that he would never work with a partner. Whenever possible, he left her in her box of an office doing paperwork, or sent her on inane errands. This was her first “real” duty in the three months since her transfer, and she suspected she was here only because Byrne had given him a direct order to take her. The wind picked up, running chilly fingers through her hair. She shivered and flicked up the collar on her coat. Overhead, the starlit sky was beginning to cloud over. The rain they’d been predicting for days was finally on the way. She could smell the moisture in the breeze, could feel the tingle of electricity running through the night air, charging her body with an odd sense of power. Why she could feel these things was another point of concern, though it was one she kept to herself. There were only two people she trusted enough to sit down and talk to, anyway. The first was Finley, who was the head researcher for the SIU. While she didn’t really know him all that well--the only time they’d ever crossed paths was when he was doing either tests or research on her--he probably knew more about her than anyone else alive. Or, at least, knew more about her biology. If anyone had any chance of understanding why these things were happening, it would be him. But Finley was still on leave, recovering from the injuries he’d received in the bomb blast three months ago. The second person was her goddamn partner, and he was harder to nail down than a snowflake in a storm. And he wasn’t just keeping his distance on a professional level, but on a personal one as well. Given how well they’d gotten on during their investigations of her former