Hidden in a toolbox, in the rafters of his four-car garage, was an envelope full of pictures taken by a private detective...They were pictures of a scrawny, boyish looking nine year old with a wide mouth and a tangle of brown hair...Her eyes were oblong and deep set, their color hidden from the camera by the slant of the sun. The angles and planes of her face were oddly beautiful just then, in that moment, frozen on Kodak paper. A hint of the woman she would someday become.

The wolf had begun hunting human prey. They were plentiful in the dark city streets and provided enough good meat to satiate his gnawing hunger. He was still very careful not to let any who saw him live. To do otherwise would displease the Master. He would only stalk those people that were foolish enough to walk alone in the night

Middling monsters died at the point of pitchforks, burned with torches, or at the butt of silver-capped canes wielded by angry, geriatric Poles. Middling people were dime-a-dozen, emptied souls, shorn sheeple, human husks. A good monster didn__ worry about what it was doing; it just did it. A true predator didn__ worry about guilt, or being popular, or anything. It just cruised along, living for the kill, surviving. A good person, well, she__ put a bullet in her head or weigh her feet down and throw herself into the Chicago River, holding her breath until she went to the sludgy, filthy bottom, and had to open wide and breathe water until she died.

Hi Maggie, it's nice to see you again,' he said, smiling so sweetly I thought I might need insulin.

I'm a five-hundred-year-old born vampire with an ever-expanding wardrobe, a serious cosmetics addiction, and enough outstanding Visa charges to fund a small third-world country.

She couldn't detach from him, couldn't catch her breath, and didn't want to. Not ever again.