Disarming (Reign of Blood #2)
By
Alexia Purdy
Blurb:The world has changed. One must adapt to survive or hold on to the crumbling shards of humanity.April continues to hold her fragile world together, but the ties that hold her family together are quickly unraveling. Rumors of a massive human underground settlement draw her to the shadows of the city once more in search of other survivors more like her, even with the hybrid vampires opposing her every move.The darkness hides secrets along with the continued threat the Feral Vampires create, but a greater evil hides within the city. Something tells April that the humans will be less than welcoming of her, and that's if she can find them before the Vampires do. Joining sides with the enemy might be the only choice she has left.
I really enjoyed Reign of Blood so when I got the opportunity to review Disarming I jumped at it.
This story picks up right where Reign of Blood ends...April is just fascinating. I love her character..her strong will to survive is awesome! I could never really grasp the relationship between Rye and April and now I completely understand. I wont give anything away...You will have to read it..but everything makes sense now.
I will say that I think Disarming was even better than Reign of Blood. You really get to know the characters and understand what they are going through. I also like the addition of some "old" characters as well as new characters. My favorite addition would be the new "Guards" and their leader Elijah. Another new character emerges from April's past and I enjoyed "her" as well.
This story has more action and excitement added to it. It had a great twist at the end that I really did not see coming and thoroughly enjoyed it! It was a refreshing take on the story. Needless to say I am excited to read the 3rd book! Looking forward to reading more about these characters and to see what happens next!!!!
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/268874
Alexia currently lives in Las Vegas, Nevada–Sin City! She loves to spend every free moment writing or playing with her four rambunctious kids. Writing has always been her dream and she has been writing ever since she can remember. She loves writing paranormal fantasy and poetry and devours books daily. Alexia also enjoys watching movies, dancing, singing loudly in the car and Italian food.
Connect with Alexia
Purdy
@AlexiaPurdy
Book
1: Reign of Blood
"Never tease anything that wants to eat you. My name is April Tate and my blood is the new gold. Vampires and hybrids have overrun my world, once vibrant with life, but now a graveyard of death shrouded in shadows. I fight to survive; I fight for my mother and brother. The journey is full of turns that I am quite unprepared for. And I'm just hoping to make it to the next Vegas sunrise..."
In a post-apocalyptic world, a viral epidemic has wiped out most of the earth’s population, leaving behind few humans but untold numbers of mutated vampires. April is a seventeen-year-old girl who lives in the remains of Las Vegas one year after the outbreak. She has become a ferocious vampire killer and after her family is abducted, she goes searching for them. What she finds is a new breed of vampire, unlike any she has seen before. Unsure of whom she can trust, she discovers that her view of the world is not as black and white as she once thought, and she's willing to bend the rules to rescue her family. But in trying to save them, she may only succeed in bringing her fragile world crashing down around her.....
Prologue
Resonating
THE DAY WAS fading and I stood staring out the car
window. My backpack was strapped to my back, even though it was extremely
uncomfortable sitting with it on. The window was cracked just a touch, and I
could hear screams echoing over from nearby streets. It made the hair on my
neck stand on end and sent a snake of terror through me. Who was letting out
those blood curdling screeches? What was happening? I had hitched a ride with
my best friend Sarah after a study session for a huge math final the next day.
I was as ready as I was going to be, even though I hated math with a passion.
Another screech
resonated across the houses, bouncing off the stucco and windows, making it
seem as though the entire world was screaming. My eyes widened as I scanned the
streets before averting my eyes to my cell phone, flipping through some
websites I had wanted to check out to distract myself from the craziness.
People were running chaotically, not a lot but a few. It just occurred to me
that there had been quite a few people clogging up the streets on the way home.
“What the heck
is going on? Some stupid rave we didn’t get invited to?” Sarah groaned as she
maneuvered around another crowd of people who kept jumping in front of the car
and jaywalking across the street. Some had bags of groceries, some with bottles
stacked in wheeled wire carts, tugging their load along as they flitted across
the street. I glanced up from my phone and shrugged, trying not to think much
of it.
“Probably, or
some flash flood warning again. It’s been storming for a week. The power
probably went down again,” I muttered.
“Oh, I hope not!
I don’t want to miss my show tonight! If it goes out again, I can’t DVR it for
tomorrow! Ugh!” Sarah cursed as another straggler popped in front of the car,
making her slam the brakes. “Out of the road, moron!” she hollered out the window.
I cringed at the glare from the man who gave the car a tap with his palm as he
continued on across the way. Road rage was not uncommon here in Vegas, and
Sarah was a poster child for it.
“I’ll stick it
on my DVR in case your power goes out. One of us is bound to have electricity,”
I offered.
“Thanks, that’d
be great. I’ll die if I miss another episode. I already don’t know what’s going
on.”
“You and your
vampire addiction.”
“Oh shut up, you
know you like the show, too.” Sarah swatted at me as best she could without
tearing her eyes away from the street, making it easy for me to block her hand.
“Hey! I do, but
I’m not dependent on them like someone I know. Can you say addicted? The first step to recovery is
to admit it!” I swatted her hand out of my way as I laughed at her. She gave me
an icy glare before weaving out of the crowd, gaining speed down toward my
neighborhood. A thump on my window made me jump, and I frowned at the person. A
woman with crazed eyes stared eerily at me as we passed. Was that blood
dripping from her mouth?
In a flash she
was gone, lost in the chaotic crowd. I shook my head. Studying had fried my
brain, because now I was seeing things.
“I’d want to be
a vampire if I could. They’re all hot, and immortality has benefits,” Sarah sighed,
thinking of the life she could have in her head.
“Careful what
you wish for, you might not like the fanged dental job or the bloody messes you
have to get into.” Arriving at my house just then, I jumped out of the car
before she could swat me again. I slammed the door behind me and waved at her
as she stuck her tongue out, rolling her eyes at me as I continued to laugh.
As her semi-new
Honda rolled away, the screams caught my attention once more. The sun had just
set under the west Summerlin Mountains, casting long, stretching shadows across
the valley and streets. The chill it gave along with the elevated humidity
coupled with the now cool September breezes made me rub my arms. I wasn’t sure
if it was so much the wind as the bone-chilling screams in the distance.
“April! Get
inside!” My mother’s voice brought my focus onto her. Hurrying through the gate
that cut off our property from the street, I helped her shut and lock it. She
looked as spooked as I was, and I waited until we were inside to ask her what
the matter was.
“Something’s
wrong.” Her wild eyes darted about the street before she twirled around and
made a beeline for the door.
“You think?” I
bit my lip as her icy glare pierced into me. I needed to shut my smart mouth.
“Sorry, Mom.”
“What’s going
on?” Jeremy’s voice made me turn toward the living room where he sat in front
of his Xbox, his game on hold in the middle of an all-out gun battle.
“Nothing squirt,
keep playing. You might beat my score one day.” I winked at him as he smiled,
turning back to his game, newly eager to beat it.
“The news said
there have been incidents… attacks.”
“What kind of
attacks?” I grabbed an apple off the pile in the fruit basket and bit down on
the sweet, bitter fruit. Crunching on my snack, I finally noticed the stacks of
canned food and water bottles littering the kitchen. My curiosity was getting
the better of me when I realized the windows had boards nailed onto them and
the sliding glass door had huge planks of plywood fixed across it.
“Um… Mom?”
“I don’t know,
they’re saying people are turning into some sort of zombie-like vampires,
pouncing on others, biting and sucking blood out of them.” Her voice cracked as
she shoved some more food into a cabinet, making a pathway to the hall where
our bedrooms were.
“Why didn’t you
call me? I could have come home to help.”
“Randy helped
us.” She looked up at me, knowing this statement would make me fume. “Besides,
the cell phones are cutting in and out.”
“Randy? The
plumber? Come on, Mom, you know he only wants you for one thing. That’s all he
wants, he’s a no good convicted criminal, how could you…?”
“That’s enough
of that,” she snapped, giving me a stern look. “He has done plenty for us. He’s
coming back with more wood to bar the rest of the windows and bring more water.”
She sighed. Her eyes looked tired as the worry made her wrinkles deepen.
“Water? Why? We
have the filter, we have water.”
“No!” She shoved
the cup I had grabbed from the drying rack before I could fill it with the
water. I looked at her, shocked and unmoving. The water was running, clear and
cool. The smell of chlorine permeated the air, reminding me to turn it off and
wait for answers.
“Mom?”
“Don’t drink
it.”
“Why?” her
silence made my temper seep into my chest. “Mom, what’s going on?”
She stopped shoving
paper plates and cups into another area of the open pantry and sighed. The look
she gave me showed me oceans of fear. This was bad, really, really bad.
“It could be a
virus, or the water could be contaminated. No one knows, April. People are
dying from it, too. The hospitals are full of bodies. People are keeling over
out of nowhere. Or turning rabid….” She ran her hand through her messy hair,
exasperated and looking extremely worn out. Her hands shook as she reached for
more supplies. “We have to stay here, inside, for a while. Be safe.”
I nodded slowly,
letting her words sink in as I glanced back toward Jeremy. I knew she was right. She always was. Mom was
as streetwise as a person got. She knew how to survive. She had made the few
dollars we’d had during hard times stretch to feed us. She had turned her side
internet business into a profitable one, bringing loads of extra income to
supplement her puny teacher’s salary. We had been able to buy a house with it.
She had been self-sufficient ever since Dad had died three years ago.
Still, he had
left an empty abyss in his place, nothing could fill it. Nothing ever would.
Not even this Randy, who had endearing aspirations of filling the spot. Nothing
could ever hope to replace him.
“I’m going to
pull the SUV into the garage, get it stocked with supplies in case we have to
leave suddenly.” She disappeared down the hall, leaving me suspended in
disbelief.
I solemnly
grabbed a bottle of water to drink, cracking the seal open and gulping down the
fresh fluid. The screams I had heard earlier crept back into my mind, making
the gooseflesh spring on my skin anew as the comprehension spilled over me.
What did this mean? A sudden surge of panic filled me as I remembered that
Sarah was heading back to her place. I had to warn her, had to let her know
what was going on and to load up her car and come back to my place. It was much
safer here, with high walls and wrought iron. My mom had bought it because of
the fortress-like feel to it, always so paranoid of intruders. Funny, I thought
she had been nuts, but maybe she’d had some sort of sixth sense about it. Her
uncanny intuition was scary at times.
Pulling my cell
phone out of my jeans pocket, I noticed the “no signal” symbol and moved about
the house until I found one or two bars staring back at me. Dialing her number
in desperation, I waited as the phone rang and rang.
Come on Sarah, answer me, please….
The familiar
beeping sound of her voicemail announcement commenced, and I cursed under my
breath, hitting the redial as fast as it let me. I kept calling until the
signal died once more, leaving me to wonder about and worry for my friend. I
prayed she had made it home safely. I prayed the chaos of the world had not
swallowed her up.
Excerpts:
Disarming (Reign
of Blood #2) Teaser #1
Testing out my
fingers, I slowly curled them into my palms, making sure it wasn’t obvious
enough for Miss Dictatorship to notice. If I could gain control of my body
before getting thrown into the cell, maybe I’d have a chance against whatever
was lurking in there. The sedative was strong and made me question what sort of
heaping dose they had given me. I hoped I would get a separate cell and
discover they had been joking all along. Come on body, wake up!
“No, not that
one! Put her in the cell with him.” The woman’s voice hissed. She sounded upset
but I was pretty sure it wasn’t completely my fault. “I brought you a little
snack.”
This was not
going to be pleasant.
Disarming (Reign
of Blood #2) Teaser #2
In the distance,
the snarls and moans of the feral vampires filled the air as they descended
from their daylight tombs. It sent a different kind of shiver down my spine as
I concentrated on breathing deeply, attempting to slow my frantic heartbeat
down. It was unnerving, sleeping in the middle of the city, surrounded by fangs
and death. I hated this and doubted I would get much sleep tonight, if any. I’d
just have to do without.
“Going to be a
long night, try to sleep some.” Rye’s voice was soft, but it did nothing to
soothe my nerves. The chair creaked with his weight as he came to sit near me.
“Okay.”
Disarming (Reign
of Blood #2) Teaser #3
Before long, I
could hear it coming. One scrawny straggler, inching its way toward me like a
tiger focused on prey. I must have looked incredibly savory, for it ignored the
beaming lights blinding its searing red eyes and headed right toward me. For a
half-starved beast, it was incredibly fast, its body looking bony and
malnourished. A growl snarled through its withered lips, exposing rotting teeth
and fangs. I took a quick step back before arching my sword right across its
neck, sending its head tumbling and spraying ink-black blood across the
cracked, muddy floor. Its body was left to twitch its last moments away near my
feet. I dodged the puddle it had created near me and crept farther down the
walls of the silent casino.
One down, how
many more to go?
Disarming (Reign
of Blood #2) Teaser #4
The woman, or
girl—he wasn’t quite sure for he hadn’t asked her what her age was, though it
seemed pretty certain that she was in her late teens, maybe early twenties—made
her way in easily. She slipped quietly into the rear of one of the main
greenhouses. It was lit up in there like twilight all night long with the full
spectrum of light slowly growing as daybreak came. It was sufficient to see a
lot of the floor, though the foliage and abundance of greenery would be
sufficient to hide her for a while. Elijah knew she had figured this out and
was now weaving her way through jagged rows of saplings, fruit and eucalyptus trees.
Her black clothing hid her enough that no one noticed the svelte woman dodging
people, sticking to the shadows and snapping quick, concise pictures of
everything she saw.
She’s studying us.
Elijah shook his
head, amused by this revelation. Of all things, this human was studying other
humans! Ha! But what for? What did she want to do with those pictures? Why
didn’t she just waltz right up to the door and introduce herself? She was
definitely human and might have been welcomed.
Or maybe not. He
frowned. Katrina was volatile and could decide she was a threat to the city
instead. And what if she was a hybrid human? Could she be?
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