CHAPTER ONE:
LOSING DOGS
1914 — 1932

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DELIA KNEW WHAT DEATH looked like. She was surrounded by it. Minutes old and sticky with blood, she'd listened with her head pressed to her mother's chest as her heart stopped beating. The chest was but a hollowed-out coffin when life left the body. Though she'd never truly remember it, Delia's instincts had created false memories several years later when she kneeled beside her father and pressed her ear over his heart, smothering the sound of her own breathing while she waited.

Life had not been kind to her. Her father's demise was just another injustice. At 3:13am on October 30th 1914, just a day shy of All Hallow's Eve, Delia had been welcomed and thus thrown head-first into the world. Her mother hadn't survived childbirth, an exertion her body had struggled through three times with only one success in her. Delia's father was furious. His younger sister, Grace, in her Christian wisdom, had tried to logically justify her sister-in-law's tragic end; after all, if the veil that separated the worlds of the living and the dead was at its thinnest, then it was to be expected that many unfortunate souls would be lost too soon.

But Charles Evenson wasn't a religious man, nor was he a patient one. He quickly searched for the next available woman to take his first wife's place. This was one trait that his daughter could admit she inherited from him. She clung to Esme desperately when Charles left for the war, yet even Esme — with her kind heart bursting at the seams — slipped through Delia's little fingers when Charles returned in 1919.

Charles never found her despite Delia pleading with him to keep searching. He soon got sick of the sound of her voice and dropped her on the doorstep of his youngest sister's house. What was supposed to be a weekend visit became five years of abandonment. Then, as Death did when families fell on hard times, he stole her uncle from her too. Passed around once more, Delia was thirteen and entirely uncertain of her place in the world, but for now it was back with Charles. She looked after him in roles that had been reversed. Cleaning up his vomit after he fell asleep from a long night drinking away his sorrows. Making sure there was food on the table when the daylight forced him back to the present, breath stinking of alcohol, head pounding, anger always brewing.

It was one of those nights when Charles was at his worst that the monster came. It was an overcast day followed by a pitch black evening. The moon was hidden behind a thick blanket of clouds. Just shy of tea time, the Heavens opened to drown their tiny Ohio town in rain. Delia prepared two bowls of vegetable stew then retreated to her bedroom once Charles had scoffed his dinner down followed by his whiskey. Fortunately, Charles was too deep in his own thoughts to pick her apart for once, so Delia made the most of the silence. She was acutely aware when it was suddenly broken.

Downstairs, almost smothered by the pitter-patter of rain on the roof, a glass had smashed. There were voices creeping up the stairs. She recognised one as her father's. Charles was loud and demanding, belligerent as he asked 'who are you? What are you doing in my house?' The other voice was male but subdued, brimming with quiet fury. It stopped Delia short before she could open the door. She didn't recognise it. With trembling fingers and a knot in her throat, she debated her options.

Her Aunt May hadn't raised a fool. Unlike the eldest of the Evenson sisters, May Nicholls viewed the world in every shade of colour. There was more to life than the black and white of her faith. If May was there that night, she wouldn't have hesitated to hide while urging Delia to do the same.

You never do know what men are capable of. Delia heard her voice clear as day drilling the sentiment into her younger brain.

So Delia hesitated. Deliberated until another glass cracked and she heard somebody yelp. Her feet moved of their own accord, skipping every creaky floorboard out of habit. Then she was at the landing, peering over the crumbling wooden rail at what she could only describe as carnage.

Charles was on the floor, overpowered for once by the violence his own hands were so used to unleashing. Dull blue eyes stared into the ceiling. Was that the last thing he'd seen? Something so simple and insignificant?

Looming over him with the knees of his trousers pressed against the shattered remnants of Charles' glass was an unfamiliar figure. He wore a heavy black coat stretched over lean shoulders. Despite being inside, his hair had been tucked beneath a hat. The brim slashed a deep shadow over his eyes but in the dark they blinked at her like twin rubies. Blood stained her father's neck. There was a bite mark on his skin right above the white-knuckled grip of this stranger's fist cracking through bone.

Bursting into tears, Delia fled for the safety of the bedroom she should've never left behind. She sobbed and sobbed, hating that she'd left her father downstairs yet praying the man who killed him wouldn't hunt her down next. He didn't. Delia was sure she heard a door click, as if he was deliberately making his exit known to her when his entry into the house had been silent and damning.

After that, there was only time and how Delia chose to waste it. One of the neighbours had heard her screaming and ran for the authorities. Nobody saw the man who murdered Charles Evenson. Part of Delia believed they didn't properly look. They deduced that it was a tragic turn of events, surely someone deranged — homeless, perhaps — or an ancient enemy of a man who only knew hatred in his dying days.

They never questioned the lack of blood in his body, but to Delia it was all that mattered. She was returned to Aunt May's care where she spent five years turning it over in her mind as Aunt May struggled to feed seven children. Delia would forget about it sometimes but like an old wound aching with phantom twinges of pain, the memory would always come back. Her brain twisted the identity of the man but Delia knew without a doubt that she would find him. She'd find him and let her mind stop spinning, for surely if she could answer how on earth vampires were real, the world as she knew it would make sense again... right?

It was Christmas Eve when Delia died and Aubrey was born. Beneath one of the loose floorboards in the room Delia shared with her three female cousins; Madelaine, Eirene and Alice — all three of them were younger than her; aged seventeen, fourteen and nine respectively — she had compiled a series of 'evidence' that justified the theories her mind had jumped to. Vampires were formidable demons to the devout like her Aunt Grace, who had taken her family to England over a decade ago and hadn't been heard from since. People would call her insane or worse. But Delia had to know. Humans were curious creatures. She wasn't the first and wouldn't be the last who crossed this line.

But on Christmas Eve, as she hid the latest newspaper clipping of another man drained of his blood in the next county over, somebody saw her. Aunt May's house was modest, if not a little rundown. With only three bedrooms, there was one for herself and then the remaining two had to be split between the children. Directly opposite the girls' cramped bedroom was the one belonging to the boys, allowing John, Victor and Evan — who were nineteen, twelve and six — a clear view into their room when both doors were open. Little Evan, as much as Delia adored him, was nosey at the best of times. He saw her and waited until her back was turned, then cheekily poked through her things. What he found scared him. He didn't understand it. Why was his favourite cousin looking for a monster out of a bedtime story?

Naturally, he ran to his mum, who promised him she would make things right.

Aunt May was waiting in the kitchen when the girls returned from their trip to the markets. Delia had a basket of apples perched on her hip while the other girls carried other items from Aunt May's shopping list. At first, they didn't notice the quiet but thunderous expression on May's face, but her unflinching gaze focused solely on Delia — and the various photos, books and newspaper clippings stacked on the table — slowly made them pause.

Delia's heart plummeted. She discarded her basket and crossed her arms, waiting with a defiant raise of her eyebrows for May to say something. When she didn't, she stated, "You went through my things."

"Evan did," May corrected, making Delia sigh.

Damn it, Evan.

"And I'm glad he did," May continued before she could even think of arguing about the lack of privacy. "What on earth are you doing, Delia Evenson?"

At once, Delia's three cousins winced sympathetically. Eirene, who was usually the one on the receiving end of May's ire, turned to leave the room but was stopped by May sharply raising a hand. She didn't even look at her daughters. Delia wanted to ask where she'd sent the boys but thought better of it.

"We're going to burn these," May declared before snatching up the pile and marching towards the fireplace. "And we're never going to speak of it again."

Delia threw herself in front of her. "No, you can't!"

She tried to reach for the papers but May only held them higher. She was a tall woman, willowy with curly blonde hair that stopped at her shoulders. Delia only came up to her chin and she hated it. Despised having to look up at her.

"Why?" May snapped. "Do you understand what would happen if somebody found out, Delia? The things they would accuse you of... our family... you're being foolish!"

"I have to know," Delia cried.

"Why?" her aunt said again, this time with more urgency. Delia hesitated, coaxing a laugh out of May. "For your father. My God, Delia!"

"You're telling me you don't want the truth," Delia scoffed, jutting out her chin.

"I know the truth! He was murdered. By a human, not a vampire. And it certainly doesn't come as a surprise!" It was quiet for a long moment, only broken by May's sharp breaths and the subtle movements of Madelaine, Eirene and Alice, who had successfully been kept in the dark about the secrets Delia had kept right under their noses. "You're not going to give up on this no matter what I say."

Delia swallowed. When May moved, she was ready. She threw herself onto her knees by the fire as May hurled all her work into the flames. She managed to salvage just a few pieces before they were swallowed whole. Smoke billowed through the room like the fog from one of her nightmares.

"Eirene, open the window," May instructed when Alice started to cough.

As Eirene complied, May turned back to Delia. Her stern expression faltered when she found Delia already gazing up at her through her eyelashes. Tears pooled in her waterline and threatened to overflow. At that moment, May looked like Delia's father. Both of them could see him reflected in the younger girl's gaze.

"You know I'm only doing what's best—"

But Delia didn't let her finish. May's hand skimmed her shoulder then she jolted away. She'd shoved past Madelaine and was out the door before anyone could stop her. The last thing she heard was May ordering her not to leave and then she was outside anyway, her frantic breathing drowned by the wind.

Once she was sure she was far enough away from the house that nobody had followed her, she stopped and tore to pieces those last few pages. Then, with ink-smudged fingers, she wiped furiously at the tears staining her flushed cheeks.

Stupid, she thought, knowing what her father would've done if he saw her crying. He'd always said that Delia was too emotional like both her mothers. But no matter what she did, she couldn't stop the ache in her chest and the tears kept on flowing.

She started walking again, her feet carrying her across the endless property that surrounded their house. The nearest neighbour was over a twenty-minute walk away. As always, Delia appreciated the privacy. She disappeared into the grassy fields, oblivious to the fact that she wouldn't be coming out of them.

It was where the bushes converged to make up a thicket of trees that she saw the figure. She was kneeling behind a bush but Delia could make out the curly mess of long black hair between the leaves. There was an odd sound rising in volume the closer she got.

"Are you alright, ma'am?" she called out, only for the words to die on her tongue when the woman turned revealing the corpse at her feet.

Red eyes. Red blood.

It spilled down her chin in a sticky river, pooling at the dip of her dress. When she smiled manically, her teeth were smeared with the same shade. Delia shrieked but the sound was silenced when the figure moved in a blur and caught Delia's neck between those crimson-stained pearly whites.

Pain.

Delia knew it every time her father raised his fist but this was nothing like it. This made her wish for the mercy of death. Was this how her father had suffered? Was he waiting for her on the other side of her agony?

"Please," Delia said but it came out as a gurgle.

She wished she'd stayed with May.

As the edges of Delia's vision started to turn black, something suddenly spooked the vampire. Her teeth reluctantly tore from Delia's neck before she fled, causing the skin there to tingle. Slowly, the feeling began to spread.

Maybe she was going into shock, Delia thought.

The next thing she knew, her body had slumped into the dirt beside the poor dead man who wasn't as lucky (or perhaps unlucky) as her. His vacant eyes were the last thing she saw before the darkness took over.

From that day on, nobody saw Delia Evenson again.