The Warrior Vampire by Kate Baxter

all dhampirs vampires?”
    â€œNo.” Ronan smiled at her attempt to deflect.
    She snatched a Ruger from a safe that sat next to the shelves of assorted weaponry. She ejected the clip and checked the ammo before sliding it home and thrusting it into Ronan’s hand. “If you insist on tagging along, you can at least make yourself useful. Or at the very least, protect yourself so I don’t have to.”
    Ronan stowed the weapon in his waistband, opposite the dagger. Whatever had brought him to Crescent City, he obviously hadn’t come outfitted for war. Unless … had someone divested him of his weapons? A tremor of anxiety rolled through him. Gods, he wished he remembered. “I’m touched that my mate is concerned for my safety.” Naya’s heartbeat picked up its pace, music to his ears.
    â€œDon’t call me that,” she quipped. “I just don’t want to have to explain how a dead vampire wound up on my turf when there aren’t supposed to be any left.”
    Ronan swallowed down the snarky comeback that would assure their verbal sparring continued. She got his blood up with nothing more than her smart mouth. A mouth he wanted to savor at his leisure. He couldn’t ignore the niggling feeling that whatever Naya hunted tonight was somehow connected to Chelle’s disappearance. Ronan was a fixer. He was good at it. And if he could only earn Naya’s trust, he’d take care of all of their problems and save them both a hell of a lot of stress.
    Chelle…?
    Gods. Chelle!
    â€œNaya, I remember something.”
    Her head whipped around, eyes wide with excitement. “You do? What?”
    â€œI know why I’m here.” His own excitement rushed through him like a spark. How could he have possibly forgotten his own twin?
    He could kill two birds with one stone by going out with Naya. She knew the town and the outlying areas. He could look for Chelle while earning Naya’s trust and showing her that he was capable of protecting her. He’d prove to her that she had no reason to be wary of him. In the hours since he’d woken up bound to her bed frame, Ronan had come to the conclusion that Naya was a strong female with an even stronger will. Reliance was a sign of weakness. She was the sort of female who demanded to be treated as an equal, rather than demonstrating her superiority complex the way that Siobhan did.
    He wanted Naya more by the second.
    â€œI came here to find my sister.” The first step to earning his mate’s trust: He had to confide in her.
    Naya finished closing up the gun safe and the weapons cabinet and studied him, her brow furrowed over her dark eyes. “Vampires seem to be coming out of the woodwork,” she remarked. “I’d know if there was another one of you in the city.”
    Ronan quirked a brow. “Would you?” He couldn’t help himself. Getting her riled by challenging her authority was just too easy.
    â€œYes,” she said. “I would.”
    â€œChelle isn’t a vampire. At least, not yet.” What would his sister think of his transition? He hadn’t had the chance to tell her before their phone call had been interrupted. “She’d appear human for all intents and purposes. She can tolerate sunlight. Silver. She’d blend right in.”
    Suspicion wrinkled Naya’s forehead as she studied him. “How is it that you’re a vampire and she isn’t?”
    How was it possible to be tethered to someone so different from himself? Someone with so little knowledge of what he was? Then again, Claire had been human when she’d tethered Mikhail’s soul. You couldn’t get much more different than that.
    â€œChelle is still a dhampir. I was only recently turned.” It was explanation enough. He would only give so much. Naya would have to quid pro quo if she wanted any more than that out of him. “She called me, said she needed my