Vampire Seeker

Book 1: Samantha Carter

by Tim O'Rourke

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

300,000 books sold 4000 five star reviews Discover an underground phenomenon Discover Tim O'Rourke Samantha Carter believes a vampire is responsible for the brutal deaths of four women in London and finally she has the chance to catch him. Desperate to prove the killer's identity, she chases him onto a late night tube train. But Samantha doesn't reach the next station - instead she's pulled into a very different journey, back in time to the Wild West - where friendship, desire and even love all come hand in hand with deadly danger. To stay alive she'll have to work out who to trust - and when to resist temptation. For Sammy's nightmares are about to come true - vampires are real and more lethal than she ever imagined... "...Tim O'Rourke has ventured into the adult genre with a spectacular entrance. 'Samantha Carter - Vampire Seeker' is a whole lot of fun, not to mention some awesome new characters for us to get to know and enjoy. All I am going to say is chapter 23!!!! I do blush!" - Novels On The Run. "...O'Rourke has once again written a wonderful novel filled with mystery and intrigue, and it definitely piqued my interest and kept me guessing." - A BookVacation "...Sammy was shameless and totally consumed by the moment. I can't believe Tim wrote it!" - Talk Supe

Release date: August 15, 2013

Publisher: Piatkus

Print pages: 305

Sample

After more rejection letters than I could afford the stamps for, I decided to self-publish my books in March 2011. At first
things were slow but I persisted. Come September the same year my self-published books started to sell and by October 2011
I had sold over 10,000 copies of my books. This was more than I could have ever imagined in my wildest dreams and I wondered
when the bubble word burst. As yet it hasn’t and my self-published books continued to sell. By September 2013 I would
have sold in excess of a quarter of a million of my self-published books.


I publish my books from my kitchen in Buckinghamshire, England. Pretty much everything is done here. But it has taken more
than just me, an overactive imagination and my laptop to make my books a success. There are plenty of people I need to thank
along the way. Firstly, my beautiful wife, Lynda, who is brutal in her assessment of my work. She worries little about telling
me where I’m going wrong – she is my harshest critique. I’d like to thank my three sons, Joseph, Thomas
and Zachary for tiptoeing through the kitchen while I’m lost in my world of writing and Valarie and David Cooper for
their support and encouragement. A really special thank you to Patrick Taylor who gave me my first ever typewriter all the
way back in 1985 and would sit with me for hours and correct my terrible spelling and grammar. Cris Ramis, Marc Ramis and
Linda Ramis for being my second family and who used to read the stories I wrote when I was an acne ridden 15 year-old! You
guys helped me through a lot. Thank you. I owe a massive debt of thanks to Carles Barrios, for creating me the best of covers
for my books and for being such a great guy to work with (hugs!). Big thank you to Carolyn Johnson Pinard for weeding out
the mistakes! Thanks to Holly Harper for starting the Facebook fan club, you’re a star. I like to thank Ed Fenton who
was the first person outside of my family to read my work and gave me the confidence to believe in my writing – that
meant more to me than you’ll ever know. I would also like to thank my agent Peter Buckman who took a chance on me and
my vampires and werewolves. Thanks also to Harry Bingham for your support and honest feedback. And a special thank you to
Anna Boatman for believing in me.


There are so many people I would like and probably need to thank, but none so much as those loyal fans who have tirelessly
supported me and my books. Without you guys none of this would have ever happened and I can’t thank you enough. I love
chatting to you all on Facebook and various other sites on the internet. So I would just like to say a big thank you to the
following fans and book bloggers for your encouragement and unwavering support.


Lisa Ammari, Carles Barrios, Sharra Courter Turner, Louise Pearson, Louise Chapman, Caroline Barker, Shana Benedict, Jen Rosenkrans
Montgomery, Gayle Morell, Louise Kemp, Sally Cannell, Kerry Goddard, Holly Harper, Robbie Parker, Daisy Kennedy, Nicole Leonard,
Arista McKim, Craig McKim, Jennifer Goehl, Jennifer Martin Green, Nereid Gwilliams, Claire White, Michelle Wilton, Kiera Spencer-Hayles,
Kerry Anne Porter, Jane Barron, Ally Esmonde, Craig Phillips, Ben Munro, Cally Munn, Helen Websdale, Noreen McCartan-Doran,
Lekeisha Thomas, Sonya Avramoska, DiAnn Fields, Paul Goddard, Steve Boston, Lisa Darke, Gerrard Collins, Lois Li, Karen Neill,
Richard Ayres, Bree Pearsall, Aminah Ahmad, Sue McGarvie, Charlene Attard, Bernice Thomas, Stacy Szita, Ronda Lynch, Stephanie
Beckett, Maria Vargas, Jacqui Platts, Claire Graham, Mark Gallard, Michelle Harlow, Becky Fisk, Deanna Schultz, Andrew Patterson,
Amanda Patterson, Janice.A.Scott, Emma Rapley, Warren Bixby, Heather Braunberger Barela, Emma Graves, Paul Collins, Connie
Neville, Shawnette Hocson, Kay Donley, Jill Andrew, Peggy Ryan, Jennifer Bryson, Becky Lees, Teresa Walsh, Beth Husselbee-Orwin,
Hazel Pattison, Monique Bouvier Grasso, Sarah Curry, Rebecca Holloway, Sarah Parker, Jaala Larsen, Amber Mundwiller, Sharon
Ward, Toni Francis, Sheila Urbanski, Amanda Porter, Nichola Dickson, Judi Hargraves, Kayleigh Griffiths, Savannah Gavin Harrop,
Beata Janik, Louise At Readers Confession, Nikki Shreim, Tara Taggart, Micky Blue Skies Stewart, Lisa Rachelle Wolper, Kerrie
Watling, Kim Odaniel, Hannah Landsburgh, Tammie Silva, Patrycja Nowacka, Stacey Hoy, Courtney Jackson, Rosie Dargue, Conny
HK, Mandy Foster Meier, Tanya Bobrucki, Jackie McLeish, Wendy Wiegert, Barbara Grubb, Rose Lennart, Sarah Lane, Julie Garner
Shaw, Dollie Lemon, Eric Townsend, Abbie Robertson, Rachel Roddy, Claire Ashmore, Diane Hurditch, Carolyn Johnson Pinard,
Autumn Nauling, Silvia Roman Villanueva, Cherry Crawford, Erica Paddock, Jemma Wood, Shelly McKelvey, Cassie Sansom, Jenn
Waterman, Patricia Lavery, Alison Phillips, Jamie Harris, Penny McCoy, Lindy Roberts, Fiz Halliwell, Claire O’neil,
Sam Mcmullen, Lianne Lewis-Devillie, Stacey Tucker, Shelly Horner, Dianna Butler, Lisa Kresco-Churchey, Angela Hubbs, Heidi
Madgwick, Shelby Proudfoot, Fiona Nelson, Rebecca Smith, Phoenix 2000, Jessica Johnson.


A big thank you to the following book bloggers/reviewers:

Shana at bookvacations.wordpress.com

Darkfallen & Greta at Paranormalwastelands.blogspot.com

Braine & Cimmaron at Talkingsupe.com

Nikki Archer at vampsandstuff.com

Bella at paranormal book club

Caroline Barker at Areadersreviewblog.wordpress.com

Jessica Johnson Bookend2Bookend

Phoenix2000

I mentioned right at the beginning of this note of thanks that I persisted - and that’s the whole point. Don’t ever let anyone tell you you can’t.You can if you really want to!


Take care,

Tim O’Rourke

My name is Samantha Carter, Sammy for short, and the man I’m following stepped like a shadow from the alleyway and out
into the drizzle. He glanced back only once and pulled the collar of his knee-length coat up about his throat. I pressed myself
flat against the wall and gripped the bottle of holy water which I held in my hand. The other held the police scanner, and
I placed it against my ear.


“We have another one,” a voice crackled.

“What is your location?” another voice hissed, as if coming from another time.

“Braham Street, at the back of Sedgwick Court,” the voice wavered. “Oh, Jesus, he’s taken the head
this time. The body doesn’t have a head.”


I stepped out of the shadows and watched the figure hurry up Mansell Street. There was very little traffic. The only sound
was the shrill whoop-whoop of sirens approaching from the distance, and the blue and white glare of flashing emergency lights from behind Sedgwick Court,
where the killer’s latest victim lay strewn across a square patch of grass in the dark and falling rain.


I watched the man head in the direction of Aldgate High Street and followed. I’d had a pretty shitty week to be honest,
and something told me things were only going to get worse. Karl, who I had been seeing for the last six months, finally got
so mad at me that he left my flat, slamming the door behind him, and I hadn’t heard from him since. Not even a text.
The sex had been good, not mind-blowing, but he had been kind and had made me laugh with his goofy ways. Was I upset? Not
much. I had other things on my mind – like the man I was now following.


Anyhow, I’m only twenty-two, and who needs to be bogged down with someone else’s demands? Not that Karl was ever
really demanding, but he did get pissed off with me, as I always had a cigarette dangling from the corner of my mouth, my
head in a book, or I was searching the Internet, trying to prove that they really do exist. I’m not a cop or anything like that – no such excitement for me. But I do study criminology
at the City University in London. My other thing is the study of Vampires. Now, as far as I know there isn’t any university in the world where you can study such things
– shame really, as I know it would be my dream. Karl would say in a jokey kind of way, that I’d only take my head
out of the books if he were as white as a bar of soap, had fangs, and a set of claws.


But Karl just didn’t get it – not really. I didn’t want to shag one of these creatures – I just wanted
to capture one. I wanted to capture the one who had killed four women in the last three months across London. The press said
that ‘Jack was back’ as they believed that the murders were being carried out by a Jack the Ripper copycat. But
that was just crap. Sure, the murders had been brutal. Each of the women had been mutilated; their throats slashed open to
the point of decapitation, and then all had been stabbed several times in the abdomen. A lot of similarities, but that’s
where they ended. The original murders had taken place in 1888, when there was little or no forensic science. Offender profiling
was a science yet to be dreamt up. But today was different – very few serial killers got away with their hideous crimes,
but not this killer. He left no clues. In a city with over sixty-thousand CCTV cameras, the killer hadn’t been captured
on one of them. Not even a glimpse or a shadow. It was like he had just disappeared. There were other differences, too.


Apart from the fact that the murders had taken place on different dates and locations than the original killings, the wounds
inflicted on the victims hadn’t been made by knives, and there was no blood discovered at the scenes of the crimes.
How did I know this? Sally, who I shared my flat with, had been dating an officer from the Metropolitan Police Force. He was
a search officer who had been placed on the inner cordon after the second killing. During a drunken night of shagging, he
had let slip to her that the forensic teams at the scene had been puzzled by the fact that the victim had been completely
drained of blood. It was as if whoever had carried out the frenzied attack had licked up every last drop of blood. He also
confided in Sally that the wounds looked as if they had been made by a set of claws, instead of a knife or other sharply-pointed
instrument. Why he felt the need to tell my friend this while they were shagging, I will never know. But Sally was writing
her first-year paper on forensically aware killers, and she was real pretty – and she probably seduced the information
out of him.


Armed with this knowledge, I knew the murders were the work of a vampire. I know – crazy idea, right? But why? Is it
any dafter than those who spend their lives trying to prove the existence of aliens, Bigfoot, the Lochness Monster, pixies,
fairies – or whatever else turns people like me on? What I mean is, vampires don’t turn me on – but the
thought of proving they exist, does. What lengths would I go to get proof? Standing in a dark alleyway, late at night, with
a pocketful of garlic, a bottle of holy water in my hand, a crucifix around my neck, and a police scanner pressed to my ear
– that’s how far I would go.


A helicopter buzzed overhead, a single beam of light shining from its belly, lighting up the streets below, frantically trying
to locate the killer.


“To all units,” the police scanner crackled in my ear again, “the suspect must still be in the immediate
vicinity.”


“Do we have a description?” another officer asked.

“Not at this time,” the original voice came back, sounding frustrated.

The man in the long dark coat reached the top of Mansell Street, turned left on to Aldgate High Street, and disappeared from
view. With my heart in my throat, and the bottle of holy water in my hand, I quickened my step. I reached the end of the street
and looked right to find the man had disappeared. Then, as a marked police van raced down Aldgate High Street from my right,
I saw the man dart into the entrance of Aldgate Tube Station. Careful not to be hit by a night bus, I raced across the road
and towards the front of the Underground Station.


“We have a suspect running on foot,” an officer screeched through the scanner. Even though I knew they were talking
about me, I couldn’t give a shit. My sole focus was to catch up with that vampire. From over my shoulder, I heard a
police van speed up as it came racing after me.


“STOP!” a voice hissed, it hadn’t come from the scanner this time, but from the speakers on top of the police van.


I ran on, the entrance to the tube station only yards away now. I was so close, and nothing was going to stop me. I passed
a rubbish bin and threw away the scanner. I didn’t want to be caught with that. Pockets stuffed with cloves of garlic
and a bottle of holy water would be hard enough to explain away if I were to be caught, but a police scanner was illegal and
I would be in all kinds of shit.


The station concourse was empty, apart from a tired-looking ticket collector who stood by the barriers. They were closed,
and I fumbled about in my coat pocket for my Oyster card. The sound of screeching tyres was almost deafening as the police
van stopped outside the entrance to the station. Glancing over my shoulder, I could see the side door fly open as several
coppers clambered out. Each of them wore a military-style helmet, goggles, black overalls, and body armour. I gasped at the
sight of the machine guns they carried in their hands.


“Halt!” one of them roared, aiming his gun at me.


With a sharp gasp, I looked front and bounded over the closed barrier line.

“Hey, lady!” the ticket inspector called after me. “You need a ticket to travel!”

I headed down the stairs, my boots making snapping sounds which echoed all around me. There was a small over-bridge and I
peered through the grating and down at the platforms. Both were deserted. Then I saw him, standing in the shadows at the end
of the northbound platform.


With the sounds of the officers’ boots thundering down the stairs behind me, I raced along the over-bridge and down
onto the platform. I wanted them to follow me, but not catch me before reaching the man, the killer – the vampire. As I reached the platform, my long blond hair billowed back from my head as a tube train rattled out of the tunnel. It stopped,
the doors slid open, and I watched the man quickly step from the shadows and onto the train. I knew that I wouldn’t
reach the front of the train before the doors closed or the cops got me. Darting onto the tube train via the nearest set of
open doors, I looked back to see the armed officers charge onto the platform.


“There she is!” one of them barked, raising his gun.

Not wasting any time, I turned and ran through the empty carriage. There was a beeping noise as the doors slid closed. I glanced
back over my shoulder and could see one of the officers racing alongside the train on the platform, his gun trained on me.


“Stop the train! Stop the train!” he was shouting.

The train pulled away, and I watched the cops who were left behind on the platform. One of them started to bark into his radio.
I looked up at the tube map attached to the carriage wall and could see the next stop was Liverpool Street. I knew that’s
where they would stop the train. Knowing that I only had minutes to reach the vampire, I turned and raced through the carriage.
Reaching the interconnecting carriage door, I yanked it open and paused. For as long as I could remember, I had wanted to
prove the existence of vampires and I never truly knew why. But now, as I was about to fulfil my lifelong dream, I was scared.
It was like the realisation of what I was doing – what I was about to find – hit me, like driving your car head-on
into a wall.


With my heart racing and my stomach doing somersaults, I closed the door behind me and stepped into the next carriage. The
lights flickered off, sending me into darkness. I gasped and gripped the bottle of holy water. The lights came back on and
I peered ahead, searching for the vampire in the empty carriage. I couldn’t see him. With the train rocking from side
to side, I made my way slowly forward. When I reached the end of the coach, I peered through the glass window in the connecting
doors. The next carriage looked empty, too. Where was he? Was he on the train? Had he managed to give the cops and me the
slip, sliding back into the shadows at the end of the platform? Would those cops have even noticed him? They seemed too intent
on chasing me.


The train rattled through the tunnels, its lights flickering on and off, leaving me in darkness for moments that seemed to
last an eternity.


“Hello?” I called out. Now why did I do that? Did I really think he would suddenly appear with a big smile and
ask me how I was doing? I did it because I was scared and couldn’t bear the sound of my own heart beating frantically
with fear inside my chest.


I reached the last adjoining door. There was only one carriage left. Knowing that if the vampire hadn’t given me the
slip and was still on the train, he had to be inside this one, I slowly opened the interconnecting door. The train lurched
left and right as it raced over points in the tunnel. With only minutes to go before we reached Liverpool. . .