But counting down to what?

     When Special Agent Brent Elliott arrives at her Chief’s request to protect Wynne and help investigate the murders, Wynne thinks that he is one of the most attractive men she's ever met, yet something about his arrogant attitude just rubs her the wrong way.
     Brent knows what is stalking Wynne, and why.  He is instantly attracted to her, but so are the Sarion: an evil race of shapeshifters who must breed with certain bloodlines of humans in order to survive.  Can Brent save Wynne from certain death and convince her that she is meant to be his mate?  Or has he finally found the one woman meant for him, only to lose her to shapeshifters who are almost impossible to track, or to kill?

     Time is running out, and the numbers are counting down.

     Will Brent and Wynne be able to outrun both their unwilling passion for each other, and the plans that Fate seems to have in store for them? Or will the Countdown run out?

Evil has a new name...

Variance: The Countdown
(Book One of the Variance Series)

     The rituals to enter the Blood Passage were harsh and extremely painful.  The Sarion knew his potential human carrier was on the other side, and with the Sarion race, the desire to breed was only topped by the desire to rule.  To do one, the other must be accomplished along with the seven ritual sacrifices.  He could sense a very strong carrier close by on the human plane of existence; a child out of her would be viable, healthy, and enormously strong… just what the future King of the Sarion needed in an heir.
     Fresh blood from a G’nor beast glistened in the circle around him, and a crystallized powder rested in his hand, ready to be sprinkled upon the still-warm blood of the ferocious beast.  A Blood Passage was never to be taken lightly… the pain of opening it and the endurance required to keep it open were sufficient to keep those unworthy ones from attempting it.
     He chanted the complex ritual, sprinkling the powder carefully, and felt his heart expand in his chest, as though it would rip through the fragile walls containing it.  At the height of the excruciating pain, a small sliver of light appeared within the circle.  As he struggled to maintain his equilibrium, the words of the ritual drifted off into a stunned silence.  The sliver of light expanded into a shifting, unstable rift between worlds, which suddenly engulfed everything within the circle, leaving only a smoking residue where the circle had been drawn.

* * * * * 

     The light blinded Wynne for a moment, as she saw a struggle between the two men and whatever they were fighting.  As her eyes adjusted, she saw a pulsing maw of black that was outlined in the most oddly colored light she’d ever seen.  The light flashed between a garish bright red, the darker color of old blood, a stained white, and black.  It looked much like she would imagine a gaping wound ripped into the flesh of reality would.  The shadows grappling before it drew her attention away from the Blood Passage.
     Brent and Thorne were fighting with long knives against a huge creature, something Wynne had never even dreamed of in her worst nightmares.  It was larger than the biggest bear she’d ever heard of, but covered in a stiff-looking dark fur.  A somewhat human-shaped head topped its shoulders, seemingly connected straight to them instead of sitting on top of a neck.   The creature’s head was huge, devoid of hair, and deep folds of flesh shadowed small eyes, a large nose and mouth, looking something like a human shar-pei dog.  Muscles were everywhere, bulging beneath a short, dirty tunic.
     It swung its arms at the men, knocking Brent into a tree, as Thorne circled around and attacked it again from the rear.  As the Sarion screamed in pain at the knife entering his back, Brent attacked from the front, pushing it towards the pulsing, bloody rip between the veils of the worlds.  Thorne pulled the knife from its back, and Brent quickly severed its head from its body, jumping back as a horrid greenish-looking blood spilled on the ground under the rift. 
     A blinding flash of light threw both men towards the cabin, slamming them into the wall and the Blood Passage collapsed in upon itself, vaporizing the Sarion and everything within a small circle around it.