Excerpt: It Ends Tonight

This is from fairly early on, just as the action is getting going:

“What are you going to do about public safety? Now that the vampires are out in the open, what is to stop them from killing anyone they choose? What will you be doing in order to protect our families?” It was clear that the reporter was not directing the question at us, and from his accent, he was one of the American press.
“We will be looking into an alternative source of nourishment for… them.” The fact that he paused before saying ‘them,’ sent my instincts roaring to life. “In light of the evens that occurred on July fourth, and until such an alternative source can be found, we will be suggesting mandatory detainment for all vampires. Until further notice.”
Suggest, implied that we had a choice.
Mandatory, said that we were never getting one.
“What!” I found the word forcing itself from my lips in an outraged snarl.
They were actually considering taking every vampire from the entire world and locking them up! ‘Until further notice,’ no less. Not a chance. Absolutely not a chance in hell. I suddenly found that the fence I had been sitting on for so long was rapidly disappearing out from underneath me. If they went ahead with their plans, if they actually tried to detail all vampires, I could see us changing sides. We stood for peace between the races, there was no way that I could just stand by and let the human race attempt such an atrocity. No matter how many problems the vampires had caused for us over the years, they did not deserve being treated like cattle.
Throwing such a statement out into the public without even discussing it was perhaps the worst mistake that the human race had ever made. Did they not realise that vampires all over the world would be watching? The second they knew that it was even a possibility that they would be hunted down and detained they would react, and their reaction would be an ugly shade of red.
“This has nothing to do with you, young lady. They are killers, you have admitted that,” the President said, glancing at me for only a second.
“Like hell it doesn’t,” I snapped, gaining his full attention. “You cannot seriously be considering doing this!”
“I would thank you not to speak to me like that again,” he told me, his voice supposedly full of the authority he held. He sounded like a whining child to me.
“I will speak to you any way I damn well please, and I suggest that you think very carefully about your next actions, before you really piss me off,” I hissed, taking a single step towards him.
It took that single step for everything go from worse, to substantially worse. As if it hadn’t been heading in that direction anyway. I took a single step towards one of the most powerful men in the world, one of the most guarded men in the world. One of those guards suddenly decided that it was the perfect time to get a little over zealous with his gun.
I must have looked very threatening. All five foot three of me, including my heels. Stepping forward by a single step, towards a man that was easily twice my build and a foot taller than me. I was clearly not armed, wearing only a skirt suit minus the jacket in the summer heat. They had proof that I was not a vampire, and, as far as they were concerned, I could do no real harm to anyone. Yet, someone still decided that little me was threatening enough to warrant the ringing out of a single shot that sliced through my left shoulder, narrowly missing my heart.
My head was ringing as the impact from the shot sent me spinning to the ground. Though it could have been the screams that had erupted from the crowd.
Shot. I had actually been shot.
Bitten by vampires; that happened on a regular basis. Broken bones; more than a few. Ribs, leg, fractured skull and even my eye socket on one occasion. I’d had my lungs punctured from a kick to the chest, my shoulder torn open by the teeth of a vampire, and far more injuries than I had ever taken the time to count. But never in my entire life had I ever found myself on the wrong end of a gun. I hadn’t even found myself in the situation where I was in the middle of a gunfight before. Guns were for humans. Vampires used their teeth. Witches used their power. Weres used their claws.