J.K. Beck – When Blood Calls

The first book in the Shadow Keepers series, published August 2010.



Attorney Sara Constantine is thrilled with her promotion - until she finds out that she must now prosecute vampires and werewolves. The first defendant she'll be trying to put away? Lucius Dragos, the sexy stranger with whom she recently shared an explosive night of ecstasy.
When Lucius kisses a beautiful woman sitting next to him at the bar, he's hoping only to avoid the perceptive gaze of the man he's planning to kill. But what starts as a simple kiss ignites into an all-consuming passion. Charged with murder, Luke knows that Sara is determined to see him locked away - unless he can convince her that he's not a monster. And that might mean making the ultimate sacrifice.


District Attorney Sara Constantine has just won a major case. She put a child killer behind bars for good, and is out to celebrate. Being kissed by a gorgeous stranger and taking him home with her, is certainly not her usual style. But she fell in instant lust with him, and just feels at home in his arms. In the morning he is gone, but she finds a bouquet of tulips on her doormat, and just swoons, remembering.
The next day at work, she gets promoted. Her hard work is noted higher up the ranks, and she is invited into Division 6, some part of Homeland Security. Little does she know she is about to enter a whole new world. Where the supernatural she has only read about, or seen in movies, is real. And they have their own judicial system, and she will be part of it. A lot of the rules are alike, in the human world, and in this new exciting one. But a lot is different, and justice is immediate and brutal. Can she handle that? She now learns her fathers murder when she was a little girl, was not normal. He was killed by a vampire. A vampire who walked on a technicality. She still has nightmares about it, every night. One of the reasons she doesn’t sleep very well, or very long.
Her first case will be a big one. One of the oldest vampires is accused of murdering a former judge. The evidence against him is strange, but true and overwhelming. But Sara gets the shock of her life, when she finds out Lucius Dragos is the very same man as Luke, whom she spend last night with, a night of passion she has never encountered before.
And he is a vampire, a murderer, just like the man who killed her father before her eyes? She doesn’t want to believe it, but it is true, and she will have to prosecute him.

Luke is surprised when he sees Sara, and relieved, as he thinks he can easily manipulate him. She soothes the daemon inside of him, and he is reluctant to do so, but he won’t hesitate. It was never his intention to get caught, he meant to escape just in time. But he had to rescue his ward first. And yes, he is a murderer, but he only kills those who truly deserves it, and mostly on demand of the head vampire. What he doesn’t know is, that Sara is one of the rare humans with a mindshield that is unbreakable. He won’t be able to manipulate her.

Sara doesn’t know what to do. She should refuse the case due to her personal connection to the defendant, but that apparently doesn’t matter in this world. And so she sets out to discover the truth, can she exonerate him? Did he really kill that judge, and if yes, then why? But Luke doesn’t really work with her, he clearly is protecting something, and Sara still has so much to learn about this new world.


J.K. Beck has created a great new world, with lots of different and original paranormal beings. I really loved those descriptions and hope to learn more about them. And still, I just can’t love this book, mainly because of Sara.
She is an attorney, getting killers behind bars, serving justice, is her whole life. She knows Luke is a vampire, a murderer. And still she is attracted to him, and risks everything she is to be with him. Even when he has escaped his attorney and shows up in her apartment, and she lets him make love to her. He is everything she loathes, and still she can’t stay away from him. And that just doesn’t make sense to me. It was only one night! She keeps helping him. And Luke/Lucius keeps getting to her. He is attracted to her like never before, even his daemon likes her. So why does he keep using her.
And the ending, well, just unacceptable to me.

I will read the next book (I have all three and pre-ordered the next three a few months ago, so I will have to), and I hope it will be better than this one. Maybe my mood prevented me from enjoying it more. I sure like the world building. Just not the main characters.

6 stars