Paen Scott is a Morovian Dark One, a vampire without a soul, unlike his brothers who are souled vampires. That does not trouble him overly much. What does is the fact that a demon lord is demanding that he find a monkey statue that his father promised the demon long ago. If Paen fails, he will lose his mother's soul. He turns to half-elf Samantha Crosse, a paranormal investigator to help locate the thing, never suspecting she is his Beloved. He doesn't even want a Beloved, but now he has one, and she will sacrifice everything to help and save him.

Like all of Ms. MacAllister's books, this is a delightful charmer. Her vivid imagination is revealed throughout, as she reinvents the vampire myth and concocts killer butterflies. You won't be disappointed with one of her books, ever.

Synopsis
Paen Scott is a Dark One: a vampire without a soul. And his mother is about to lose hers too if Paen can't repay a debt to a demon by finding a relic known as the Jilin God in five days.

Half-elf Samantha Cosse may have gotten kicked out of the Order of Diviners, but she's still good at finding things, which is why she just opened her own private investigation agency.

Paen is one of Sam's first clients and the only one to set her elf senses tingling, which makes it pretty much impossible to keep their relationship on a professional level. Sam is convinced that she is Paen's Beloved—the woman who can give him back his soul...whether he wants it or not.