One Foot in the Grave

  I stared at him. He didn’t drop his eyes from my hard gaze. Finally I shrugged.

  “I believe in what I’m doing, whether you believe in me or not. I’m taking a week off to contemplate this and figure out my next step. When I come back, we’re having another talk, and this one will include Tate, Juan, and Cooper. You’re going to tell them about the consequences of the blood they drank. And you’re wrong about something, Don. It’s not vampire blood that corrupts—it’s whether the person who drinks it is corrupted to begin with. Hey, don’t take my word for it, look at the guys. They felt that same power, felt how different it could make them…and yet they didn’t turn evil. It doesn’t twist who you are, it only increases it, for better or worse. Remember that, but I have a feeling I’ll have to remind you.”

  “Cat.”

  Don stopped me as I kicked back the rubble to open the door.

  “You are coming back, aren’t you?”

  I paused with a hand on the frame. “Oh, I’ll be back. Whether you like it or not.”

  It didn’t surprise me to feel the change of energy in my house later that night. I was in the kitchen, heating up a frozen dinner in the microwave, when suddenly I knew I wasn’t alone.

  “It’s polite to knock,” I said without turning around. “My front door’s not broken, you know.”

  That feeling of power intensified as Bones walked in the kitchen.

  “Yes, but this is more dramatic, don’t you agree?”

  My dinner beeped. I took it out of the microwave, grabbed a fork, and sat down at the dinette table. Bones took the seat opposite me, watching me with tempered wariness.

  “I’m not bothering to offer you any,” I said flippantly. “My neck and I both know you already ate.”

  A hint of a frown touched his mouth. “I told you that wasn’t about feeding.”

  “No, it was about you making your point.” I skewered a bite and chewed. “Next time, maybe use something other than my jugular as your Exhibit A?”

  “It wasn’t your jugular. That would have made you pass out too quickly, and I wanted you to have time to make your decision to kill me or not,” Bones replied, holding my stare. “So I bit around your jugular. That’s why it took longer…and why I could enjoy drawing your blood into me instead of just swallowing a gushing arterial flow.”

  That made me hesitate on my own swallow. Bones’s eyes were swirling with green from the memory, like mint in chocolate, and if I were honest, I’d admit to an internal ripple of pleasure as well at the recollection. His bite could have passed for foreplay, it had felt that good.

  But there were more important things to get down to, even though my libido certainly didn’t agree.

  “So,” I said after I’d finished chewing. “You’re hell-bent on not going away until this danger with Ian has passed and you’ve neutralized whoever’s waving a check around for my corpse, right?”

  Bones nodded. “That’s right.”

  “And you probably followed me earlier when I went into work, just waiting to see if I’d try to fly the coop?”

  A shrug. “Let’s just say no plane would have made it off the ground there today.”

  My gaze hardened. “Then I suppose you followed me to Noah’s afterward, and eavesdropped on that as well?”

  Bones leaned forward with complete coldness on his face. “I normally would never harm someone innocent, but I admit to a certain lack of rationality when it comes to you. You saved that man’s life by breaking up with him today, because if I’d have listened to anything else going on at his house, I would have snapped him in half.”

  “You would have tried,” I ground out. “Noah doesn’t believe in vampires, ghouls, or anything more supernatural than Santa Claus. You’d better not hurt him.”

  “Kitten, if I intended to kill Noah, I’d have done it before you even knew I was in town. But you could hardly expect me to twiddle my thumbs and listen to you shag him. Remember your response last night when I kissed Felicity?”

  Yes, there had been that whole urge to rip her limb from limb. Vampire territorialism. It really didn’t care who was innocent or not.

  “Fine,” I acknowledged. “We both still have feelings for each other. You think it can work despite my job and my mother’s virulent hatred of vampires. Since you’re refusing to leave anyway because of Ian and the contract out on me…”

  He started to smile. “Are you waving the white flag?”

  “Not so fast. I’m saying we can take things slow. See if it blows up in our faces. I’m not saying declare eternal love for each other while I fall back with my legs open.”

  His smile deepened. “There are alternate positions.”

  Those words—and the look in his eyes—rubbed me like a physical caress. I drew in a deep breath. That’s why I’d decided on a celibacy mandate. No way could I keep a leash on my emotions if I threw sex into the mix. I’d be screaming out my undying love for Bones in five seconds flat.

  “Take it or leave it.”

  “Done.”

  I blinked, part of me not believing what was happening. Was this real? Or just another crazy dream, one of thousands I’d had about Bones?

  “Okay.”

  I didn’t know what to say. Or do. Shake hands? Seal it with a kiss? Shout “Celibacy sucks!” and rip his clothes off? There should be an undead dating manual—I was lost here.

  Bones cocked his head to the side, and then he let out a resigned noise.

  “Kitten…your resolve is about to be put to the test sooner than you expected.”

  Huh? “What are you talking about?”

  He stood up. “Your mum’s here.”

  SEVENTEEN

  I LEAPT TO MY FEET. “OH SHIT!”

  Panic made me try to walk without fully pulling my chair out, and I promptly tripped. So much for half-dead reflexes. Then I caught Bones out of the corner of my eye. “Er, what are you doing?”

  He had calmly gone into the next room to sit on the couch.

  “Staying right here. You just agreed to give us a chance, and I refuse to be shoved into a closet this time. You’re going to have to come out of the coffin with your mum about me. I should have forced this issue before. Instead, she found out about our relationship only after vampires murdered her parents in front of her. Little wonder she took it poorly.”

  “Took it poorly?” The memory of my grandparents’ death scalded my tone. “She tried to have you killed!”

  A knock boomed on the door. My mother had never been delicate.

  Bones arched a brow. “Will you get it, or shall I?”

  This had disaster written all over it. But from the set of his jaw, I wasn’t going to talk him into hiding. And he really was too strong for me to shove in a closet again.

  “Just a second, Mom!” I hollered. Then I rummaged around for a bottle of gin. Boy, was I going to need it.

  “She’ll go straight to Don,” I muttered.

  “Let her,” Bones countered. “I’m staying.”

  I gave him one last ill-tempered look before I went to the door. So much for slowly wading into this relationship—looked like I was about to swan dive right into the deep end. Guess there was no time like the present to see if Bones was right about overcoming our obstacles. This particular obstacle was more formidable than Don ever could be.

  My mother swept into my house as soon as I opened the door. She was already bitching.

  “—called Noah’s cell earlier looking for you, and he told me you broke up with him! Don’t think I don’t know why, Catherine, and I’m here to tell you that it will stop. This instant. You threw away that piece of murdering trash years ago, and you will do it again! I will not sit back and watch you turn into the same kind of hell demon that spawned you…”

  Her voice trailed off into a hiss when she spied Bones on the couch, watching her with what could only be called amusement.

  “Hallo, Justina,” he drawled. “Lovely to see you again. Won’t you have a seat?”

 
For effect, he patted the empty space next to him.

  She went from white to crimson in one glance flat. I closed the door and took a swig of my drink. Let the hysterics begin.

  She turned to me in a fit of wrath. “For God’s sake, Catherine! What is wrong with you? Did he put you under a spell again?”

  That drew outright laughter from Bones. He uncoiled himself from the sofa with effortless grace, walking to her as she stepped back several paces.

  “If anyone’s under a spell, Justina, it’s me. Your daughter put one on me five years ago, and I haven’t broken free of it yet. Oh, and you’ll be delighted to know, we’ve decided to resume our relationship. Don’t bother with congratulations—trust me, your expression is congratulations enough.”

  I took a longer drink from the bottle. Bones had obviously decided against killing my mother with kindness and was going right for the throat instead. Typical vampire.

  My mother’s tone was acid. “I thought you’d gotten over your whoring when you left him, Catherine, but it seems you only postponed it.”

  Bones’s face turned to stone, and he answered her even before I could snap out an indignant response.

  “Don’t you ever speak to her that way again.” There was pure warning in the whip of his words. “You can call me any name you like and more, but I will not stand by while you slander her out of your own ignorance.”

  She backed up another step, and something in her expression changed. As though she finally realized she’d have to contend directly with him and not just through me.

  “Are you going to just stand there and let him threaten me?” she demanded to me next, switching tactics. “I suppose you’d just sit back and let him suck the life out of me, too?”

  “Oh stuff it, Mom,” I barked. “He wouldn’t hurt you, which is a damn sight more than you’d do to him given the chance. Excuse me if I don’t defend you when you’re pissed that he doesn’t want you calling me nasty names. Must be that flaw in my character.”

  She shook a finger at me. “Blood will out, my father always said, and he was right! Look at you! You have debased yourself, leaving a good man for a filthy animal, and a thing not even an animal! Lower!”

  “I’m standing right here, Justina, and you’d better get used to it. You want to call me an animal? Turn your eyes this way then.”

  Bones moved in front of me until she either had to look at him or look away. My mother fixed her attention to him for the first time, looking straight in his eyes. To her credit, she didn’t back down under his stern gaze. She was many things, but a coward wasn’t one of them.

  “You. What’s your name again?”

  Her taunting allusion to his lack of importance made me hide a smile behind his back. She knew damn well what his name was.

  “It’s Bones. Can’t say it’s a pleasure to be properly introduced, but it’s about time, don’t you agree?”

  I could see her to the side of his shoulder. She let her belittling gaze take him in from top to bottom, and finally she gave a dismissive shrug.

  “I don’t agree, in fact. Well. Aren’t you pretty.” It wasn’t a compliment from the way it fell from her lips. “Her father was pretty also, just gorgeous. Of course you should know—she looks just like him. Sometimes I could barely stand to look at her for their resemblance.”

  A jab of pain sliced in me, because I’d felt that all my life. She might love me, but she didn’t accept me. Maybe she never would.

  “She might look like him; I can’t say,” Bones replied steadily. “Never met the bloke. But let me assure you, she has a great deal of you in her. Stubbornness, for one thing. Courage. A nasty temper when she’s upset. She can also hold a grudge quite well, but you’ve got her beat there. Over twenty-seven years later, you’re still punishing her for what happened to you.”

  That made her advance until she pointed a finger an inch from his chest. “How dare you! You have the nerve to throw up to me what one of your kind did, what you have no doubt done yourself, to my very face, you dirty, murdering fiend!”

  Bones stepped right up also. They were toe to toe.

  “If I were merely a murdering fiend, then I would have punched your ticket years ago. Would have made my life a measure easier, I assure you. You had her in shambles when those wolves came with their greedy little offer, and we all know why she took it, don’t we? It doesn’t bother you a bit that she’s been as miserable as I’ve been these past years, or that she’s had more near-death experiences than bloody Houdini. No, you sit back on your satisfaction that she’s out killing vampires instead of shagging one! Well, Justina, I hope you enjoyed your interlude, because it’s over. I’m back and I’m staying.”

  She gave me a fraught look over his shoulder. “Catherine! You can’t mean to stay with this creature! He’ll take your soul, he’ll change you—”

  “My soul is mine and God’s, Mom. Bones couldn’t take it if he tried.” I moved out to face her and took in a deep breath. Stand your ground. Now or never. “But I’m not going to let you or anyone else decide what I do with my personal life anymore. You don’t have to like Bones. Hell, you can hate his guts for all I care, but as long as I’m with him, you will have to tolerate him. So will Don and the others, or…or I’ll leave and never come back.”

  She just blankly regarded me, passing her gaze over each of us in turn. Then a gleam appeared in her eye. I laughed bitterly.

  “Just try it, Mom. Try to call my work and have him killed. You saw what he did to them years ago on the highway, and that’s when he wasn’t even mad! Furthermore, if anyone comes for him, I’ll kill them myself. No matter who it is.” I let her see from my gaze that I meant it. I might do anything I could to avoid that—but ultimately, I meant it. “Then afterward, Bones and I will disappear. Permanently. You really want that? After all, if I stay here with you and them, I have much less of a chance to want to change into a vampire. Take me away from all of my human support and…well, you never know.”

  I was shamelessly playing on her greatest fear, but she’d earned that. Bones’s lips twitched.

  “Look at the bright side,” he urged my mother with devilish intent. “If you let us be, she could grow tired of me in time. But forcing us to run gives me few other alternatives…” He dangled the sentence.

  “Like I’d believe anything you’d say,” she shot back. “It would be better for everyone if you’d just stake yourself and die for good. If you really loved her, you’d do that.”

  Bones gave her a jaded look and then let it rip. “You know what your problem is, Justina? You’re in desperate need of a good shag.”

  I downed a gulp of gin to cover the laugh that forced its way out. God, if I’d thought that once, I’d thought it a thousand times!

  She let out an outraged huff. Bones ignored it.

  “Not that I’m offering you one myself, mind. My days as a whore ended back in the seventeen hundreds.”

  The gin was abruptly sucked back into my lungs as I gasped. He did not just tell my mother about his former profession; sweet Jesus, let me have heard incorrectly!

  I hadn’t, and Bones went right on. “…but I have a friend who owes me a favor and he could be persuaded to…Kitten, are you all right?”

  I’d stopped breathing as soon as he casually admitted to his prior occupation. Add that to the liquid stuck in my lungs, and no, I wasn’t all right.

  My mother was oblivious. A torrent of insults erupted from her throat.

  “Filthy, degenerate, molesting sodomite—”

  “Isn’t this a proper flashback to her childhood? You’re more concerned with yourself than your daughter, bloody woman; can’t you see she’s choking?”

  Bones pounded me on my back as I coughed to expel the gin from my windpipe. The first breath seared me when it came. My eyes watered profusely, but at least I was able to take in another painful one, and then another.

  Reassured that I was breathing again, Bones picked up where my mother left off.

 
“Sodomite’s incorrect, Justina. Women were my clients, not men. Just wanted to clear that up; I’d hate to have you think something false of me. ’Course, if you don’t trust my recommendation for a shag, I reckon your daughter’s friend Juan might be up for the arduous task of—”

  “That’s it!” she shrieked, snatching the front door open.

  “Come back soon,” he called after her as she slammed it behind her hard enough to shake the windows.

  “She’ll go straight to Don,” I got out, voice hoarse from my accidental attempt to breathe gin.

  Bones only grinned. “No she won’t. She’s riled, but she’s crafty. It threw her a good one to see you stand up to her. She’ll stew for a while, and then wait for an opportunity. Despite whatever she’s told you, she’ll never risk you leaving her. She has no one else, and she knows it.”

  I wasn’t convinced. “You should still watch your back. They could send a team after you.”

  Bones laughed. “To what end? It would take a small army to corner me, and I’d hear that coming. Don’t fret, luv. I’m not so easy to kill. Now, do you want to wear that? Or do you want to put something else on?”

  “For what?” I asked suspiciously.

  “I’m taking you out to dinner,” he replied. “That is a traditional dating activity, isn’t it? Besides, your previous entrée is cold, and it looked none too appetizing when it was hot.”

  “But what if—” I began, then stopped.

  From his expression, Bones knew I’d been about to say, But what if we’re seen together? If I really meant what I said about giving this relationship a shot, then I’d have to reconcile Bones and my job. More specifically, I’d have to reconcile Don with Bones. Or quit—and hope like hell I wasn’t the team’s next elimination assignment.

  Now or never. “I’ll go change; wait for me.”

  Bones gave me an ironic smile. “I’m rather used to that.”