One Foot in the Grave

“After yesterday, I have cause to wonder if you’re offering with ulterior motives, so let me tell you what will happen if any harm comes to her. I’ll cut you off from my line.” Bones took a knife out of his pocket and sliced it across his palm, his eyes never leaving Annette’s. “On my blood, I swear I’ll cut you off. And then I’ll offer a standing reward to anyone who makes your life an unbearable hell, do you understand me?”

Annette actually gulped. I couldn’t help but wince in empathy for her. What Bones had just promised her was worse than a death sentence. Annette would be open game for anyone undead and uncaring, and she wasn’t strong enough to protect herself. Throw in some cash prizes to any interested Dead Depraved, and she’d be truly screwed.

Bones arched a brow at me. “Now you can have Annette accompany you, and I’ll go after Noah.”

Poor Noah. The only reason he was involved in this to begin with was that he’d had the misfortune to date me. In fact, out of everyone, I was the only truly safe one in this whole messed-up scenario. Annette would protect me with her whole afterlife now, and Ian’s men would probably risk getting killed themselves rather than hurt their sire’s coveted new toy. That left Bones at risk trying to keep Noah safe, not to mention if Annette and I couldn’t beat Ian’s men, my three guys were in the most danger of all. Ian had said he’d kill one of them, for revenge and to prove a point. Tonight would decide everything, and suddenly I couldn’t bear to just gamble that we’d be all strong enough or smart enough to pull it off. What if we weren’t? Why should any of them have to risk dying to save me? After all, there was another way out. It only required my sacrifice, and I made the decision in a split second.

“Bones.” I came over and grasped his hand. “None of this has to happen at all. Ian only wants me because being a half-breed makes me rare, but if I’m a full-blown vampire, then I’m nothing special. So do it. Change me over. Make me a vampire.”

The howl of protest I expected from Tate, but the most emphatic refusal came much softer.

“No.”

I blinked in surprised anger. “Come on, dammit, do it! Or was Annette right? Does my body temperature mean that much to you?”

Cheap shot number two. Bones tightened his grip when I tried to tug free.

“You’re not leaping before you look on this one. Balls before brains won’t do it.” His refusal finally penetrated the rampage by Tate, who shut up and stared at Bones with disbelief. “You don’t want this, luv,” Bones continued. “You think you have no choice, but I’ve told you time and again, there is always another way. If you truly desired me to change you, then I would. You know that. But not like this. There’s no going back from this decision, and then even the most poignant regret is wasted.”

He pulled me to him, and his next words fell softly near my ear.

“And if I were really just so fond of your flesh being warm, I’d throw you in a hot tub each time before I shagged you. You’d be ninety-eight degrees in twenty minutes, vampire or no, so sod Annette and her nasty little comments.”

“Something could happen to you with Max,” I muttered.

Bones let out a snort. “Not a chance. You’re right-Max is too much of a coward to take me on, and if he did, I’d bend him in half the wrong way and deliver him to you in a box.”

“That leaves my guys. If Annette and I fail, I can’t just stand there and watch Ian kill one of them.”

Bones sat back, but still didn’t let go of my hand.

“There’s another way around that as well, if it comes to it. Once I’m free of Ian’s line, then I’m free to take my people-and my possessions-with me. You don’t like it, but the fact remains that in vampire culture, you’re considered mine by right of blood and bed. I’ll claim your men as mine, too. Ian couldn’t kill them then, not without risking war with me.”

“But you haven’t fed from or fucked any of them!” I burst. “And unless things are going to get downright freaky, that isn’t going to change!”

“I for one would rather die,” Tate muttered.

“You’re already covered, you sod,” Bones said curtly. “Annette is under my line, so when she shagged you, that gave her the ability to call you hers. Which then makes you mine by default, though I won’t be proud to say it.”

“What?” Tate asked, incensed. “I’m not some fang boy toy!”

Annette chuckled throatily. “But according to vampire laws, darling, you’re my fang boy toy if I say so.”

“You should’ve read the fine print before hopping into bed with her, Tate,” I said pitilessly. “You’ll be lucky if I don’t pay you back for what you did to me, and tattle to Don about it. Still, right now we’ve got bigger issues. Okay, Bones, if you or Annette bite Cooper and Juan, we’re covered if things go south with Ian?”

“Yes,” he said, ignoring Tate’s glare.

That worked for me. I didn’t want to announce myself as property to a room full of vamps, but if it was that or watch one of my men die…fuck my pride. Theirs, too. Life was more important than bruised egos.

“All right,” I said, standing. “We’ll go to the compound so one of you can bite Juan and Cooper, then Annette and I will take the guys to play bait and switch with Ian’s men, you and Rodney will get Noah…when are we all supposed to meet up later with Ian?”

“’Round midnight, Kitten, which gives you time, because between capturing Ian’s blokes and going to see Ian, you need to go to a spa.”

“A spa?” I repeated, like I’d never heard the word before. “Why on earth would I do that?”

“Because you need at least an hour in a steam room to sweat my scent from your pores,” Bones replied calmly. “If you go to Ian as you are now, he’ll know from one sniff that we’ve double-crossed him, and then we may as well just start the mayhem. Don’t fret, everything’s been arranged.”

“A spa,” I repeated again, shaking my head. That would have made my top ten of things I did not count on doing today, but looks like I had a date with a steam room. And Ian’s men. And Ian. And my father.

Tonight was going to be a busy night, no doubt about that.

THIRTY-FOUR

TATE, JUAN, AND COOPER WERE IN THE BACK of the van, handcuffed, with duct tape over their mouths and three unused rolls of it near their feet. This van wasn’t the luxury kind with the DVD player, surround sound, or heated seats, either. There weren’t any seats in the back, actually, and aside from the metal grille separating the two front seats from the rest of the vehicle cabin, the interior was as stripped as could be. Rodney had supplied the van, and from the looks of it, my guys weren’t the only people who’d ever been restrained in the back of it.

Annette drove. I didn’t complain about that, since it made sense, appearance-wise. Bones had told Ian he was sending Annette to deliver the hostages to his men, and Ian would have relayed that. I was supposed to be the bisexual fang groupie who was Annette’s date for later. The really horny bisexual fang groupie, since I was also supposed to suggest to the guards that they blow off a little steam with us. Neither Annette nor Bones thought they’d be hard to convince, since what danger would leaving three trussed-up humans alone for a bit pose to a group of vampires? None that they were aware of, which was the point.

“We’re almost there,” Annette said, her first words this whole trip. The hour-long silence had suited me just fine. Chatting with Annette wasn’t high on my list of priorities.

A new waft of scent from the back coincided with an increase in my guy’s pulses. The news that we were almost there was kicking their adrenaline into gear. Since we hadn’t had more time for them to practice with Belinda, I didn’t expect them to be able to pin Ian’s men long enough for Annette and me to secure them. But we were hoping Tate, Juan, and Cooper would prove to be enough of a distraction to make it easier on Annette and me. And for them not to get killed in the process, of course.

I inhaled again. It was such a unique thing to be able to discern emotions by scent. I’d inherited a lot from my undead father, but a heightened sense of smell hadn’t been one of those upgraded senses. Maybe when I saw him