One Foot in the Grave

“Come closer,” a voice beckoned.

It reverberated with echoes. Was that an English accent? I couldn’t be sure. My pulse sped up, and I went farther inside the cave.

There had been some changes since I’d last seen it. The area that once doubled as a living room was trashed. The sofa was in sections, and it hadn’t been a sectional. Stuffing from the cushions settled like snow on the floor, the television was smashed in, and the lamps had long since seen their last light. The dressing screen that had guarded my short-lived modesty was in pieces throughout the area. Someone had obviously torn the place apart in a fit of rage. Frankly I was afraid to look in the bedroom, but I peeked inside anyway, and my heart constricted.

The bed was reduced to bits of foam. Wood and springs littered the space and stood inches deep on the ground. Stones in the wall were chipped here and there from a fist or other hard object pummeling them. Anguish welled up in me. This was my doing, as surely as if I’d used my own hands.

A cool current parted the atmosphere behind me. I whirled around with knives at the ready. Staring at me with glowing green eyes was a vampire. Behind him were six more. Their energy thickened the air in the close space, but they were evenly distributed, if you could call it that. Only one of them crackled with an abundance of power, but his face was entirely foreign to me.

“Who in the fuck are you guys?”

“You came. Your old boyfriend wasn’t lying. We weren’t sure whether to believe him.”

This statement was from the vamp in front, the one with the curling brown hair. He looked to be about twenty- five, in human years. From the clout oozing off his body, I judged him to be roughly five hundred or a young Master. Out of the seven, he was the most dangerous, and his previous sentence scared the shit out of me. Your old boyfriend. That was how they knew about me. Mother of God, it wasn’t Bones who killed those people, but these vampires instead! What they would have done to him to make him talk both sickened and infuriated me.

“Where is he?”

The only question that mattered. If they’d killed Bones, I was going to turn them all into exact replicas of the mattress behind me. Indistinguishable from one particle to the next.

“He’s here. Alive still. If you want him to remain that way, you’ll do what I tell you.”

The other minions began to fan out, trapping me with the bedroom as my only exit. Since it was a closed area, there was no help there.

“Let me see him.”

Curly Hair smiled smugly. “No demands, girl. Do you think those knives will really protect you?”

When my grandparents were murdered and I’d rammed a car through a house to rescue my mother, I thought I couldn’t get any angrier. How wrong I was. The unadulterated bloodlust pouring through me made me tremble. They took my shaking for fear, and their smiles broadened. Curly stepped forward.

Two of the daggers flew out of my hand before I even articulated the order to my brain. They buried past their hilts in the heart of a vamp to my left, who had been licking his lips. He pitched forward before his tongue finished its insinuating path. More knives replaced those, and once again both my hands were full.

“Now I’m going to ask again, and don’t piss me off. I have spent the morning up to my ass in guts and I am low on patience. The next one’s aimed for you, Brownielocks, unless you show me what I want to see. Your boys might get me in a rush, but you’ll be too dead to care.”

My eyes bored into his, and I let him see that I meant every single word. Unless they showed me Bones, I was going to assume the worst and go down in flames, and by God, I’d see they went with me.

There must have been something in my gaze he took seriously. He jerked his head at two of his stunned lieutenants. They took a last look at their friend, who was slowly beginning to shrivel, before trotting off. One untwisted knife wouldn’t have killed the vamp. But two had done the necessary damage to his heart. In the background, I heard the clanking of irons, and then I knew where they had Bones. Hell, once I’d been chained there myself. Now I was sure I could hear a heartbeat. Did they have a human guard on him?

The leader studied me dispassionately.

“You are the one who’s been murdering our kind the last several years. A human with the strength of an immortal, the one they call the Red Reaper. Do you know how much money you’re worth?”

Holy shit, now that was ironic. He was a bounty hunter, and I was his mark. Well, it was only a matter of time, I supposed. You can’t off a hundred creatures and expect no one to get cranky.

“A lot, I hope. Hate to be on clearance.”

He frowned. “You mock me. I am Lazarus, and you should quake before me. Remember, I hold the life of your love. Which means more to you-his fate, or yours?”

Did I love Bones enough to die for him? Absolutely. Relief that he wasn’t behind this made me almost cheerful about my impending death. Any day of the week I’d rather die than suspect him of such cruelty again.

Sobbing brought my attention back to the situation. What was going on? A glance at my watch showed fifteen minutes before bomb time. Bones would have to get out fast before that missile hit. Lazarus wouldn’t be around to collect any cash. Maybe I’d tell him that before the timer ran out.

Something human and weeping was thrown to the surface near my feet. I gave it a disparaging look before turning to Lazarus.

“Quit stalling. I don’t need to see one of your chew toys to believe you’re all badasses. Really, I’m quaking. Where’s Bones?”

“Bones?” Lazarus said, his eyes darting around. “Where?”

Two things occurred to me at nearly the same instant. One, from Lazarus’s expression, he had no idea where Bones was. Two, the tear-streaked face turning up at me belonged to the lying little shit who’d seduced and dumped me when I was sixteen.

SIX

DANNY?” I SAID IN DISBELIEF. “DANNY MILTON? You’re the reason I had to drag my ass all the way from Virginia?”

Danny also wasn’t happy to see me. “You ruined my life!” he wailed. “First your freak boyfriend crippled my hand, then you’re not dead, and now these creatures kidnapped me! I hate the day I met you!”

I snorted. “Right back at you, asshole!”

Lazarus regarded me suspiciously. “He said you used to be in love with him. You’re just pretending not to care now so I won’t kill him.”

“You want to kill him?” Perhaps I was crazed with the knowledge that less than fifteen minutes remained, or maybe I was just fed up. “Go ahead! Here, I’ll help!”

I pulled the gun from the back of my pants and shot Danny at point-blank range. Lazarus and the other vampires were momentarily stunned at this turn of events, and I took advantage. The next rounds landed full in Lazarus’s face. I didn’t bother firing into his heart, because I wanted him alive. He had information for me, if I lived, and I emptied the clip into him while my free hand flung knives at the remaining five.

They charged me. Fangs sank in and ripped my flesh before I threw them off. This was a flat-out brawl, rolling around on jagged rocks, pummeling and hacking any flesh that wasn’t mine. I was acutely aware of the seconds ticking by as I struggled to keep my knives in my hand and their fangs from my throat. After all, it was one thing to die for Bones, whether he’d gone mental or not. Quite another to die for that sniveling prick Danny Milton. You could safely say I still held a grudge.

The last vampire was eliminated with a gouge to his heart, and my watch showed less than thirty seconds. Lazarus, not dead after a face full of silver bullets, crawled toward Danny. Danny, still alive, moaned helplessly and tried to back away. There wasn’t enough time to pump Lazarus for information, let alone kill him and rescue Danny. Barely enough time to do just one.

Without a moment to think, I grabbed Danny and tossed him over my shoulder, running flat-out for the entrance of the cave. He screamed at the jostling and cursed me between gasps. The timer went to zero just as