“You will be safe.” Michael sighs as if this entire conversation is boring and beneath him. “Now, if your little half-vampire and you are done with your tantrums, I have pressing matters to attend to.”
God, I can’t stand you. So pompous and rude! What’s worse is that I’m thirty-five and Michael looks about twenty. I know he’s not, but I don’t like being bossed around by any man, let alone one who looks so much younger than me. Everything about this situation pisses me off. Most of all, that I’ve lost the only man I’ve ever loved, and the person who’s taken his place refuses to kill Nice.
Fine. Don’t need him, I tell myself. But can I really catch Nice on my own? I haven’t the faintest clue, but I know I have to try.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Stop the vampire deceit train. I’m getting off! By the time we land at a private airport near Cincinnati, I have had the chance to do some critical thinking. Mostly, I’m beginning to think that Michael isn’t being honest with me about anything. My vampire emotions were clouding my mind. Now that I’ve calmed down, my librarian senses are tingling.
What’s he up to?
I poked and prodded at him multiple times during the flight, but he either ignored me or we started bickering, which then led to him also ignoring me. And, as any good Keeper will tell you, what people don’t say can be just as important as what they do say.
Michael doesn’t want to talk about where exactly Nice is going in Mexico, or how he plans to capture him at a bullfight, which makes me suspect that Nice isn’t going there at all. Good try with the whole cape story, Mikey!
Also, I’m not buying Michael’s story about him sending his men after Nice.
First off, Nice is one of, if not the deadliest vampire on the planet. No one knows for sure how old he is, but his reputation is right up there with Michael’s maker, Clive—a first-generation vampire, one of twelve.
Ironically, it was Michael’s maker, Clive, aka Cluentius Boethius, who started the Great War, wanting to bring law and order to the vampire world. It was also Clive who started the Uprising after regretting his choice to “domesticate” vampires and force them to live in a more civilized manner, blending in with humans instead of openly hunting them.
Clive’s dead now, killed by Nice in exchange for me. It was all set up through Michael’s right hand, Lula. She was also made by Clive and worked behind the scenes to stop her “father” and his Uprising. Michael, on the other hand, went publicly against his “dad,” so Clive wanted him dead. When Lula found out, she went to the only vampire who could kill Clive. You guessed it. Mr. Nice.
And what did Nice want in exchange for protecting Michael, aka killing Clive, and ending the Uprising? Me. Nice wanted me as payment.
Lula didn’t know I was pregnant at the time. Neither did I. But she thought she was killing two birds: stopping the Uprising by killing their insane leader, and getting rid of me, her competition. The truth was that Clive made Lula specifically for Michael, a mate to keep Michael company for all time. Lula never got over the fact that Michael friend-zoned her and fell in love with me.
Agreeing to let Nice take me was a decision Lula would come to regret as she watched Michael spiral into a dark depression. At first, after Nice took me, Michael was determined to find me, and he spent twelve months searching the globe. But back in the vampire world, everything was falling to shit. Clive was dead, the Uprising was over, but there were still traitors trying to undermine our system of governance. Then the council members—those who remained alive and weren’t traitors—refused to retake their posts. We were on the brink of anarchy and chaos again. Without strong leadership, the societies would simply hunker down and go back to the “every coven for themselves” model. That meant territory wars, the inability to travel for business, and humans at risk.
Michael had fought too hard and lost too much to allow that to happen, so he gave up searching for me and helped restore order. But I heard rumors he wasn’t doing so well behind the scenes. Some say he hunkered down in my library and hardly ever left it for four years.
It kills me to think about him sitting there day after day with my books, missing me. If I had known, I probably would have tried harder and fought to leave Nice instead of accepting my fate. But I always imagined my fierce vampire was off raising hell, living his life, kicking traitorous asses, and taking names. I figured he missed me; I just didn’t know that it was eating away at him, turning him into an empty shell.
I wasn’t there, of course, but vampires love to talk. About me, Michael, Lula, and Nice. We’re like the ultimate vampire soap opera.
In any case, I’ve learned that everyone fears Nice for good reason. He’s ancient. He’s fast. He’s strong. But I know how his mind works. I know how he makes everything into a game about seeking pleasure or entertainment.
I also know Michael. I heard stories about him when I was a girl. Then I got to understand him and love him. He thinks that if something important needs
