Jeaniene Frost - Destined for an Early Grave

“Can I trust you not to kill him, Vlad, while I go inside and not sleep?” I asked.

Vlad smiled. “For a while, you can.”

Juan didn’t come back. Neither did Fabian, though it wasn’t eighteen hours before there was word. It came in the form of a phone call. Funny how terrible news usually came to me by phone.

“Cat.”

Juan’s voice. As soon as I heard it, I knew it was bad. He sounded so controlled. So forcibly gentle.

“I didn’t want to wait to tell you, querida …”

Vlad was staring at me. Tate was, too. Spade almost had his head on my shoulder to hear the report firsthand.

“When Fabian found him, it was clear that Bones wasn’t being held against his will. He, ah, indicated that he wanted Fabian to leave…would you pull yourself together, amigo ?” This was presumably to the ghost, since I hadn’t broken down. Yet. “Look, querida , Fabian said Bones was very harsh. Told him to sod off, or similar.”

I took a deep breath. “So you’re saying he wanted to be left alone still. Did—did he say for how long? Did he say anything about me?”

I couldn’t help it; my voice cracked at the last question. My heart was racing, and I felt faint, but at least my legs were straight.

“Sí.” Juan sounded like he’d swallowed something rancid. “Fabian asked, ‘How am I supposed to tell your wife this?’ and Bones said…”

Juan stopped. “Said what?” I almost screamed.

“He said, ‘I have no wife.’”

Spade snatched the cell out of my numb fingers. “That’s a bloody lie!”

“Look, I don’t like it either,” I heard Juan snap. “But he’s not lying.”

Spade didn’t stop fuming. “I’ve known that man 220 years, and I can tell you—”

“Let it go, Spade.”

He quit his ranting at my calm tone and gaped at me. “You don’t believe this rot, do you?”

I think I laughed. Hell if I could say for certain. “I guess after seeing satellite imagery and hearing eyewitness accounts, I’m going to side with yes. Answer me this—did Bones actually say he was coming back to me? Or did you assume?”

Spade straightened. “He didn’t need to write it down for me to know his intentions—”

Now I was sure about the laugh, and it was ugly. “In other words, no, you assumed.”

Here Bones had clearly told me it was over, but I still hadn’t gotten it. I’d clung to the scrap of hope Spade had dangled right up until the bitter end.

Annette stayed in the far corner of the room, smart. Spade hung up on Juan without another word.

“Cat, let’s get out of here,” Tate said. “You can go back to Don and the team. You’ve always got a home there. You don’t need this.”

I stared at him, cold reality intruding between the searing pain. That’s right, this isn’t your home. You don’t belong here. You don’t belong anywhere.

“No.”

I thought it, but I wasn’t the one who said it. Vlad brushed by Tate like he wasn’t there.

“Gregor’s shown he won’t let her go, and you can’t protect her from him. You’ll only get your soldiers killed, and her as well, in short order. She can come with me until she decides what she wants to do.”

“I doubt your intentions are honorable,” Spade said, his eyes glinting green.

“If Bones were concerned with my intentions, he’d be here to observe them,” Vlad replied. Tate’s protest wasn’t helping. The mood was quickly turning dangerous. “You’re guarding an abandoned lover, not your best friend’s wife. Why don’t you mind your own love life, since you were lax on that front before.”

If it were possible for a vampire to whiten, Spade just had. Vlad’s reference to Giselda, Spade’s fiancée, who had been murdered, wasn’t lost on me. Quickly, before things were beyond salvaging, I moved between Spade and Vlad. It wasn’t that I was worried about Vlad getting hurt. I was afraid that if Spade touched him, Vlad would burn him to death.

“Spade, whatever you may think, Bones made it crystal clear that we were over. It’s my fault I didn’t accept it. Tate…I can’t go back. There is no going back.” God, if only there were. “Vlad, what’s your price? Vampires always have one, so what do you want if I go with you until I figure things out?”

Vlad seemed to consider it. “I’ll take feeding from you as a fair price.”

“Agreed.” Or, Sold! to the vampire with the coppery-green eyes.

Spade crossed his arms. “There’s no way I’m allowing you to leave with him.”

Don’t get physical , I sent to Vlad, seeing his lip curl at the challenge. Spade is my friend, even if he is wrong. No snack for you if you toast him. That goes for Tate as well, since he looks like he’s about to throw himself in our path.

“Do I smell smoke?” Vlad asked, that little smile never leaving his face.

With that, flames began crawling across the walls. It looked like orange and red snakes magically appeared and grew. And grew.

Spade began cursing and went to the sink, filling the nearest containers with water while shouting for assistance.

“If you’re quick, you’ll have it out in no time,” Vlad assured them, holding out his arm to me. “Shall we?”

To stay would be to cause greater damage. The three of them would come to blows, I knew, and no amount of intervention would stop them. Tate already wasn’t rational. He grabbed Vlad’s shoulder—and then went flying up through the ceiling. Both of them, from the sounds of it. Rubble showered down amidst the flames.

Vlad didn’t even blink. “That’s a warning. The next one won’t be.”

I gave a last glance at the hole in the ceiling and the burning walls before I took Vlad’s arm, still reeling from the past fifteen minutes. “Let’s go.”

We got into a car that I assumed was Vlad’s. As we pulled away, there were four distinct ka-booms, and the vehicles in the driveway exploded.

“So they don’t attempt to follow us,” Vlad said in response to my stunned look.

Lightning broke across the sky. It was the last thing I saw before I closed my eyes.

THERE ARE FIVE STEPS TO THE GRIEVINGprocess, or so they say. Denial is the first. I’d had plenty of that since I left Spade’s. Then anger, and oh yeah, I was angry. Couldn’t even take a few days to stop and think about things, maybe let the dust settle? Oh no, not you, Bones! Back in the saddle, huh, cowboy?

Then bargaining, perhaps the most pathetic one of all, which kept me busy through the flight to our unknown destination. Let him come back. I love him so much, and he did love me. Maybe we can still work things out…

Fuck him! my anger said. I always knew Bones would go back to his old tricks. A leopard can’t change his spots, right? Doesn’t have a wife, huh? Who needs you, anyway?

If the vampire next to me was listening to my mental schizophrenia, he gave no indication. Vlad whistled while my emotions played Russian roulette. By the time he announced we’d arrived, I was into a state of full-blown depression.

Or, in other words, step Number Four.

The car stopped, and I heard people approach. None of them had heartbeats.

My car door opened. There was a light tug on my hand. “Keep them closed a moment longer. I’ll lead you inside.”

A minute of careful stepping later, and we stopped.

“You can open your eyes now, Cat.”

I did. We were in a long hall of some sort, very old-looking. High, high ceilings. Gothic in the very definition of the word.

Vlad smiled. “Enter freely and of your own will, isn’t that what I’m supposed to say?”