Jeaniene Frost: Destined for an Early Grave

Then Mencheres gave a thin smile. “All right. I told you I locked Gregor away for planning to interfere with Cat’s future so she’d never meet you. What I didn’t say was that Gregor had already taken Cat away with him before I captured him.”

I jumped up. “I’ve never met Gregor before in my life!”

“That you remember ,” Mencheres replied. “You feel pains in your head when you hear of Gregor, right? Those are the stabs of your repressed memory. You’d been with Gregor for weeks before we found the two of you in Paris. By then, he’d managed to infatuate you and confuse you with lies. I knew I had to alter your recollection to fix things, which is why you have no memory of your time with him.”

“That can’t…but he can’t…” There went the hammers in my skull. He is not your husband…Sorry it didn’t work out with that other guy…it was at the Ritz on Place Vendôme…

“But vampire mind control doesn’t work on me,” I finally sputtered. “I’m a half-breed; it’s never worked on me!”

“That’s why I was the only one who could do it,” Mencheres said quietly. “It took all my power, plus a spell, to erase that time from your mind. A lesser vampire couldn’t have managed it.”

Bones appeared stunned as well. “Partir de la femme de mon maître,” he murmured. “That’s what one of Gregor’s vampires yelled at me before he ran. So that’s why Gregor is so obsessed with her.”

Mencheres was silent. Bones glanced at him, then at me.

“I don’t care,” he said at last. “Gregor can shove his claims straight up his arse.”

I still wasn’t convinced. “But I hated vampires before Bones. I would never have gone away with one for weeks.”

“You hated them because of your mother’s influence,” Mencheres said. “Gregor dealt with her first, compelling her to tell you he was a friend of hers who would protect you.”

Bones growled. “How far has word of Gregor’s claim spread?”

Mencheres considered him. “You haven’t asked me if it happened yet.”

I felt like they were speaking another language. “What?”

“Doesn’t matter. He’ll only get her over my dried, withered corpse.”

“What!” Now I jabbed Bones for emphasis.

“Gregor’s claim,” Bones said icily. “Now that he’s free, he’s telling people that sometime during those weeks you were together, he married you.”

Contrary to popular belief, there have been a few times in my life I’ve been speechless. At sixteen, when my mother told me all my oddities were due to my father being a vampire, that was one. Seeing Bones again after four years of absence, that was another. This topped both of them, however. For a space of several frozen moments, I couldn’t wrap my mind around a vehement enough denial.

I wasn’t the only one goggle-eyed. Even in my state, I noticed the other vampires in the van wearing astonished expressions that quickly turned blank after whatever evil glare Bones gave them. Mencheres continued with his same, uncompromising stare, and finally, I voiced the first coherent thought that came to mind.

“No.” Just saying it made me feel better, so I repeated it, louder. “No. It’s not true.”

“Even if it were, it won’t last beyond his death,” Bones promised.

I gestured to Mencheres. “You were there, right? Tell him it didn’t happen!”

Mencheres shrugged. “I didn’t see a blood-binding ceremony. Gregor claimed it occurred right before I arrived. A few of his people said they’d witnessed it, but they could have been lying, and Gregor’s honesty is not without fault.”

“But what did I say?”

All at once I was afraid. Had I somehow bound myself to an unknown vampire? I couldn’t have, right?

Mencheres’s eyes bored into mine. “You were hysterical. Gregor had manipulated your emotions, and he was being taken away to an unknown punishment. You would have said anything, true or not, to prevent it.”

In other words…

“Bones has stated his position in this matter.” Mencheres flicked his gaze around the van. “I support it as his co-ruler. Does anyone have a differing opinion?”

There were instant denials.

“Then this is settled. Gregor has an unsubstantiated claim, and it will be ignored. Cat cannot confirm the binding herself, and she is the only other person who would know if it occurred. Bones?”

A sudden grin flashed across his face, but it was as cold as I felt inside. “Let’s see how long someone lasts if they suggest that my wife is not my wife. ”

“As you wish.” Mencheres was unperturbed about the potential thinning of the herd. “We will arrive at Spade’s before dawn. I, for one, am tired.”

That made two of us. But I doubted I could sleep. Finding out that over a month of my life had been ripped from my memory made me feel violated. I stared at Mencheres. No wonder I’ve always had a problem with you. On some subconscious level, my instincts must have remembered that he’d manipulated me against my will, even if the exact memory of that event was lost.

Or was it?

“Why can’t you just look into my mind and see what happened for yourself? You erased my memory, can’t you bring it back?”

“I buried it beyond even my reach, so as to be sure it stayed forgotten.”

Great. If Mega-Master Mencheres couldn’t pry it out, then it must really be lost.

“I don’t care what Gregor or anyone else believes,” Bones said in a softer tone to me. “All I care about is what you think, Kitten.”

What did I think? That I was even more fucked up than previously believed. Having a month of my life forcibly removed regarding a stranger I might or might not have married? Hell, where did I start?

“I wish people would just leave us alone,” I said. “You remember when it was just the two of us in a big dark cave? Who knew that would be the most uncomplicated time of our lives?”

BARON CHARLES DEMORTIMER, WHO RENAMEDhimself Spade so he’d never forget how he’d once been a penal colony prisoner addressed only by the tool he’d been assigned, had an amazing home. His house was a sweeping estate with immaculate lawns and high perimeter hedges. With its eighteenth-century-style architecture, it looked like it was built while Spade had been human. Inside, there were long, grand hallways. Ornate woodwork along the walls. Painted ceilings. Crystal chandeliers. Handwoven tapestries and antique furnishings. A fireplace you could hold a meeting in.

“Where’s the queen?” I muttered irreverently after a doorman had let us in.

“Not your taste, luv?” Bones asked with a knowing look.

Not nearly. I’d been brought up in rural Ohio, where my Sunday best would have been a dishrag in comparison to the fabric on the settee we just passed. “Everything is so perfect. I’d feel like I was desecrating something if I sat on it.”

“Then perhaps I should rethink your bedchamber, see if we have something more comfortable in the stables,” a voice teased.

Spade appeared, his dark, spiky hair tousled as if he’d recently been in bed.

Open mouth, insert foot. “Your home is lovely ,” I said. “Don’t mind me. I’ll get manners when pigs fly.”

Spade hugged Bones and Mencheres in welcome before taking my hand and, oddly, kissing it. He wasn’t usually that formal.

“Pigs don’t fly.” His mouth quirked. “Though I’ve been informed that you found wings earlier tonight.”

The way he said it made me self-conscious. “I didn’t fly. I just jumped really high. I don’t even know how I did it.”

Bones gave me a look I couldn’t read. Spade opened his mouth to say something, but Mencheres held up his hand.