She said nothing. Neither did he. At least, not with words. His gaze told her how frustrating and unforgettable she was, especially while the breeze played with the tendrils of hair that had come loose from its elegant updo. Her bolero jacket did little to hide the long, tempting line of her throat, and each accelerated breath swelled her breasts against her snug lace bodice like the rise and fall of stormy seas.

  She swallowed hard, looking away when her gaze began filling with the same need that made him barely able to restrain himself. Then, she took another swallow of gin.

  “We have to get back to the reception,” she said in a newly unsteady tone.

  Yes, they did. Before he decided that talking was very, very overrated. But first…

  “Mind if I have a drop from your bottle?”

  Her brow furrowed since she knew his chosen spirit was whisky, not gin. Still, she handed it to him.

  Bones slid his tongue over the red streaks marring the glass instead of drinking its contents. His nerve endings erupted at the taste of her blood-so sharply sweet and addictive, just like she was. He’d only drank from her once before, and the memory filled him with the same fire he saw in her gaze as she watched, her breath coming faster while her scent ripened until it nearly begged him to taste her lips next.

  Oh, I will, Kitten. But not now.

  He handed the bottle back once he’d licked away every drop of her blood from it. Her fingers trembled as she took it.

  “Still going to pretend there’s nothing between us?” Bones asked in a heated whisper.

  A helpless sort of desperation lit her gaze before angry denial covered it. “There isn’t. Go hit on Felicity instead. Good news: I hear she’s easy.”

  With that, she tried to sweep by him. Bones caught her hand and held it, ignoring her angry tugs to get away.

  “Stop that,” he said while pulling out his knife.

  Her brows shot up.

  He bit back a derisive snort. No, I’m not going to stab you for your cruel directive. I’ll repay that another way.

  He scored his palm with the blade and pressed her open cut to his welling wound. Her failure to instantly heal was another of her human traits. When she tugged away again, he let her go.

  She watched as his blood healed her cut until only the red smear on her palm remained to show that it had ever been there. Then, she looked at him and didn’t look away.

  He stared back, still feeling the heat from her skin while tasting her blood on his tongue. Both made him want to kiss her until she admitted what her scent, eyes, and pulse all screamed at him, but he didn’t. First, she had to admit to herself that she still wanted him, and he knew how to make her.

  Brace yourself, Kitten. I’m calling your bluff.

  “Weren’t you leaving?” he asked with an arched brow.

  After a final, confused look, she did.

  Bones waited a few minutes before returning to the ballroom. Then, he ignored Cat and focused on Felicity.

  “Good news, luv,” he said with his most charming smile. “I do dance as well as I look.”

  12

  The reception lasted three hours. Bones focused on Felicity the entire time…except for one brief exchange about halfway through. When Cat was occupied with Denise and her mum, Bones passed by Noah and whispered “Rumpelstiltskin” near his ear.

  The single word activated a previously-planted subconscious directive. Ten minutes later, Noah was apologizing to Cat, Denise, and Randy while hurrying out the door. Noah, an on-call veterinarian, believed there was an animal emergency at his clinic. He’d stay there the rest of the night believing it, too.

  Without Noah to distract her, Cat barely managed to conceal how she stared at Bones while he drank, danced, and laughed with Felicity. As the night wore on, Cat’s scent became so singed with anger that she could have set off the smoke alarms, but she still did nothing to interfere. Randy and Denise had just left when Felicity took Bones’s hand with a sultry smile.

  “Come here, gorgeous. I have something to show you.”

  He wasn’t interested in whatever it was, but Cat obviously needed more incentive. So, Bones let Felicity lead him out of the ballroom and onto the patio. The lights were out in the furthest corner, and once they were encased in shadows, Felicity pushed herself aggressively against him.

  “I’ve wanted to do this all night,” she muttered, and tried to pull his head down to hers.

  “Stop,” Bones said with a flash of green in his gaze.

  Felicity froze, her arms still around his neck. Bones sent his senses outward. Would Cat seek them out? Or was she still clinging to her denial?

  Moments later, Bones heard the clatter of high heels coming toward the patio, in strides too long to be someone on a casual stroll. Cat’s jealousy had finally gotten the better of her.

  “Continue,” Bones whispered to Felicity.

  She all but yanked his head down to hers. Bones’s lips had barely brushed Felicity’s when those footsteps came to an abrupt halt, and he heard Cat gasp. He looked up, guilt and triumph mingling as he saw utter devastation on her features. Then, green fire burst from Cat’s gaze. The sight would have terrified Felicity if she hadn’t been facing the other way. For an instant, Bones thought she might actually attack Felicity. Then, Cat spun around and ran as if hell itself chased her.

  Bones broke the kiss, holding Felicity back when she tried to prolong it. “You’re no longer interested in me,” Bones said with another flash of green. “You’ve decided you can do better.”

  Felicity backed up at once, saying, “Yeah…I’ve gotta go.”

  “As do I,” Bones said with the briefest nod, and headed back toward the ballroom.

  He’d only made it a few feet when he heard a car’s tires screech as it peeled out of the parking lot. Blast it, Cat was already speeding away! No time for him to get his own ride now. He’d have to follow her another way.

  Bones returned to the patio. Then, covered by the shadows and his black-on-black tuxedo, he flew.

  Cat’s distinctive black Volvo was easy to follow. She didn’t drive home, though. She drove nearly an hour away to a nightclub, of all things. Bones noted which one, and then flew elsewhere in order to land without being spotted. The club was surrounded by too many lights and people.

  Barely ten minutes passed before Bones walked up to the bouncer at the entrance. The hostile look he received was replaced by a smile as Bones pressed two large bills into the bouncer’s hand. Then, he was ushered inside the club.

  Several cages were elevated above the dance floor, and they boasted scantily clad dancers gyrating to the deafening beat. Bones checked the bars first, but Cat wasn’t there. She also wasn’t on the dance floor, and with so many people wearing cologne and perfume, it was impossible to track her by scent.

  If she hadn’t come to drink or dance, why was she here?

  The answer came when he felt a blast of supernatural energy coming from the back of the club. Of course. Cat had looked angry enough to kill when she saw him kiss Felicity, so she’d come here to do exactly that.

  Bones followed that energy to a door marked “maintenance” next to the bathrooms. The lock was broken, and, no surprise, it wasn’t a maintenance room. It led to a narrow hallway with no lights and another door at the end of it. That lock was broken, too, and Bones slipped inside while silently cursing the fact that he only had one silver knife. Normally, he never went anywhere without several weapons, but the last thing he’d intended to do tonight was go vampire hunting!

  The noise from the club faded as soon as he was inside the new room. Must be soundproofed. It looked like a small, normal office, but the scent of blood and death came from an open door that led to yet another room. A young blonde woman stood in the doorway. Her back was to Bones as she sighted down a gun’s barrel, thumbing back the hammer to pull the trigger.

  Bones heard Cat in there and didn’t hesitate. He flung his silver knife deep into the blonde’s heart. She dropped like a stone, and only when he caught the sound of her heart stuttering to a stop did he realize that she was a human.

  No matter. Bullets wouldn’t work on vampires, so she’d been aiming at either Cat or another human. Bones rushed by her body and went into the next room. Red streaks decorated the walls, as if a Jackson Pollock imitator had been given only one color to paint with. Several bodies were strewn on the floor, both human and vampire, and there was also a ghost here, of all things.

  Cat was in the center of the mayhem, clad in only a bustier, knickers, and knife sheaths on her thighs. She yanked a vampire’s head off with a vicious twist and then whirled, sensing Bones’s gaze. When she saw him, she lowered her knives.

  “You forgot one,” Bones said in lieu of hello.

  She glanced around. “Who?”

  “The bitch sneaking behind you with a gun.” Had Cat not seen her before? Or had Cat dismissed her because she was human? “She’s not a threat any longer,” Bones added with a brief smile.

  She kicked the headless vampire aside. “Three of these girls are still alive, but they’re in bad shape. Give them blood. Yours will work better than what I have to offer.”

  Bones accepted the knife Cat gave him and he sliced his palm, the silver burning long after the blade left his skin. The wound didn’t heal as quickly, either, giving Bones time to drip his blood into the mouths of the three girls. The ghost fluttered around the last one, trying to touch her even though his hands kept going through her. Bones saw the ghost’s body nearby, and it was still warm. Poor lad barely looked out of his teens, and he’d been murdered less than an hour ago. Cat had arrived in time to avenge him, but not to save him.

  The ghost chewed on the stud in his lower lip before asking, “Will she be okay?”

  Cat listened to the girl’s heartbeat, which had grown steadier after Bones made her swallow several drops of blood.

  “Yeah. She will be now,” Cat said with a relieved smile.

  The boy’s answering smile fled as he looked around the room. “You didn’t get all of them. There were three more of those creatures before, and they said they’d be back.”

  “Bastards,” Cat muttered under her breath. Then, to the ghost, she said, “I’ll get them. Don’t worry. It’s my job.”

  The ghost gave her a sweet smile that blurred as his body started to fade away. Within moments, nothing was left of him.

  “Is he gone?” Cat asked in a quiet voice.

  She didn’t mean from her sight. She meant the literal way.

  “I expect so. He accomplished what he wanted, so now he’s moved on. Some stubborn folks manage to do one last thing.”

  And this boy had been more than stubborn. He’d been selfless, too. Most newly-dead ghosts were so horrified by their own demise that they couldn’t focus on anything else. This boy had moved past that and managed to save his girl. If Bones had been wearing a hat, he’d have taken it off to the young lad.

  Cat went to the doorway where she’d left her dress. The blonde woman had almost fallen on it, and a few stray streaks from the blonde’s punctured heart stained the lavender dress.

  “Smart to remove it,” Bones commented. “That frock’s snug fit would have cost you fluidity, and taking it off would have been quite distracting to the vampires in here.”

  She gave him a look as she shimmied into the dress. “I do remember how to hunt, you know.”

  He was about to respond when a flash of dark lines on her hip caught his eye. At once, Ian’s words rang in his head. Seeing your distinctive cross-bones symbol on her hip is what distracted me enough for her to plug a silver stake in my heart…

  Bones was across the room and touching her hip before Cat could shout “Stop!”

  Too late. Bones traced the lines in Cat’s tattoo. Every notch and curve was identical to the one he had on his upper arm. She’d memorized his cross-bones so thoroughly that a picture couldn’t have been more accurate. His emotions fired like the finale of a fireworks show.

  “Stop touching me,” Cat said in a hoarse voice.

  “You don’t want me to,” Bones whispered. “I see it in your eyes, and your scent betrays you.”

  Yearning and frustration battled in her gaze, and then, hardness covered them both. “We have vampires to kill.”

  Bones withdrew his hand. Yes, they did.

  Cat finished pulling up her dress and walked out the door.

  13

  Bones checked on the three survivors. Their pulses were steady, but they’d lost so much blood that they were still unconscious. Best thing, really. Now, they wouldn’t see the slaughter around them and run screaming into the nightclub to get the human authorities involved. That would scare the vampires off, and Cat was right. They needed killing.

  “What are you doing?” Bones asked as Cat came back into the room with the dead blond in her arms.

  “Piling Miss Pink Toenails in here with the rest of them,” she replied, dropping the blonde’s body further inside the room. “Then, I’m going to wait in the hall until their friends come back, and kill the hell out of them.”

  This plan needed improving. “No, you’re going to wash that blood off your hands and arms. Then, we’re going to dance.”

  She stared at him. “The hell we are!”

  “You’re a professional killer, aren’t you?” Bones mocked. “You can’t hover around that hallway with blood spattered on you and expect to look inconspicuous. But, if you’re dancing with me, then no one will see the blood, and we’ll sneak up behind the vamps and kill them when they return to this room.”

  Her lips thinned as his logic left her nowhere to run.

  Bones only smiled. “Best hurry. They might return soon.”

  Bones took off his jacket and tie while Cat was in the loo. Then, he opened his white shirt at the neck and rolled up his sleeves to just below his elbows. Now, he only looked a little overdressed instead of being noticeably formal for a nightclub.

  Cat did a good job washing off. When she was done, only the stains on her dress and its scent remained. She put less effort in the second part of their plan, holding herself stiffly and keeping a broad distance between them on the dance floor.

  “Really, Kitten?” Bones said as he pulled her closer. “I know you can do better than this.”

  She gave him a single glare but began to move more naturally, although nuns would approve of the distance she kept between their hips. The music’s bass vibrated through him, mimicking the heartbeat he’d lost centuries ago while the lights scattered colors across Cat’s shoulders, throat, and the tops of her breasts. The sight was breathtaking, but he was more interested in her eyes. Thus far, she’d tried to stare anywhere except at him, yet when she did, he caught anguish in her gaze.

  He could guess why. The last time she’d been in his arms, she’d wept as she said goodbye. He’d only thought they’d be separated for a few hours.

  Instead, it had been years…

  “Why are you here?” Cat asked, her gaze suddenly swinging to his. “I thought you’d be busy with Felicity, with how the two of you looked. Unless you’re already finished with her? If so, that’s hardly up to your usual performance.”

  Bones had forgotten about Felicity. Cat hadn’t, but her snippy question was merely deflection. As always, she’d rather attack than show how she really felt.

  “Did seeing me kiss her bother you?” Bones asked with an arched brow. “Why? I was only doing as you instructed.”

  She tried to pull away. He didn’t let her.

  Fuck you, her expression said, but pain lingered beneath it. Her directive had hurt her more than it had him because she was still in denial about her feelings, and he wasn’t.

  “The men who came to the hospital that day knew what I was, Bones,” she said, finally acknowledging the real issue between them. “My pathology reports tattled on me since they already knew about vampires. The one in charge-”

  “Don?” Bones said with a pleasant smile.

  Her eyes widened in surprise, but she quickly recovered.

  “Yes, Don. He said he’d been looking his whole life for someone strong enough to fight vampires who wasn’t one of them. He offered to relocate me and my mom if I led his team. He also promised to leave you alone. We couldn’t all have survived any other way-”

  “Bollocks,” he cut her off.

  She stiffened. “We would have been hunted like animals! And my mother would rather have died than gone with you. She’d also rather see me killed than changed into a vampire, and let’s face it, that’s what you would have eventually wanted me to do!”

  Her voice rose at that last part, as if she were confronting him with something he’d tried to hide. Frustration swirled like a tornado inside him, and Bones spun her faster than he intended. Cat jumped out of the way to avoid bumping into another dancer.

  He yanked her back, still torn between anger and frustration. “That’s what kept you away after you left? Believing your mum that I’d make you turn into a vampire? Bloody hell, Kitten, did it ever occur to you to talk to me?”

  “Talking wouldn’t have mattered,” she said stubbornly. “You’re a vampire. I’m not, so you would have insisted on that eventually.”

  “No, I wouldn’t have, and when have I ever lied to you?”

  “How about when you kidnapped and murdered Danny Milton?” she shot back. “You swore you’d never touch him, but I don’t suppose Danny’s off in Mexico sipping margaritas, is he?”

  Bones leaned down until his face was only inches away.

  “You made me swear never to kill, cripple, maim, dismember, blind, torture, bleed, or inflect any other injury on Danny, or stand by while someone else did. I did none of those things, and you should save your concern for someone worthy. Danny wasn’t. At least he was finally useful. He told me you lived in Virginia. I’d had you narrowed down to three states, and Danny saved me some time. That’s why I told Rodney to kill him fast and painless, but I didn’t stay to watch.”

  “You bastard,” she breathed, seeming angrier at how he’d skirted his vow than she was at Danny’s death.