One Foot in the Grave (Night Huntress 2)

He pulled me to him, and his next words fell softly near my ear.

"And if I were really just so fond of your flesh being warm, I'd throw you in a hot tub each time before I shagged you. You'd be ninety-eight degrees in twenty minutes, vampire or no, so sod Annette and her nasty little comments."

"Something could happen to you with Max," I muttered.

Bones let out a snort. "Not a chance. You're right-Max is too much of a coward to take me on, and if he did, I'd bend him in half the wrong way and deliver him to you in a box."

"That leaves my guys. If Annette and I fail, I can't just stand there and watch Ian kill one of them."

Bones sat back, but still didn't let go of my hand.

"There's another way around that as well, if it comes to it. Once I'm free of Ian's line, then I'm free to take my people-and my possessions-with me. You don't like it, but the fact remains that in vampire culture, you're considered mine by right of blood and bed. I'll claim your men as mine, too. Ian couldn't kill them then, not without risking war with me."

"But you haven't fed from or f**ked any of them!" I burst. "And unless things are going to get downright freaky, that isn't going to change!"

"I for one would rather die," Tate muttered.

"You're already covered, you sod," Bones said curtly. "Annette is under my line, so when she shagged you, that gave her the ability to call you hers. Which then makes you mine by default, though I won't be proud to say it."

"What?" Tate asked, incensed. "I'm not some fang boy toy!"

Annette chuckled throatily. "But according to vampire laws, darling, you're my fang boy toy if I say so."

"You should've read the fine print before hopping into bed with her, Tate," I said pitilessly. "You'll be lucky if I don't pay you back for what you did to me, and tattle to Don about it. Still, right now we've got bigger issues. Okay, Bones, if you or Annette bite Cooper and Juan, we're covered if things go south with Ian?"

"Yes," he said, ignoring Tate's glare.

That worked for me. I didn't want to announce myself as property to a room full of vamps, but if it was that or watch one of my men die...fuck my pride. Theirs, too. Life was more important than bruised egos.

"All right," I said, standing. "We'll go to the compound so one of you can bite Juan and Cooper, then Annette and I will take the guys to play bait and switch with Ian's men, you and Rodney will get Noah...when are we all supposed to meet up later with Ian?"

"'Round midnight, Kitten, which gives you time, because between capturing Ian's blokes and going to see Ian, you need to go to a spa."

"A spa?" I repeated, like I'd never heard the word before. "Why on earth would I do that?"

"Because you need at least an hour in a steam room to sweat my scent from your pores," Bones replied calmly. "If you go to Ian as you are now, he'll know from one sniff that we've double-crossed him, and then we may as well just start the mayhem. Don't fret, everything's been arranged."

"A spa," I repeated again, shaking my head. That would have made my top ten of things I did not count on doing today, but looks like I had a date with a steam room. And Ian's men. And Ian. And my father.

Tonight was going to be a busy night, no doubt about that.

Chapter Thirty-Four

TATE, JUAN, AND COOPER WERE IN THE BACK of the van, handcuffed, with duct tape over their mouths and three unused rolls of it near their feet. This van wasn't the luxury kind with the DVD player, surround sound, or heated seats, either. There weren't any seats in the back, actually, and aside from the metal grille separating the two front seats from the rest of the vehicle cabin, the interior was as stripped as could be. Rodney had supplied the van, and from the looks of it, my guys weren't the only people who'd ever been restrained in the back of it.

Annette drove. I didn't complain about that, since it made sense, appearance-wise. Bones had told Ian he was sending Annette to deliver the hostages to his men, and Ian would have relayed that. I was supposed to be the bisexual fang groupie who was Annette's date for later. The really horny bisexual fang groupie, since I was also supposed to suggest to the guards that they blow off a little steam with us. Neither Annette nor Bones thought they'd be hard to convince, since what danger would leaving three trussed-up humans alone for a bit pose to a group of vampires? None that they were aware of, which was the point.

"We're almost there," Annette said, her first words this whole trip. The hour-long silence had suited me just fine. Chatting with Annette wasn't high on my list of priorities.

A new waft of scent from the back coincided with an increase in my guy's pulses. The news that we were almost there was kicking their adrenaline into gear. Since we hadn't had more time for them to practice with Belinda, I didn't expect them to be able to pin Ian's men long enough for Annette and me to secure them. But we were hoping Tate, Juan, and Cooper would prove to be enough of a distraction to make it easier on Annette and me. And for them not to get killed in the process, of course.

I inhaled again. It was such a unique thing to be able to discern emotions by scent. I'd inherited a lot from my undead father, but a heightened sense of smell hadn't been one of those upgraded senses. Maybe when I saw him tonight, I'd thank him for my other abilities. Right before I killed him.

Then I took another deep breath and frowned. Bones's scent still clung to me, of course, even after my shower this morning. Hence his whole spa idea later, but that wouldn't do me any good now, ten minutes away from facing Ian's men.

"I still smell like Bones," I said to Annette. "Won't smelling him on me cause suspicion when we play our little act with Ian's guards?"

Annette's mouth curled. "They think you're just another pretty girl, not the Red Reaper Ian's after, so it would make perfect sense that you'd smell like Crispin. The two of us supposedly just came from picking up prisoners from him, remember? Crispin does have a reputation. In fact, you really should smell more like me as well, for things to be truly believable."

My teeth ground, which only made Annette's smirk broaden. "When hell freezes," I said evenly.

She clucked her tongue. "Pity." And she gave me a slow once-over that reminded me loud and clear that Annette found women just as enticing as men. Guess since she hadn't succeeded at pulling me away from Bones, she thought she'd try a "can't beat 'em, join 'em" approach.

I drummed my nails on the van door, biting back the urge to groan, "Are we there yet?" Fighting vampires held a much stronger appeal than getting hit on by Bones's former main squeeze. Especially since she only wanted to get me in bed so that Bones could join us.

About five minutes later, Annette pulled into the parking lot for a strip of warehouses. I glanced around. It was after six in the evening on a Friday, so most of the working world had left, assuming any of these warehouses were owned by the average company with average employees. Annette pulled out her cell and dialed.

"Open the bay door," she said by way of greeting.

"We're here."

Annette backed the van up into a bay door, which closed as soon as we were inside. I'd wondered how we were supposed to hand over three handcuffed and gagged men without attracting attention. I gave a quick glance around what I could see of the warehouse from my vantage point in the van. Aside from the six vampires approaching us, there didn't appear to be anyone else in the immediate vicinity. That was a plus.

The fact that the warehouse consisted of one open, big-ass room was a definite negative, however. The van was the only thing that interrupted the space in here. Mentally I cursed. So much for bringing the vamps back into a room two at a time so no one else could see what was going on. I caught Annette's eye and nodded at the open area around us. She just shrugged and got out of the van.

Bitch.

"'Allo, my beauty," one of the vampires greeted Annette in an accented voice. He had a patch over his right eye, and a crooked nose that, when he was human, must have been broken repeatedly. Still, those defects somehow worked with the rest of him, giving him a roguish air that complemented his dark looks.

Annette gave the man a kiss on the mouth. A long one. My brows shot up. Well. Annette was either very friendly when meeting people, or he wasn't a stranger.

"Francois," she murmured. "It's been too long."

He said something in French that I couldn't translate, but Annette did, because she laughed and replied in the same language. It was irritating not knowing what they were saying. Note to self: Expand linguistic skills.

Whatever their exchange was, it had Francois looking over at me with a glint in his, er, eye. Suddenly I wasn't so sure about my bright idea of having Annette back me up instead of Bones. She didn't like me; that had been firmly established. What if she was telling the other vampire that this was a trap? What if Bones's warning of horrible punishment didn't scare her as much as it should? Jealousy was an irrational emotion, and Annette might figure that she could come up with a whopper of a story afterward to deflect Bones's anger. I shifted uneasily in my seat, casting a quick look toward the back at my three bound guys. Things could get very ugly, very fast.

Francois stroked a strawberry-blond lock of hair from Annette's face before turning on his heel and coming over to my side of the van. I tensed, my hand sliding down to my thigh-high boots. I had silver knives tucked away in those. Maybe there wouldn't be any hostages for me to use as leverage against Ian after all.

Francois opened my door and I smiled, pretending to play with the tops of my boots in girlish flirtation while in reality, I was fingering the hilt of one of my blades.

"I have not had the pleasure of meeting you," Francois said. "I am Francois, and my friend Annette tells me you are Selena."

I let him take my hand and kiss it, even though it meant being farther away from my knives. Behind Francois's shoulder I saw Annette saying hello to the other guards. She knew all their names, I realized with an inner wince. If she wasn't backstabbing me, then she was about to do it in a big way to these people. Finally I realized the magnitude of what Bones was doing. These were Ian's people; therefore, Bones probably knew them residually, if not quite well. And for me, he was double-crossing them. Sure, it wasn't like they were innocents, since they'd agreed to be guards and potential executioners for my men, but still. It was so much easier to betray strangers than friends.

"Selena, my pet, come here," Annette said, waving me over.

I smiled at Francois once more and excused myself. Francois nonchalantly went around the back of the van, out of my sight, as I met Annette by the cluster of five vampires. If she's going to turn on me, I thought grimly, now would be the perfect time to do it.

But all Annette did was pull me close and kiss my neck while casually stroking my arm. Behind us, in the back of the van, it sounded like Francois was unloading Tate, Juan, and Cooper. Their hearts were beating faster, but nothing that made me think they were in imminent danger.

"Selena, meet my friends," Annette said.

I was quickly enveloped in warm hello kisses, as if this was a swingers' bar instead of a warehouse hostage transfer. Annette laughed when one of the men, Hatchet I think he'd said his name was, gave me a kiss heavy with tongue and decided to feel all the contours of my ass.

"Enough of that, Hatchet," Annette said, playfully pulling me back. "Selena likes to get warmed up first, but by the feminine persuasion. Isn't that right, darling?"

Bitch, I thought again, seeing the dare in her eyes, but I smiled and let Annette fold me in her arms. At least she wasn't grabbing my ass. Yet.

"That's right," I said breathily. "Still, it's nice to have something more substantial than a tongue to finish me off. Are you men going to be very busy here? Or do you get to take, um, breaks?"

I licked my fingers as I spoke. Annette was behind me, caressing my sides suggestively, and it was almost funny to see five sets of gazes all of a sudden turn streetlight green.

"When are we supposed to be at Ian's?" one of them asked.

Francois's voice came from the other side of the van. "Not until eleven, over four hours from now."

Annette's mouth ran along the line of my neck to my shoulder, and I shivered pleasantly without faking it. The way her teeth grazed my skin had made little goose bumps appear. Then she followed the line with her tongue, rubbing along the back of me with a slow, voluptuous slide.

Hatchet began taking off his clothes. I blinked. Apparently that was enough incentive for him.

Francois came around the van and put his arms around Annette. She purred and snake-hipped against him, which had me moving in the same way, too, since her hands still gripped my sides. Then Francois extended his reach and cupped my breasts. The rest of the guys started stripping as well. Pretty soon I'd have visual proof that none of them were packing weapons. So far the only knives I'd seen were carelessly laid several yards away by where the van pulled in. They really hadn't expected a trap.

I bent forward, like I was reveling in the sensations...and then I palmed four knives from my boots. Good timing, too. Francois had been about to feel me up, or were those Annette's hands starting to get frisky?

"Now!" I shouted, and flung the blades.

Two landed in Hatchet's eyes, and the other two in the eyes of the vampire next to him. They screamed, snatching at the blades while I leapt forward, throwing myself on them and smashing their heads together hard enough to hear crunching sounds.