Relief slammed into me with such force that my knees trembled. Oh God, for a second, I hadn’t thought he was faking. I thought I’d been played in the worst way possible.

“Kitten, I don’t feel anyone else, but take a look around this building anyway. Break down the doors if you have to, but make sure no one else is here.”

I gestured to the girl, who hadn’t moved. “What about her?”

“She’ll hold a bit more.”

“If you kill me, it won’t only be Hennessey who’ll come down on you. You’ll wish your mother had never been born,” Charlie hissed. “He’s got friends, and they go higher up on the pole than you can handle.”

I left, but heard Bones’s reply as I started on the closest unit.

“As far as Hennessey and his friends go, I thought they wouldn’t miss anyone stupid enough to get dried by me? Your words, mate. I suspect you’re regretting them.”

A quick sweep if the complex turned up nothing. There were only four separate units and they were all empty. This building was a front, was my guess. Only one unit had been inhabited by the late Dean and the soon-to-be-late Charlie. Still, to the casual observer, it had been another typical small rental. One day I’d like to actually see something typical. I hadn’t come across it yet.

When I came back ten minutes later, the girl was still lying on the floor, but Bones and Charlie were gone.

“Bones?”

“Back here,” he called out.

Dean’s room. I approached with less stealth than before, but couldn’t bring myself just to trot in without caution. Untrusting. Yeah, that was me.

The sight that greeted me widened my eyes. Bones had Charlie in bed. Not lying on it, but in it. The metal frame was wrapped around him and twisted together to form clamps. That silver knife was still in Charlie, wedged with a bent beam holding it in place.

Bones had three jugs near his feet. Their smell, even with my nose, told me what they were.

“Now, mate, I’m going to make you an offer. It only gets extended once. Tell me who these other players are, all of them, and you’ll go out quick and clean. Refuse, and…” He hefted a jug, emptying out its contents over Charlie. His clothes soaked up the liquid and the harsh scent of gasoline filled the air. “You’ll live as long as it takes for this to kill you.”

“Where’d you get those?” I asked irrelevantly.

“Under his kitchen sink. Thought they’d have something like this on hand. You didn’t think they’d just leave this place and all of its forensic evidence behind when they were through, did you?”

I hadn’t gone that far in my thinking. I’d been a day late and a dollar short all night, it seemed.

Charlie gave Bones a look filled with chilling hate. “I’ll tell you in hell, and that’ll be soon.”

Bones struck a match and dropped it on him. The flames sprouted instantly. Charlie screamed and started to thrash, but the bed frame held. Or the fire incapacitated him too quickly.

“Wrong answer, mate. I never bluff. Come on, Kitten. We’re leaving.”

FOURTEEN

W E ONLY STAYED LONG ENOUGH TO MAKE sure Charlie didn’t get out. Bones trailed more gasoline to the other units on the upper floor, and they lit up the sky as well. The girl had yet to speak. Her eyes hadn’t even really focused when I carried her out of there.

Bones gave her a few drops of blood. Said they’d tide her over until he got her somewhere safe. We couldn’t hang around here for many reasons. The fire department would be on their way. The police, too. And any of Hennessey’s goons who’d soon find out that one of his residences had been torched with his people inside.

I was surprised when Bones went over to Charlie’s car and popped the trunk. “I’ll be right back,” I murmured to the girl, and left her in the backseat. She didn’t seem to even hear me.

I went around to the back of Charlie’s car, curious. Bones was bent over the trunk. When he came back up, he had a man in his arms.

I gaped. “Who the hell is that?”

The guy’s head drooped into view and I sucked in a breath. The obnoxious jerk from the bar!

Even though I didn’t hear a heartbeat, I had to ask. “Is he…?”

“Dead as Caesar,” Bones supplied. “Charlie took him ’round the back and snapped his spine. Bloke would have felt me, too, if he’d been paying more attention. That’s where I was hiding.”

“You didn’t try to stop him?”

It came out with all of my residual guilt over the unknown man’s death. I hadn’t tried to stop him, either. Maybe that’s what sharpened my tone.

Bones fixed his gaze on me, unblinking. “No. I didn’t.”

I felt like beating my head against a wall. Technically, we’d won tonight, but the victory was hollow. An innocent man killed. A young woman traumatized beyond comprehension. No names of who else was involved, and the knowledge that now it would only get worse.

“What are you doing with him?”

He set him in the grass. “Leave him as he is. There’s nothing more to be done. With this fire, he’ll be found soon. He’ll have a proper burial. That’s all he’s got left.”

It seemed so callous just to leave the man there, but Bones had a practical, if not cold, point. There was nothing more we could do for him. Dropping him off at a hospital with a note wouldn’t make his family hurt any less.

“Let’s go,” he said briefly.

“But what about Charlie? You’re just going to leave him and Dean for the police to find, too?” I persisted, getting into the backseat and taking the girl’s hand as we sped away.

“Coppers?” A humorless smile played on his lips. “You know that when vampires died, their bodies decomposed to their true ages. That’s why they look like bloomin’ mummies sometimes afterwards. Just let them try to figure out why a bloke dead ’round seventy years ended up stuffed into a bed frame and torched. They’ll be scratching their chins about that for days. And I’m leaving Charlie the way he is for a reason. I want Hennessey to know who did it, and he will, because when we get back to the hotel, I’m going to call around and find out if there’s any money on this sod. If there is, I’ll claim it, and word will get to him. He’ll be nervous, wondering what Charlie told me, and with luck it’ll draw him out of hiding. He’ll want to shut me up for good.”

That was a very risky move. Hennessey wasn’t alone in wanting Bones as worm food. From what Charlie had said, there were about twenty other people who’d be happy about that also.

“Where are we taking her?”

“Give me a moment.” He flipped out his cell and dialed, driving one-handed. I whispered useless comforting things to the girl and thought of my mother. Once, many years ago, she’d been the victim. This wasn’t the same scenario, true, but I didn’t imagine it felt much different.

“Tara, it’s Bones. I’m sorry to ring you so late… I have a favor to ask… Thank you. I’ll be there within the hour.”

He met my eyes in the rearview mirror. “Tara lives in Blowing Rock, so it’s not that far, and the girl will be safe with her. No one really knows Tara, so Hennessey won’t think to look there. She’ll be able to give her the help she needs, and not just physically. She’s been through something similar.”

“A vampire got her?” What a horrible club to be a member of.

Bones looked away, turning his attention back to the roads.

“No, luv. He was just a man.”

Tara lived in a log home in the Blue Ridge Mountains. It was accessible only by a private driveway. This was the first I’d been out of Ohio, and I was awed by the steep cliffs, high bluffs, and rugged scenery. If these were different circumstances, I would have demanded that Bones pull over just so I could look around at it all.

An African-American woman with salt-and-pepper hair waited on the porch. Her heartbeat announced her as human, and Bones got out and gave her a kiss on the cheek.