A blur in the corner of the room made Bones drop down on one knee. Louis let out a triumphant laugh, but Bones wasn’t kneeling in defeat. It was because he’d seen what Louis, with his back turned and his attention fixated on Bones, hadn’t noticed.

Delphine saw it, too. She started to scream even as Bones sprang back, slamming both of them against the wall behind him—while a long, curved blade arced its way through Louis LaLaurie’s neck.

Louis’s head turned to the right and kept going. It rolled off his shoulders even as he slumped forward, a dark, viscous hole facing Bones where his head used to be. Ralmiel held a red-smeared blade behind him.

Delphine screamed again, in a piercing wail of rage and grief. Bones didn’t hesitate. He reached into his boots and pulled out the two oblong canisters they contained, ripping the tops off and stabbing them into her chest.

The twin flares erupted, lighting her clothes on fire as they burned her from the inside out. Bones held on to them, pitilessly pushing them deeper. A ghoul’s body didn’t have enough blood in it to put them out. Delphine’s screams became frenzied, her legs and arms scissoring madly as she tried to escape. Bones pinned her to the floor, ignoring the licking flames on him as she continued to burn. He’d fed well before tonight; he wouldn’t burn as easily. The fire spread through Delphine’s body, splitting and blackening her skin faster than she could heal.

Something savage in Bones made him want to prolong this. To keep shoving flares into Delphine and burning her until there was nothing left but ash, except there wasn’t time. Sirens wailed, getting louder. The police would be there soon. That bomb, though relatively small, hadn’t gone unnoticed.

Bones pulled a long blade from his boot, letting Delphine see the gleam of the metal as he held it above her. Then Bones cut deeply through Delphine’s neck, feeling little satisfaction as her head rolled across the floor to stop at Louis’s decapitated corpse. After all the evil the two had committed, it was too quick and merciful an end for them.

But Jelani, at last you have your vengeance.

Ralmiel walked over to him and held out a hand. Bones, after a pause, took it and let the other vampire pull him to his feet.

“Aren’t you supposed to be trying to kill me?”

Ralmiel didn’t smile. He glanced at the ceiling and shook his head. “I came in by way of the attic and saw her. She doesn’t have much time.”

Becca.

Bones ran out of the room, following the sound of the other, fainter heartbeat. The explosion actually helped in this regard. The chunk it blew out of the hallway revealed a metal staircase inside the walls, Becca’s heartbeat sounding louder in there. Bones pulled back some of the drywall to slip through, then raced up the narrow stairs. He flung back the hatch at the top of the stairs that opened into a small, box-shaped room on top of the house’s roof.

Becca was lying on a bench. Bones’s face twisted as one glance revealed the extent of her abuse. He knelt beside her, turning her head so she could see him.

She was awake, though in her state, that was a curse instead of a blessing. Bones stared at her, letting the power in his eyes capture her mind. In her condition, it took a few moments. He waited, murmuring, “It’s all right, luv. You’re safe now,” until the horror and terror left her gaze and she quit trying to move or talk.

She couldn’t do either, though. Her lips were sewn together with what looked like fishing line, and her arms and legs were gone. The only reason she was still alive was that Louis—or Delphine—had used some of their own blood to seal the gaping wounds left where her limbs used to be. What used to be her arms and legs were now hideously smooth stumps.

Bones closed his eyes. He could save Becca’s life…by taking it. She wouldn’t survive the transition if he tried to turn into a vampire, but he could make her a ghoul. All it required was her drinking some of his blood before she died, and that wouldn’t be long. She was very near death as it was.

He thought of Jelani. Of the ghoul’s admitted pain over trying to live as someone who would always be helpless compared to even the weakest of their kind. And Becca didn’t know there was another world that existed on the fringe of hers. How could Bones condemn her to wake up trapped in that body, changed into something she didn’t even know existed?

A slow sigh came out of him, then he forced himself to smile. His gaze brightened while he harnessed all his energy into making Becca believe everything he was about to tell her.

“It’s all right,” Bones said again, stroking her face. “You’re safe, Becca, and there’s no pain anymore. You’re not injured. You’re not even here. You’re in a beautiful field, flowers all around you. Can you see them, Becca?”

She nodded, her features slipping into relaxed planes that were completely at odds with the ragged stitches around her mouth.

“…you’re warm, and you’re lying on the ground looking up at the sky…look at it, Becca. See how blue it is…”

Her stare became more fixed. Bones leaned forward, his mouth settling on her throat. Her pulse was so faint, he could barely feel it against his lips.

“Sleep now, Becca,” Bones whispered, and bit deeply into her neck.

11

Ralmiel met him at the front of the salon where Becca worked. From there, they had a clear view of the police swarming over the LaLauries’ old house and the bomb unit being called in. Blokes didn’t want to chance that anything else might explode in the place, not that Bones could blame them.

After a few minutes of silence, Bones turned to Ralmiel. “Why did you come there tonight?”

Ralmiel shrugged. “Jelani offered to pay me double the highest bounty on your corpse, if I let you live instead. So I thought to help you kill the scum fouling my city. It was easy to know where you were, mon ami, once the house went boom.”

Bones couldn’t contain his snort. “Mate, I’ve got some bad news for you. Jelani’s skint broke, and Marie hasn’t authorized any of what he’s done the past several days, so don’t expect her to reimburse you, either.”

Ralmiel stared at him. “There’s no money?”

“’Fraid not.”

“He lied to me. I will kill him,” Ralmiel said in outrage, pulling a pouch from his pocket and squeezing it.

Nothing happened. Ralmiel looked down in surprise, then squeezed again. And again.

A slow smile spread across Bones’s face. “Having some difficulty, are you?”

Understanding bloomed on Ralmiel’s face. “You found Georgette,” he murmured.

“Never underestimate your opponent,” Bones replied. “You know you’re not to be trifling with magic, and if anything happens to Georgette for coming to her senses and refusing to participate in your crimes again, I’ll be forced to make them public.”

Ralmiel said nothing for a long moment. Bones waited, wondering if now that Ralmiel knew he wouldn’t be collecting any quid for “letting” Bones live, he’d dare to take him on in a fair fight, without the chance of one of his magic escapes.

Finally, a faint smile creased Ralmiel’s mouth. “Non, mon ami. That time is past. Money is not everything, oui? One day, perhaps, you might assist me.”

Bones inclined his head. “I hope you’re not lying. I rather like you, but if I ever see you on the other side of a silver weapon again, I’ll shrivel you.”

Ralmiel shrugged. “Understood.” Then he nodded at the mass of people in the street. “Thirsty?”

Another snort escaped Bones. Did he want to plunge into that crowd and glut himself on the throats of nameless, countless people who’d never know they’d been bitten by the time he was done with them? No. He wanted to take Becca to his townhouse, clean her body up, and then bury her in his courtyard so no more indignities could be committed upon her.