“Why haven’t you told me about all of this before? You trained me to fight, and then you kept me out of the real battle.”
He answered while still out of eyesight. “I didn’t want you involved. Blimey, I’d just as soon you not risk your life going after vampires to begin with, but that’s what you want to do, so I trained you to be better at it. Not like you’d listen to me if I told you to stay home, is it? Still, Hennessey and his blokes are different. Your part with them was supposed to end after Sergio, but your little physics chit ruined that tonight. You should be patting yourself on the back for killing her. Those other ‘potentials’ certainly would, if they knew what she’d had in store for them.”
“Was safety your only reason for keeping this from me, or is there more I don’t know about?”
There was the sound of water being poured. “No, there’s one more reason I kept it from you. I didn’t want to give you another reason to hate vampires. It’s not like you aren’t already predisposed to it. You tend to judge people for what they are, rather than what they do, if they don’t have a pulse.”
I was silent for a moment, because I had no defense to that. No truthful one, anyway.
“You should know something, Bones. I lied to you when we made our deal. I was going to kill you the first chance I got.”
I heard a dry chuckle. “I already knew that, luv.”
“About Hennessey…I want to help. I have to help. My God, I was almost one of those girls who never would have been heard from again! I know it’s dangerous, but if you find out where this Club Flame is, if you get a lead, I want to be there. Hennessey has to be stopped.”
Bones didn’t reply.
“I mean it,” I persisted. “Come on, I’m the perfect wolf in sheep’s clothing! Really, do you know any other half-breed girls living in an area that’s currently being harvested? You’re not talking me out of this!”
“I can see that. Here.” He returned with a bowl of water and a cloth, setting it near me and then handing me one of his shirts. “You’ve got blood on the front of you. If you go home like that, you’ll scare your mum into thinking you’ve been hurt.”
I looked down at myself. The red smear of Stephanie’s blood stained my stomach in a wide circle. In yet another example of my prejudice, even though I didn’t mind killing her so much anymore, I snatched my blouse off and immediately began to scrub my skin.
It was only after I cleaned the last of the blood from me that I felt the weight of his stare. When I looked up, his eyes were fixed on me and laced with green.
“Hey.” I slid back a few inches on the couch. “Dinner’s not served. Don’t go all glowy at the blood.”
“Do you think blood has anything to do with the way I’m looking at you now?”
His voice had a strange timbre to it. Thick with things unspoken.
I struggled not to show any reaction, but my heart had just sped up, and it wasn’t from fear. “Green eyes, fangs peeking out…pretty incriminating, I’d say.”
“Indeed?” He sat down, moving the bowl aside. “It seems I’ve neglected to inform you of what else draws such a reaction, but I’ll give you a hint—it isn’t blood.”
Oh. I drew in a breath. “Considering last weekend, I don’t have anything you haven’t seen before, and I doubt you’re overcome with desire by seeing me in my bra.”
“Kitten, look at me,” he said flatly.
I blinked. “I am.”
“No, you’re not.” He slid closer, his eyes all green now. “You stare straight through me as if I’m not even there. You look at me…and you don’t see a man. You see a vampire, and therefore accord me less substance. One of the few exceptions was last weekend. I held you and kissed you, watched your eyes light up with desire, and knew for once you were truly seeing me for all I was. Not just a non-beating heart with a shell around it. I dare you to look at me that way again, now, with no excuse of chemicals to fall back on. I want you.” A slight smile twisted his lips as he made the blunt statement. “I’ve wanted you from the moment we met, and if you think sitting next to me in your bra doesn’t overwhelm me with desire, you’re very wrong. I just don’t force myself where I’m not invited.”
For a few stunned seconds, I was speechless. So much had happened tonight, my brain was having a hard time sorting through it all. I looked at Bones and it was almost as if scales dropped from my eyes, because suddenly I did see him. Those high cheekbones, dark brows framing eyes turned to emerald, a curving mouth, straight nose, and etched jawline. Crystal skin stretched over those features and tightly wrapped around a lean, rippled frame. His elegant hands and their long, tapered fingers. My God, he was beautiful. Absolutely, incredibly beautiful, and now that I’d finally allowed myself to notice, I couldn’t stop staring.