FELICITY TOOK ONE LOOK at the half-empty pilsner glass of gin I returned with and gasped.
“Cristine, can’t you keep a lid on your drinking? This is my cousin’s wedding, for heaven’s sake!”
Her prim tone made me squeeze my glass so hard to avoid slamming it over her head that it shattered. Gin spilled on the front of me, and my palm started to bleed.
“Motherfucker!” I shouted.
Every head turned. Bones smothered a laugh by faking a sudden cough.
“Are you okay?” Randy looked worriedly at me and wrapped his napkin around my hand. He glanced at Bones, who gave him an innocent shrug.
“I’m all right, Randy,” I yelped, mortified.
Denise poked her head around her new husband. “Do you want us to switch the seats?” she asked quietly.
They thought I was rattled because Bones was a vampire. That was the least of my concerns. His nearness was shredding my control, and the reception had barely started.
“Cristine!” Noah came to the table and took the napkin off my hand. “Is it bad?”
“I’m fine,” I snapped harshly. His hurt face made me cringe with guilt. “Just embarrassed,” I covered. “I’ll be okay. Go back to your seat. Let’s not make it worse.”
Noah looked mollified and he went back to his table. I smiled to mask my treacherous thoughts. “Really,” I added for Denise’s benefit.
I gathered the shards of glass and began to pile them into the bloody napkin. “I’m going to the ladies’ room to wash this off and throw away the glass.”
“I’ll go with you,” Denise offered.
“No!” She looked startled by my abrupt reply. I gave a glance to my right at Bones and then back to her again. Her eyes widened, and she got the picture. Part of it, anyway.
“Cris,” she addressed him. “Would you mind going with Cristine and seeing if they have any bandages? Randy says... ” She paused and then continued wickedly, “Randy says you have a great deal of experience with bleeding wounds.”
“Ooh, are you a doctor?” Felicity cooed.
Bones stood and gave Denise an appreciative grin at her choice of words.
“Back in London I was many things,” he answered Felicity evasively.
I made a stop at the bar first. The bartender gave a wide-eyed look at my red-stained napkin.
“Gin. No glass, just the bottle,” I said bluntly.
“Um, miss, maybe you should—”
“Give the lady the bottle, mate,” Bones interjected, his eyes flashing green.
Without delay an unopened gin was thrust in my still-bleeding hand. I twisted the top off, threw away the glass and my bloody napkin, and took a long swallow. Then I led Bones out to the far corner of the parking lot, where there were the fewest cars. He waited patiently while I drank again. I was smearing blood all over the outside of the bottle, but I didn’t care.
“Better?” he asked when I came up for air. His lips twitched with amusement.
“Not hardly,” I countered. “Look, I don’t know how long my mother will keep quiet, but in case you didn’t notice, she hates you. She’ll call in the troops and try to have you skewered over an open flame with a silver stick. You have to leave.”
“No.”
“Dammit, Bones!” My temper exploded. Why did he have to be so gorgeous, why did he have to stand so close, and why did I still love him so much? “Are you trying to get killed? One call to my boss, that’s all it’ll take, and believe me, my mother’s probably caressing her cell phone and fantasizing about it now.”
Bones rolled his eyes.
“Sods like your boss have chased me most of my undead life, yet I’m still here while they’re not. Neither your mum nor your boss scares me, Kitten. Unless you’d like to choose now for us to have our long-overdue talk, I suggest we return to the festivities. But you can forget about me leaving—or you, either, for that matter. I found you days ago. There’s a reason you didn’t know about that until now. You try to vanish into the smoke again and it’ll be a short flight, I assure you. Plus, then we’ll be having our chat under much different conditions. Like with you chained up somewhere so you can’t try to sneak off again. You pick your circumstances, luv, but I have damn well waited long enough to have this out with you.”
Uh oh. I already knew Bones never bluffed, but even if I hadn’t, the look in his eyes said he meant every word.
“It was you I felt outside my house the other night, wasn’t it?” I asked accusingly. Had to be. That was the same night Bones had met Randy at the bar.
A small smile touched his mouth. The breeze ruffled his darker curls, and in his tux with the moonlight caressing the chiseled planes of his face, he looked positively devastating.
“So you felt me. I wondered if you would.”
I couldn’t keep staring at him. I might be immune to vampire powers, but Bones had always been my kryptonite.
“We have to get back to the reception,” was all I said, looking away.