My mother sat at the table, and she vibrated with excitement. I was less enthused. Noah and I had been dating for two months now, and the poor schmuck said he wanted to meet her. She’d been over the moon to find out I had a boyfriend who was both alive and not in the military. Her brown hair was swept up and she even wore an outfit that wasn’t dowdy. For her to take care with her appearance spoke volumes to me. Though she was only forty-four, she often dressed like she was eighty-four. It was a waste because she was an attractive woman. To my knowledge, she had never been on a date since the night she was raped. Too bad she had as tough of a time letting go of the past as I did.
“Catherine, I’m so happy for you!” she said for the fifth time.
“Cristine,” I corrected her. She was forever reverting back to my original name, probably because she gave it to me.
She waved a hand in apology. “Oh, right. Gosh, I hope I don’t slip in front of Noah. He might think something strange was going on.”
That made my lip curl. No, mustn’t let Noah be confused by the fact that there were always strange things going on.
He’d made it amazingly difficult for me to come up with an excuse to stop seeing him in the past couple of months. Whenever my pager went off and I had to rush out in the middle of dinner, he would simply have the waiter bag my food to go and tell me not to forget to eat. If I had to cancel at the last minute, he didn’t complain about being stood up. When Tate and the guys waited at my house one night after my cell died and a vampire was spotted three counties away, Noah shook their hands and told them how glad he was to meet my coworkers. The fact that I’d climbed into a van filled with five athletic, muscular men didn’t seem to faze him. If the shoe were on the other foot, I’d have demanded to see their identification.
No, Noah was the perfect gentleman. Even Don, who ran a full background check on him without my knowledge, was happy with him. To give him credit, Noah did take the edge off my loneliness. He was a great guy and I liked him tremendously.
But… I still cried at night when I thought of Bones. All the warm, friendly feelings in the world couldn’t hold a candle to fact that my heart still belonged only to him. Perhaps I would continue feeling like I’d had a hole blown through the center of me for the rest of my life. At least I could say I tried.
A car pulled up in the drive and my mother shot out of her chair. “He’s here!”
“Calm down. Here, check the roast. I’ll get the door.” I wiped my hands on a towel and opened the door to let Noah in.
He gave me a quick kiss before extending his hand to my mother. “Mrs. Russell, what a pleasure to meet you. Cristine has told me so much about you, I feel as if I already know you.”
I’d told him lies, of course. There wasn’t a shred of truth I could share with Noah. He thought my father had died when I was a baby and that my parents’ marriage hadn’t been a happy one. In my pretend life, I wasn’t illegitimate. Then again, I wasn’t half-vampire, either. He also thought that I was Irish. Hell, for all I knew, I could be. With all the resources of the United States government at my disposal, I still hadn’t been able to find out my real father’s identity.
“Call me Jussie,” my mother said.
She’d taken less liberty with her name than I had and simply abbreviated it. She also had no idea that Russell was Bones’s surname. If she had, my mother would have flatly refused to use it for her alias.
“Jussie, then. Can I help you with anything?”
“Not at all, Noah,” she assured him. “Ca— Er, Cristine and I have it under control. Have a seat and tell me about yourself.”
My cat picked that moment to jump onto the counter and leisurely eye the mashed potatoes. I handed Noah and my mother a drink while I swatted him away. He sat on the floor, watching everything with bright green eyes that were almost identical to my own when my other nature flared. My mother frowned at the kitty. She rarely visited me at home anymore because of him, which could be why I’d grown to love the cat so much.
“Cristine, can’t you lock that… critter in your room?” she said with a sniff in my cat’s direction. “It’s unseemly.”
I gave a short laugh. “Mom, Noah’s a vet, so the only person my cat is offending is you. Get over it. He stays.”
She huffed at that but gave up. She must still be trying to make a good impression on Noah, or she would have fought me for at least another few minutes.
“Why haven’t you put his collar on him, Cristine?” Noah asked me, petting my cat. He purred before leaving with a flick of the tail. The feline was fickle in his affections.
“I keep forgetting,” I lied. “He never goes outside, so it’s not like he’ll get lost.”
In truth, I couldn’t because Noah still thought that my cat’s name was Bones. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he’d totally misunderstood why he’d overheard me saying that name to myself, and I hadn’t come up with a different name for the kitty yet.
“What collar?” my mother asked.
I flashed her a look that said to drop it. She ignored me, as usual.
“I gave Cristine a collar for her cat on our first date, but she never remembers to put it on,” Noah said with a forgiving smile at me. He was impossible to piss off.
My mother wasn’t. “Cristine, that is so rude! When someone gives you a gift, you don’t let it languish. What a thoughtful gesture, Noah. Where is the collar? I’ll put it on the mangy feline myself.”
Oh, now she was going to get it. “Right-hand drawer, next to the oven.”
I watched with dark satisfaction as she fetched the collar and approached my cat. He watched her balefully, his tail swishing back and forth.
“Let’s see now,” she mused to herself. “Here is the buckle and here is the strap. Oh look, it’s got his name on it. Cristine, I didn’t know you named him. What—?”
The name finally registered, and my mother pitched forward in mid-crouch. My cat scored her hand with his claws before leaping away with a hiss. Noah blinked at the foul word she shouted as she sprawled on the floor. I shook my head without sympathy. She’d asked for it.
“Let me help you up, Jussie!” Noah said, recovering from his surprise. “Are you all right?”
My mother let him help her to her feet and then gave me a withering look. “What a perfect name for that animal, Cristine. It fits the horrid beast.”
“Huh?” Noah didn’t get it.
I did, and steam nearly poured from my ears. “See, something bad always happens when you mess with Bones. Did that scratch hurt? I hope it doesn’t leave a mark like the one I got the last time I petted Bones. He practically kept me up all that night licking it.”
Noah glanced back and forth between us, feeling the tension but not knowing the reason. My mother’s face flamed in furious embarrassment, but I didn’t care. One low remark deserved another.
Noah coughed, trying to defuse the situation. “Let me check on the oven. Something sure smells good in there.”
***
The rest of the dinner passed without further incident. Occasionally I would look up and see my mother give me a scathing glance, but she dropped the entire matter of the cat’s namesake. Noah was charming, as usual. You were just weird if you didn’t like him. Soon he had her warmed up to where she was laughing again. By dessert, she quit with the underhanded dirty looks and instead was obviously pleased with my choice of a boyfriend. So pleased, in fact, that she faked several yawns even though it was only eight o’clock and was out the door in record time. I usually had to force her to leave when she visited.
“I don’t know why you hesitated about having me meet her, Cristine,” he remarked. “Your mom is terrific. She really doesn’t like the cat, but then no one is perfect.”
I gave him a level look. “She was behaving, Noah. Believe me, she can be a real bitch, but she loved you. I’m shocked she didn’t grab your ass on the way out.”
He laughed. “That would’ve been different, but then things are always unpredictable around you. It’s what I like most.”
He put his arms around me and kissed me. I responded, but it was surface level only. We hadn’t slept together, but it was definitely to the stage where it was inevitable unless I broke it off. Kissing Noah was enjoyable, but it hardly inflamed me with passion.
He was worked up about it, judging from his accelerated breathing and the hardening of his body. I continued to kiss him while a cold list of pros and cons ran through my mind. I liked Noah, but I wasn’t turned on by him. The truth was, I hadn’t been turned on by any man in over six years. Finally, my choice boiled down to a single question: did I want to go to bed tonight with my loneliness or with Noah? He wasn’t the man I loved. Not even close, but there was someone pressed against me instead of no one, and at the moment, it was better than being alone.
I pulled back to whisper against his lips, “You don’t have to go home tonight, Noah.”
He stared down at me while his hands tightened on my back. “You’re sure?”
I kissed him and reached down, pulling his shirt out of his pants. He gasped when my palms traced his bare stomach and then moved lower.
“I’m sure.”
***
The next morning, I woke up to hear him whistling as he clanged around making breakfast. He would make someone a wonderful spouse one day with how domestic he was. For a few minutes, I stayed in bed and wrestled with the unavoidable comparisons.
In the plus column, he was miles better than Danny had been, that worthless jerk. On the other hand, I had gained about as much satisfaction out of the two times last night as I did from a good gin and tonic. Still, I’d woken up in the middle of the night with a warm form next to me that wasn’t just the cat. Orgasms weren’t everything. After all, I could have those alone.
“Breakfast is ready, Cristine,” he called out. “Come down before it gets cold.”
The clock showed nine a.m. I never woke up this early if I could help it. What a closet sadist he must be. I headed straight to the bathroom and was occupied when the phone rang. No one called me at this hour unless there was trouble. What now?
“Noah, get that for me!” I yelled.
He answered and I heard him tell the caller to wait. Once I left the bathroom, I grabbed the phone next to the bed. “Noah, hang up. I’ve got it.”
My tone was brisk and he complied without comment. There was a second of silence on the other line, then Tate’s voice. “Is he off?”
“Yes. What’s wrong?”
“What’s he doing there this early, Cat?” An edge was in his words.
“Did you call me for a reason? Or did my mother resign and you took over?” Tate was the only person who didn’t seem happy with Noah, even though he’d only met him twice.
“Yes, I called for a reason. You need to come in right now. Don’s calling in Juan and Dave as well. I’m already on my way to your house; I’ll be there in five minutes.”
Tate lived close by, and my house was on his way to the compound, but still it annoyed me. Noah lingered in the doorway and his face fell when he saw my expression. It was one he recognized well by now, the one that said I was leaving.
“Right.” I hung up without saying good-bye and started to pull on some clothes.
“You’re going.” It was a statement, and I shot him a look.
“Noah, this is the part where I remind you I don’t live a regular life. If you can’t handle that, let me again tell you that you should reconsider dating me. Trust me, I’d understand.”
He came forward as I dropped to the floor to put on my boots. “How can you think I would just walk out on you after last night? I don’t want to pressure you or move too fast, but I think I’m in love with you.”
Oh no, no, no. “Noah, please… I told you I don’t do normal.” My boots were on and so were my clothes. I splashed water on my face and began to brush my teeth.
“I know what you told me. Yes, I am reminded of that whenever I’m with you. But I don’t care. Cristine, what do you feel for me? Is this just… casual to you?”
He looked so vulnerable with his black hair tousled and gray-blue eyes pleading. I felt like a heel for using him to relieve my forlorn existence. An abrupt knock at the door saved me from replying. I brushed past Noah, running down the stairs to answer it.
“We’ll talk later,” I threw over my shoulder. “You can stay here as long as you want. Just lock the bottom knob when you leave and set the alarm. I have to go.”
Tate positively glowered at me when I opened the door. His indigo gaze took in Noah’s shirt lying on the carpet, his pants resting on the banister, and finally Noah himself, clad in only his boxer shorts.
“Sorry to interrupt,” he said sarcastically.
I gave him a dangerous peep of emerald light in my eyes as a warning. “I’ll call you later, Noah,” I said, and left without looking back.
Tate started in on me as soon as the car door shut. “I thought you said you weren’t serious about him?”
“Drop it, Tate. Do you know what’s going on? Why didn’t Don call me first?” That miffed me, because I was the leader of this band of freak fighters, and I’d earned my place in the pecking order.
He snorted. “He wanted to ask my opinion of what the situation was before speaking to you. There were some murders last night in Ohio. Pretty graphic ones, no attempt made to hide the bodies. In fact, you might say that they were displayed.”
“What’s so unusual about that?” We didn’t jet around to every nasty crime scene in the nation or we would never be able to cover them all.
“I’ll let Don fill you in on the rest. My job was to pick you up. Guess I’m glad I called first. If I would’ve just used my key, I might have walked in on you two.”
He only had a key in case of my untimely death, but still. “Since when would you have barged in without knocking? God, Tate, if I didn’t know better, I’d say you sounded jealous.”
The guards waved us through the gates at the compound. Tate and I were such a common sight we didn’t even have to show identification anymore. We both knew practically all the guards by name, rank and serial numbers.
“Maybe you don’t know as much as you think,” he responded.
Noah called me every day. I didn’t call him back. The only two people I spoke to outside of work were Denise and my mother. Denise had met Dave on a few occasions, and I had once even entertained the notion of setting them up. She declined, stating she couldn’t handle the stress of being with someone who risked his life every time he went to work. Since he was dead now, I was glad they hadn’t been involved. At least I hadn’t contributed to her misery as well. When I told her he died, sparing any other details, she hung up the phone and drove straight over. She brought a bottle of top-shelf gin and held my hand while I finished it. Denise was a true friend who didn’t need to press for more than what I was willing to tell her. In the end I hadn’t divulged anything more than his death. Better for her not to know particulars. Particulars could only endanger her, and she knew too much already.
The fourth night after Dave’s death, there was a knock at the door. It was after ten p.m., and my only company was the cat and a pint of Häagen-Dazs. Denise was out on a date and my mother was more harm than help. She never wanted to hear about the rigors of my job, content to know I came back alive and the vampires didn’t. In that regard she was easy to please.
There were only three people who would come by without calling: Tate, Juan, or Noah. Noah was my unplanned visitor and stood outside on the front porch under the light at the doorway. I hadn’t seen him in nearly a week and hadn’t missed him. In fact, I’d barely spared him a thought. Depression turned me into a selfish monster. I would have sold my soul for one night of mindless bliss inside the pale, chiseled arms that had been my only source of comfort.
The condemnation I felt over Dave’s death ran even with the staggering knowledge that Bones was truly lost to me. Somehow I’d pictured him still in that cave, waiting there should I ever decide to return. Illogical, irrational, and incorrect, as it turned out. He was long gone. The scent of him to my improved nose was so faint as to be almost nonexistent. Bones hadn’t been there for years. Yet the tiny whiff that lingered in the bedroom with the decimated mattress had been enough to level me emotionally. Maybe I could have run fast enough to save Dave from Lazarus had I concentrated more. Either way, it was my fault. No matter what Don said.
“Can I come in?” He shifted on his feet and looked searchingly at me.
There was no reason why I shouldn’t want him to. He was kind, gentle, sincere, considerate, and handsome. That meant, of course, that I felt nothing for him beyond the benign affection I gave Tate and Juan. Less than that, actually. With them there was the deeper bond of facing death together regularly and the accompanying sense of responsibility. Noah had none of those ties with me. At the moment, however, he offered me one thing they couldn’t.
Escape. There was no reality with him. No death, no vampires, no ghouls, no buried bodies of close friends who had trusted me to protect them. I could be Cristine, the research and field analyst who was utterly human and just worked odd hours.
“Come in.”
Drowning hands grasp at anything, and Noah was my final gasp of oxygen before taking that lethal plunge. I shut the door behind him and didn’t object when he folded me in his arms.
“I’ve reconsidered what I told you before, Cristine. I don’t think I love you. I know I do. I don’t care if this is moving too fast, I’ve been crazy all week without you. You can throw me out afterward if you want, but I’m going to say this anyway. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, no matter how many times your job interrupts us. Marry me, Cristine. You don’t have to say anything now, but give me a chance to prove that I can make you happy.”
My head whirled with thoughts too fleeting to cling to. Above them all was a warning: Don’t do it. Dave’s blood splashing my hands as I tried to stem the flow… Don’t do it. … Bones’s last words to me. “Don’t fret, luv, I’ll be back before you know it.” … Don’t do it. … My old house littered with new body parts… Don’t do it. … My mother’s face when she called me a whore for sleeping with a vampire… Don’t do it. … Don’s smile when he forced me to come work for him… Don’t do it. … The headstone I’d glimpsed before leaving Ohio, engraved with the name Catherine Crawfield and dated six years ago…
“Yes, Noah. I will marry you.”
***
“You what?”
Don’s voice was almost comical in its incredulity. He was my second call after my mother. She’d cried with happiness.
I repeated the sentence slowly and clearly. “I got engaged to Noah and took off to Niagara Falls to celebrate that.”
Nothing but silence as he digested the news. I could just imagine him tugging madly at his eyebrow. “I see,” he replied at last. “Congratulations, I suppose, although you took my advice to start living a bit literally, didn’t you?”
Asshole. “You always tell me to pay attention, Don.”
Another pause. “Are you sure about this?”
“I’ll tell Noah you offered your congratulations,” I cut him off, then hung up. For once, it had been nicer talking to my mother. That was scary.
“Was that your boss?” Noah inquired in a careful tone.
I leaned back. “Yeah, it was.”
“Will I ever meet him?” Again, he sounded like he was choosing his words.
“Not if you’re lucky,” I murmured and flipped over to kiss him.
Sex with Noah still didn’t excite me, but he didn’t know that. I told myself that one day I might feel Noah inside me and not wish it was someone else. How easily the lies came.
I’d developed a neat self-defense mechanism since Dave had been murdered. Think about nothing. React blindly. Fuck the consequences. We’d see how it worked. Noah certainly wasn’t complaining. He was too busy moaning and arching his back.
I looked down at him and knew I didn’t have to worry about my eyes changing color. My vampire nature hadn’t flared up once. See, there were some advantages to not being satisfied by my new fiancé. I just had to look at the bright side.
***
The hotel-room phone rang thirty minutes later. I answered it, which was a good thing since Tate’s first words were, “Are you out of your fucking mind?”
“Didn’t take long for Don to trace the call, huh?” No surprise that he’d scrambled to find what hotel I was in.
“You don’t love him,” Tate went on as if I hadn’t spoken. “You don’t even know him! I doubt you even know his middle fucking name. And he sure as hell doesn’t know you. He’d shit his pants if he knew the real you. Look, we’re all upset about Dave, but do you think Dave would want you to go and do something as stupid as get engaged to some chump who wouldn’t know the dangerous end of a gun if it were shoved up his—”
I hung up. Okay, so maybe this had been hasty, but I was going to see it through. After all, it couldn’t be the worst mistake I’d ever made. My life was a glorious account of one bad decision after another, and usually those decisions ended with someone dead, like my grandparents. Or Dave. What was a quickie engagement compared to that?
Next to me, Noah began to stir. Sex was like a sedative to him. I didn’t know whether to be flattered or offended. Since I was trying to think positive, I picked flattered.
“Who was that? Did the phone ring?” he asked me drowsily.
“Just Tate, wishing us all the best.” How easily the lies came.
Noah kissed me and got out of bed, heading for the bathroom. Moments later, the shower turned on and I heard him whistling as he stepped inside. I grabbed a pillow and hugged it to me. Please, I prayed, please let me have done the right thing by agreeing to marry him.
“I love you, future Mrs. Rose,” Noah called out.
“I love you too, Mr. Rose,” I replied immediately.
How easily the lies came.