Home for the Holidays: A Night Huntress Novella
Page 13
“How?” Bones asked calmly.
Madigan gave a cagey look at the hold Bones had on me before replying. “They were killed while trying to take down a vampire nest.”
“Must have been quite the nest.”
Madigan all but shrugged. “As it turned out, yes.”
“I want their bodies.”
Madigan showed more surprise than he had when I lunged at him. “What?”
“Their bodies,” Bones repeated, his tone hardening. “Now.”
“Why? You didn’t even like Tate,” Madigan muttered.
My murderous haze cleared. He was stalling, which meant in all likelihood he was lying about their deaths. I tapped Bones’s arm. He released me, but one hand remained on my waist.
“My feelings are irrelevant,” Bones answered. “I sired them so they’re mine, and if they’re dead, then you have no further use for them.”
“What possible use would you have?” Madigan demanded.
A dark brow rose. “Not your concern. I’m waiting.”
“Then it’s a good thing you don’t age,” Madigan snapped as he rose from his chair. “Their bodies were cremated and their ashes disposed of, so there’s nothing left to give you.”
If Madigan wanted us to believe they were dead, then they must be in serious trouble. Even if Madigan wasn’t behind it, he clearly intended to leave them to their fates.
I wasn’t about to.
Something in my stare must have alarmed him because he glanced left and right before flinging a hand in Bones’s direction.
“If you’re not intending to let her complete her term of service, then both of you can get out before I have her jailed for dereliction of duty, desertion, and trying to attack me.”
I expected Bones to tell him where to go, which was why I was stunned when he merely nodded.
“Until next time.”
“What?” I burst out. “We’re not leaving without more answers!”
His hand tightened on my waist.
“We are, Kitten. There’s nothing for us here.”
I glared at Bones before turning my attention to the thin older man. Madigan’s face had paled, but underneath the heavy scent of cologne, he didn’t smell like fear. Instead, his blue gaze was defiant. Almost . . . daring.
Once more, Bones’s grip tightened. Something else was going on. I didn’t know what, but I trusted Bones enough not to grab Madigan and start biting the truth out of him like I wanted to. Instead, I smiled enough to bare my fangs.
“Sorry, but I don’t think you and I would have a healthy working relationship, so I’ll have to decline the job offer.”
Multiple footsteps sounded in the hall. Moments later, heavily armed, helmeted guards appeared in the doorway. At some point, Madigan must have pushed a silent alarm—an upgrade he’d installed since my previous visit to his office.
“Get out,” Madigan repeated.
I didn’t bother with any threats, but the single look I gave him said that this wasn’t over.
WE WERE FOLLOWED from the compound all the way back to the tree where Bones left his cell phone. Once he retrieved it, we launched ourselves into the air. It took an hour of streaking across the sky before we lost the helicopter. Bones could have crashed it, but I didn’t have anything against the pilot aside from annoyance over his maneuverability skills. Once assured that we’d lost our tail, I plummeted down into a nearby field, landing with a skidding thud.
Bones dropped to the ground next to me without so much as a bent stem of grass to show for it. One day I’d master landing that gracefully. For now, I did well not to leave a small crater in my wake.
“Why did we let Madigan go so easily?” were my first words.
Bones dusted some dirt off that I’d kicked up with my impact. “My telekinesis isn’t strong enough to have stopped all the guns.”
My laugh was more disbelieving than amused. “You thought the guards would be faster than you?”
“Not them,” Bones said steadily. “The automated machine guns in the walls on either side of us.”
“What?” I gasped.
Then I remembered how Madigan had glanced to our right and our left when I was about to charge him. I’d thought he was looking about in alarm. Obviously not. No wonder he hadn’t smelled like fear.
“How did you know?” I asked.
“The room smelled of silver and gunpowder though none could be seen, plus the texture of the walls across from his desk had changed. His glancing at them when he felt threatened only confirmed it.”
Here I’d thought the silent alarm had been Madigan’s only addition to his office. Note to self: Pay more attention to surroundings.
“Why didn’t he use them? He’s always considered us a threat and now that we know he’s lying about the guys, he’s right.”
Bones’s expression was coldly contemplative. “Perhaps he wasn’t sure those guns would be enough, but more telling was how he tried to compel you to work for him. He wants you for something, Kitten, which means he needs you alive. The new security measures were only if he had no other choice.”
I was silent as I digested this. Since we first met several months ago, Madigan had exhibited an unusual interest in me, and it wasn’t the flattering kind. Whatever he wanted, it would end in my death, of that I had no doubt. The only thing I wasn’t sure of was what he hoped to accomplish before that.
He wouldn’t get a chance to find out. Once I discovered what had happened to my friends, I’d kill Madigan.
“Now what?” I asked, mentally gearing up for the road ahead.
Bones gave me a measured look. “Now we track down your uncle and force him to tell us the secret he’s tried so hard to keep.”
About the Author
JEANIENE FROST is the New York Times, USA Today, and international bestselling author of the Night Huntress series and the Night Huntress World novels. To date, foreign rights for her novels have sold to nineteen different countries. Jeaniene lives in North Carolina with her husband, Matthew, who long ago accepted that she rarely cooks and always sleeps in on the weekends. Aside from writing, Jeaniene enjoys reading, poetry, watching movies with her husband, exploring old cemeteries, spelunking, and traveling—by car. Airplanes, children, and cookbooks frighten her.
To know more about Jeaniene, please visit her website at www.jeanienefrost.com.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.
Also by Jeaniene Frost
Twice Tempted
Once Burned
One Grave at a Time
This Side of the Grave
Eternal Kiss of Darkness
First Drop of Crimson
Destined for an Early Grave
At Grave’s End
One Foot in the Grave
Halfway to the Grave
Coming Soon
Up From the Grave
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
“Home for the Holidays” was originally published in the anthology The Bite Before Christmas in 2011 and 2012 by William Morrow and Avon Books, respectively, Imprints of HarperCollins Publishers
Excerpt from Up From the Grave copyright © 2014 by Jeaniene Frost.
HOME FOR THE HOLIDAYS. Copyright © 2011 by Jeaniene Frost. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the expres
s written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub Edition NOVEMBER 2013 ISBN: 9780062322043
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About the Publisher
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Table of Contents
Contents
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Twenty-Four
Epilogue
An Excerpt from Up From the Grave
Prologue
One
Two
About the Author
Also by Jeaniene Frost
Copyright
About the Publisher