“Yes, with the strongest army he can amass to capture you,” Bones said, his emotions flashing through mine with the intensity of lightning strikes. “Need I remind you that the last time you met an adversary on his terms, you were shot and nearly burned to death.”

By reflex, I ran a hand through my hair. Even with vampire healing abilities, it still hadn’t grown to the length it had been the night Kramer set fire to me.

“But who’s here and who’s locked in a spectre trap?” I countered. “If history’s most powerful ghost couldn’t do me in, then humanity’s biggest asshole doesn’t stand a chance.”

Spade leaned back, making himself more comfortable while a satisfied expression crossed his features. No doubt he was thinking paybacks were a bitch as he listened to Bones and me argue over acceptable safety risks.

Then the person I least expected to take my side strolled into the kitchen, wearing nothing but a bed sheet wrapped around his hips.

“Why do you bother, Crispin? You married a fighter, so stop trying to convince her that the sidelines suit her better.”

“The day you love anyone but yourself is the day I’ll take your marital advice, Ian,” Bones bit back in an icy tone.

“Then today is that day,” Ian replied sharply, “for I love you, you wretched, pig-headed guttersnipe. I also love that arrogant, overprivileged dandy smirking at us”—a wave indicted Spade, whose aforementioned smirk vanished—“as well as the emotionally fractured, malfunctioning psychic who sired me. And you, Crispin, love a bloodthirsty hellion who’s probably killed more people in her thirty years than I have in over two centuries of living, so again I say, don’t bother trying to convince her that she isn’t who she is.”

Denise’s mouth hung open, either at Ian’s less-than-flattering descriptions of us, or the notion that I’d killed more people than he had. Spade’s expression was now stony, but a muscle ticked in Bones’s jaw—the only indication of his feelings since he’d shrouded his aura under an impenetrable cloud.

As for me, I didn’t know whether to punch Ian for calling Bones a pig-headed guttersnipe or thank him for stating the obvious. I might be tired of all the fighting and constantly straddling the line between life and death, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t good at it.

Some people were born to be mothers, fathers, inventors, artists, speakers, preachers . . . and then there was me.

“He’s right,” I said in a quiet tone. “My true skill is killing. I’ve excelled at it since I was sixteen, when I took on my first vampire without knowing anything about them.”

Then I went over to Bones, framing his face in my hands.

“It was you who taught me to judge people by their actions instead of their species. You saved me from a life of misery, regret, and well-earned recriminations. Now it’s time to let me do my thing, Bones”—I smiled wryly—“and trust that you taught me to be the best damned killer I could be.”