my responsibility.”
Milburn and I exchanged a look of perfect understanding. “What exactly do you intend to do with her?” I asked, because I wasn’t Beau’s friend, and it was easier for it to come from me.
Beau looked perplexed. “Press her, of course. I don’t like doing it, but I can press her to change her thinking and stop this nonsense. I can fix this.”
I almost laughed, because I had been in this exact situation a few months earlier, when Simon had asked me to keep Morgan alive. He’d promised me the clan could control her. They could punish her.
They could fix this.
Odessa wasn’t the same kind of dangerous as Morgan Pellar, but I wasn’t about to make the same mistake again. “First of all,” I said evenly, “she’s nothing if not clever. I’m guessing she’s put some sort of protection in place to keep from being pressed. Any one of her witch friends could make a vampire bag.”
“I can remove it—”
“Second,” I went on, because I was way past caring about interrupting a cardinal vampire, “that’s just not good enough. She murdered Becca, Beau. Not to mention Warton and Hempstead. She is planning to sell explosives that no police force in the world can track.”
Beau’s eyes narrowed. “Now, look here—”
“No,” I said with some force. “No. You need to wrap your head around the fact that Odessa has murdered people. And they deserve justice.”
Beau looked ready to snarl at me, and Tobias started to move between the two of us.
Milburn laid a hand on Beau’s shoulder, though his eyes were on me. “What do you have in mind?” he asked.
This was all I’d been thinking about while we waited for them to arrive. “Odessa is human,” I said simply. “She killed a human. She can face human consequences.”
The two vampires exchanged a look. “You want her to go to prison?” Beau said incredulously.
I lifted my chin. “You’re goddamn right. She grew toxic plants to make poisoned honey. There’s evidence of premeditation all over this house, and Becca’s body is still in the barn. Call the police.”
“We can’t just—” Milburn began, but I wasn’t done.
“Press them to see the crime scene your way if you have to, but Odessa deserves to go to prison,” I broke in. “It’s the only way Becca gets justice.”
Beau was studying me. “You saw her, didn’t you?” he said, his voice low and intimate. “You saw Becca.”
Right. I’d almost forgotten about his history. I expected a shudder of fear at the memory of Becca’s spirit, but I felt . . . calm. “I made her a promise,” I told him. “So she could rest.”
Beau sighed heavily, turning his back on us, and paced a few feet away. He put his hands on his hips and stared at the ceiling for a long moment.
I looked at Milburn, who shrugged.
After a few minutes of silence, Beau turned to speak over his shoulder. “I accept your terms,” he said.
I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding, and beside me I heard Tobias doing the same.
“Good,” I said, because I refused to thank him for doing the right thing. “Here’s another one: you can’t go with us.”
Beau spun on his heel. “What? Of course I’m going.”
“That’s exactly what she wants, don’t you see? She wants you worked up, emotional and blinded, so you’ll make a mistake and she can take advantage.”
“I would never—” Beau begin, looking furious, but Milburn held up a hand, and his boss fell silent.
“Perhaps we could table that particular discussion for the moment,” Milburn said, shooting me a warning look. “Let’s agree on our approach first.”
I made myself take a deep breath. “Fine. Odessa is planning to meet her friends to make another spirit bottle at midnight. I’m going to need to know more about this cemetery, but first we need a plan. We can’t just crash the party and assume there won’t be any problems.”
“We’re vampires,” Milburn said, as though I might have forgotten. He nodded at Tobias. “He’s a werewolf. We can just . . . stop them.”
I counted slowly to five in my head. “You’re underestimating her,” I said. “Again. She knows she’s busted. She’ll be expecting you, which means she’ll be ready for you. I think we have one advantage—as far as I know, I don’t think any of us mentioned the mahogany obsidians to her.” I looked at each of them in turn, but all three shook their heads. “Good. Then she may not know that we have