Page 1 of Blades and Bone

Chapter One

“This is a terrible idea.” Brodie crossed his arms and stared at his older sister, well aware that he was pushing the line. As matriarch, she should be afforded a level of respect higher than what he was currently showing, but before she became the head of the Ashby family, she’d simply been his older sister.

Vivian held his stare. “I wasn’t asking for your opinion, Brodie.” She pushed a file across the table to him. The plain manila folder would be a dossier for him to examine. “Mirabella Orlan is putting everyone in danger, and we can only take her and her rabid family down if we unite with the Reids. No other family is as powerful and on our side.”

Were they on the same side?

Or were the Reids only looking out for themselves?

“We will be painting a target on our backs. The Orlans won’t come this far north.” The Ashbys ran Queensland. They owned resorts and cattle ranches, and unlike the other families, they’d gotten out of the criminal business soon after arriving in chains and earning their freedom. Back then it had been one woman and her brother. Enough to start a new dynasty.

She smiled at him; the kind one might give a child who didn’t understand.

He understood.

He ran the resorts and had a master’s in business and management. Sure, Vivian was fifteen years older and had been raised to take over…but he had been raised to protect her and grow the businesses.

“Mirabella will not stop until she has everything,” Vivian said.

“She told you that?” Anyone else might have gotten a slap in the face for questioning her; as it was, Brodie knew he’d overstepped from the five millimeters of fang she revealed.

“History, Brodie.” She tapped the file. “We are uniting with the Reids. They will be arriving in a week. You will ensure security is tightened.”

He inclined his head. “Of course.”

He’d already noticed that the bungalow had been booked by Vivian. Now he knew why. She usually stayed in the family suites when she stayed at the resort where he lived.

“All the information will be sent to you.”

Brodie frowned. “Then what is in the file?”

“A union requires blood, and they are making the offering.”

Brodie swallowed. Was she talking about murder? He flipped open the file. A photo of a man with dark curly hair and a smile that lacked pointed fangs stared up at him. Hamish Reid, twenty-three. He was so young—had he even been blooded? “He’s the sacrifice?”

“Pleasing, isn’t he?”

“What does that matter?” How desperate were the Reids to make an alliance if they were willing to give up the nephew of the matriarch?

Her smile widened, still full of fang. “You are to marry him.”

Brodie was sure he’d misheard. “I’m doing what? I thought we were killing him.”

“No. He will join our family as your husband. You are to keep him in line and ensure he does not become a liability.”

Brodie clamped his teeth together and pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth, so his fangs didn’t flick forward. “I do not want a husband or to manage a potential spy.”

“You are the most suitable, and I trust you to handle him.”

Brodie gave her a single nod. There would be no escaping this unwanted burden. While he’d sworn his loyalty to his mother and then his sister, he had not sworn his heart. He’d always expected he’d meet someone, probably a human, at some point that he loved enough to tell them he was a vampire.

No human he’d met had been worth it, and the vampires were jostling for proximity to power. When they were no longer convenient, he had no problem letting them go. He knew he was viewed as cold, but his priority had always been Vivian and the resort, now resorts.

His older brothers ran the cattle ranches, and two of them were already married.

While he was sure they had cousins who’d jump at the chance, viewing the arrangement as a promotion, that was the wrong reason to give it to them. It wasn’t about them, or even him; it was about what was best for the family.

His problem was that he didn’t agree that letting a Reid into their midst was the best option, not while they were stirring the pot and antagonizing the Orlans. The Orlans had taken out the Hadleys and had turned their attention to Reid territory in the west. He wasn’t stupid enough to think they would stop there, but there were other families, albeit smaller ones, they could align with.