A/N: Here we go with book 2, One Foot in the Grave, which is my personal favorite out of all the books. Special thanks to Wistar89 for her suggestion of including the letter Cat writes Bones…

And here's the big disclaimer...This is written solely from Bones' point of view. Most of it is internal, just in his head, but there a few things that are referred to in the books that take place between him and Spade or him and Ian, and I will be writing them out. That will be the only original dialogue between characters. A lot of the second book will original thoughts from Bones as he is seeking Cat out. I've broken the story up into segments of action, rather than by chapter, and they might be shorter than some on this site, but you might get 20 chapters of this story out of one from each book. Since it is a partial re-write, there are a number of lines in every chapter that belong solely to Jeaniene Frost - I'm just borrowing them. These characters also all belong to Jeaniene Frost, as does the entire Night Huntress World I like to play in. This little disclaimer is good for every chapter of this story, but will only appear once to save me from having to copy and paste it and save readers from having to skip it.

And in the end,
The love you take,
Is equal to the love
You make

– The Beatles

The bed I'd thrown against the wall in a rage made a keening sound as it settled on the floor. The watch she'd left went flying, but I saw Rodney go pick it up and hand it to me, silently. Numbly, I placed it in my pants pocket – the one not containing the ring I had hoped to give Kitten today.

But the letter, the letter… I watched as the letter flew up into the air when it was thrown off the bed and as it seemed to slowly, gently, settle into my lap. When the pink tears cleared from my gaze, I tried to read it, crumpling it up at several points in rage only to smooth it back out again.

Dear Bones,

By now you've come back and found us gone. I want you to know that this was the hardest decision I've ever had to make, leaving you, and it will haunt me forever. I meant what I said last night – I will love you until the day I die. I don't expect you to do the same – in fact I wish you any happiness you might find after this. Grab it and don't let it go, but please, for me, move on. I can't stand the thought of you embittered by this, or giving up your love of life. You have so much love in you to give – if you find someone to share that with, I wish you joy.

You were right yesterday when you guessed that the men who had me were government. They had me and they had my mother, and they knew about vampires. They said they'd been looking for something strong enough to fight vampires - that wasn't one of them. If I hadn't gone with them, it was only a matter of time before they found out about you, and I wasn't about to lead them right to your doorstep.

So I took the only option I had – to go with them. You know my mother would never have gone (or stayed) with you for long. She'd look for her first chance to escape. They promised that if I went with them, they'd leave you alone and take care of her. This is the only way to keep the only two people I love safe.

Please don't hate me. I love you,

Your Kitten.

I couldn't believe it. The only woman I'd ever truly wanted expected me to just move on and forget about her? Did she not remember how tenacious I was in my campaign to win her heart? And she honestly expected me to just walk on down the road and find another woman like her? It was insulting, is what it was.

I needed to think. And I needed to plan. Because not for one second was I giving her up, giving us up. I'd waited too long, worked too hard – and I'd seen enough of the world to know that what we had was unique, special, one of a kind.

I wasn't giving up on us. Not now, not ever.

I was a bounty hunter; I knew how to find people. And I had a new person to catch, one red headed half-breed. The clock starts: now.