(My life. Hell's bells.)

Anyway, I didn't have a key or any time to spare, so when I got to the locked gate to the marina, I abused my cool new superstrength and forced the chain-link gate open in a low squeal of bending metal. It took me about three seconds.

"Cool," Molly murmured from behind me. "Wait. Did you do the car, too?"

I grunted, a little out of breath from the effort.

"Holy cow," Molly said. "You're like Spider-Man strong."

"Nah," I panted. "Spider-Man can press ten tons. I can do sets with four hundred kilos."

"Kilos," Molly said.

"I inherited the last guy's weight set," I said. "It's this fancy European thing. Not sure exactly how heavy that is in English."

"In England they use kilos," Molly said wryly. "But it would also be around sixty or sixty-five stone."

I stopped and looked at her.

She smiled sweetly at me.

I sighed and kept on walking out to the boat.

It's called the Water Beetle. It could be the stunt double for the boat of the crusty old fisherman in Jaws, except that it had been freshly painted and refinished and it looked a little too nice. I stopped on the dock in front of it.

There. I'd been standing right there, looking out toward the parking lot when it happened. My chest didn't actually feel a pang of agony, but the memory of it was so sharp and clear that I might as well have reexperienced it-it hadn't hurt at the time, not until I'd been in the water for a while, but it had been pure fire once Mab and Demonreach had succeeded in keeping my soul and body knit together.

And to think, I'd had to call in a solid to get the guy to come shoot me. It seemed like kind of a waste, at this point. I'd been sure that if I had managed to win the day, thanks to my deal with Mab, that I would be a monster in need of a good putting down. I'd scheduled my own assassin, and Molly had used her unique talents to help me forget that it was coming. Once the day had been safely saved, the plan had been to circumvent the evolution of monster-Harry by way of high-powered rifle.

Except I'd survived. Next, I guess, came the monster-Harry part.

I had it on good authority that it didn't have to end with me going all nutty and villainous-assuming an archangel was trustworthy, which I didn't. I also had it on good authority that it would end like that anyway. So at the end of the day, I really didn't know what was going to happen to me in the future.

Heh. Why should I be any different?

The Water Beetle was definitely not battened down for winter, not yet. She was a sturdy, tough little craft-not fast, but not afraid of much of anything nature would throw at her, either. Her gangplank was down, and "batten" and "gangplank" are about the only boat words I'm comfortable with. I moved up it without hesitation, even in the shadowy dimness of late night on the marina. I was familiar with the boat.I'd visited the island on it on multiple occasions.

I went aboard and up onto the roof of the wheelhouse, where the driver's position was. I flicked on a couple of tired old bulbs and checked the gauges. Fuel, oil, good. She had more than enough for the trip out to the island and back. The key wasn't in the ignition-it would be in the small safe down in the boat's cabin, but I knew the combination.

"We're good," I called softly. "Come on."

Molly came up the gangplank while I went down into the cabin.

I got no warning whatsoever, no sound, no visible motion, nothing. One second I was going down the stairs, and the next my face and chest were being crushed against the wall and something extremely sharp was pressing against my neck, just beneath my right ear. Cool, iron-strong fingers were spread over my whole head, pressing it to the wall. The message was clear-if I struggled or made any sound, something pointy would go into my brain.

I froze. It seemed smart. If my attacker wanted me dead, I wouldn't still be able to reason that he could already have killed me.

"Hello, precious," murmured a man's very soft voice. "I think you're on the wrong boat."

I sagged suddenly in relief. "Stars and stones," I breathed. "Thomas, you scared the hell out of me."

The power of the cold fingers against my head did not falter in the slightest, but there was a short, stunned silence. Then the pressure against my skull became furious. "Do you think this is funny?" my half brother said, his voice becoming louder, fairly boiling with anger. "Do you think I am amused by this kind of prank?"

"Thomas," I said. "It's me."

"Sure it is," Thomas snarled, the pressure against me surging for a second. "Harry Dresden is dead."

I thought my eyeballs were trying to squeeze their way out of their sockets. "Glurk!"

"Now," he growled. "I'm going to give you exactly three seconds to start telling me the truth, or I swear to God they will never find enough pieces of you to identify the body."

He meant it, Hell's bells. He was furious. If I were the kind of guy who ever got scared by anything, ever, which of course I am not, I would have been feeling extremely nervous at that moment.

"Mab!" I ground out. "Dammit, Thomas, you lunatic. It was Mab!"

"Mab sent you?" Thomas demanded.

"Mab saved me!" I rasped. "Hell's bells, man, it's me!"

Thomas growled, lower, but he didn't pancake my skull or stick something sharp and metal into my brain. Thomas was strong-stronger than me. A vampire of the White Court can bring out that kind of strength only on special occasions, but Thomas was a very well-fed vampire. I knew that if he wanted to do it, Winter Knight steroids or no, he could twist me like a congressman's logic.