“Crawford wants me to bring Gray to him,” I told Clayton. He rode shotgun as I drove us through the city, searching for the familiar misty trails that belonged to Gordon Gray. “He and his family want to face his niece’s murderer.”

“They want to torture him,” Clayton said.

I nodded. “True enough. But I can’t bring myself to care.”

He looked at me, and his eyes held a grim smile. “If you become close with one vampire, you’ll begin to care about all of them. Your indiscriminate killing and torture of vampires will come back to haunt you.”

I frowned, angry that he would make me consider something that should have been an impossibility given my history.

But I’d protected Amias, and things had changed.

I had changed, and we both knew it.

Still, I wasn’t ready to admit it. “Not going to happen,” I muttered. Then, “Your feelings for Miriam don’t make you hate all women. Or all supernats.”

“I don’t hate Miriam.”

“You’d have to,” I scoffed.

He kept his silence, and I didn’t press. How could he not hate Miriam? She enslaved him. Humiliated him. Hurt him. Of course he’d hate her.

Reluctantly, I turned the car in the direction of Raeven’s Road. I didn’t want to go back there, but that was where I’d pick up his scent. Somewhere in the woods off that road, Gordon Gray was hiding out.

I just had to find him.

Then I had to try capturing him without killing him so the captain and his family could get some revenge. It wouldn’t bring back Lucy, but it’d give them a little satisfaction. Maybe.

“Best case scenario,” I said, more to myself than Clayton, “I’ll find his den, then go back when he’s sleeping to silver him. When the sun goes down, I’ll take him to the captain.”

My cell rang and I dug it out of my pocket. Clayton grabbed the dashboard when I glanced down at my phone and nearly ran us off the road, but I pretended not to notice.

“Captain?” I put the phone on speaker.

“We have a dead body,” Crawford said. “CSI is done, so you can come have a look.” He gave me the address. “I’m hoping you’ll get his scent and track the bastard down. This has priority, Sinclair.”

I understood. His need to avenge Lucy and appease her family was important to him—very important—but catching the vampire currently killing the women of Red Valley was crucial, and it was urgent. “Of course,” I said. “You’re there now?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m on my way.” And maybe I was a little relieved at the delay in traipsing back down Raeven’s Road.

“Sinclair,” he said, before I could end the call.

Something in his voice made my stomach tightened and my heart begin to beat a little too fast. “Yes?”

“A substance was discovered on one of the bodies.”

Clayton and I traded dread-filled stares. “What substance?” I asked the captain. As if I didn’t know.

“A drug that’s been banned for decades, and one that hasn’t surfaced in all the years I’ve been on the force.”

The Foam of Aphrodite. They’d found it.

Unfortunately for the supernaturals, they’d found it.

And that was going to change everything—a lot sooner than we’d believed.

“I’m on my way,” I repeated. I glanced at Clayton as I pushed the phone back into my pocket. “This is bad.”

He nodded. “The vampires aren’t killing the Red Valley women. The incubus is.”

I smacked the steering wheel. “Shit!” Then I frowned. “But there were fang punctures on the bodies. They were drained. The incubus couldn’t have done that, could he?”

“Maybe,” Clayton told me. “But I don’t know why he would.”

“I’m going to have to tell the captain about the incubus. If I don’t, they’ll start looking at the supernaturals.”

“If there’s no incubus to give them, they’re going to be looking at the supernaturals anyway.”

When we arrived at the scene, there was a small crowd of people standing outside the taped-off area, most of them craning their necks to get a glimpse of the corpse.

Despite the crowd, the situation appeared controlled and the atmosphere was subdued. News vans were parked along the street, but they were wrapping up.

“Captain,” I called, when a uniform reached out to stop me.

Captain Crawford lifted the tape and motioned me through, but refused to allow Clayton to accompany me.

“There’s something wrong with that man,” the captain muttered, when I stood beside him. Then he forgot about Clayton as he took my arm and walked me toward the dead woman on the ground.

“We pulled traces of the rape drug off the corpse.” He blew out a heavy breath, then rubbed the bridge of his nose. New lines radiated from the corners of his eyes, and he could’ve packed for vacation using the bags under his eyes. “Someone is using the Foam of Aphrodite on human women, and the vampires are draining her. What is going on here?”

“Captain,” I murmured.

He narrowed his eyes. “You know something about this, Sinclair?”

I wanted to say no. I nodded. “We should talk.”

He stared at me for a few seconds, his expression going from angry to suspicious to weary, before he finally put his hands on his hips and nodded. “I’m listening.”

I glanced around to make sure no one was close enough to overhear the conversation. “The absolute last thing the supernats need is for word of this foam to leak to the public,” I said.

“I’m not worried about the supernatural community right now, Trinity,” he barked. “I’m worried about the piles of dead human women I’m carting to the morgue.” Still, he lowered his voice. “What do you know?”

“Vampires aren’t killing these women,” I told him. “It’s an incubus. We think he’s making the foam from…” I swallowed, suddenly hesitant. “From his…er…sperm, blood, and the sexual energy he steals from the women he kills.”

He frowned, absorbing my words, then shook his head. “The bodies are drained. There are fang marks—the lab confirmed both those things. And incubi, not that I believe your story, don’t kill when they feed. They rape and terrorize, but they don’t kill.”

“Usually they don’t,” I agreed, “but this one is sick. He’s stuck here. Maybe he was banished as punishment for something. The longer he’s here the sicker and weaker he becomes. He can’t exist here on sips of humans. He needs all of them. They will keep him alive until he can get what he needs to propel himself back to his world.”

“And that would be…”

I shrugged, offering him an uneasy grin. “Me, I’m afraid.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You.”

“He needs the energy of a bloodhunter to gain enough power to return to his world. We’re pretty rare, as you know. He discovered me, and he’s been trying to eat me ever since.”

“How long?”

“A little while now,” I mumbled.

He nodded slowly and pursed his lips, wondering how angry he should be at me. “A little while now. You knew about this incubus from the beginning.”

“Of course not,” I snapped. “We just—”

“We meaning you and the supernaturals.”

“Yes. And if word gets out that it’s not actually vampires killing these women, the humans will go after the supernaturals. You know they will. You have to protect them.”

“No,” he said. “I have to protect the women this incubus is killing.”

My stomach hit the ground. “Captain. Frank. Please.”

“Captain,” one of his men called. “Have a minute?”

“When this gets out, and it will, I’ll make sure the public knows the foam is coming from a demon,” the captain told me, turning to stride away. “That’s all I can do.”

I stared down at the ground, trying to avoid the woman’s face as I searched for tracks. They weren’t difficult to find. I picked up a few of them, but two of them, both vague blue—one darker than the other—were the most vivid. Both of them swirled not only around her body, but inside it. Blue fog drifted from her mouth, her ears, even her eyes.

But why?

Before I could think too hard about it, I knelt beside the woman, closed my eyes, and put my nose close to one of the colorful fog tracks. I pulled in the scent, latched on, then straightened, only realizing when I heard horrified shouts of disgust and anger how I must have looked to the watching crowd.

“Corpse sniffer,” someone screamed.

“Oh hell,” I muttered, climbing to my feet. “That’s not how I want to be labeled.”

Captain Crawford hurried to me. “What the fuck are you doing?” he muttered.

“Picking up a trail,” I told him. “Vampires were here. I want to find out why. I want to find out what they know.”

He ran his hand over his face, then blew out a hard breath. “If you bring him to me and he agrees with what you said, I’ll put the story out to the public.”

Maybe I could save the supernaturals. With that one vampire, I could save them. I just had to find him.

I nodded. And then, ignoring the jeers from offended humans, I lifted my nose to the air and began to follow the scent one of the vampires had left behind. Clayton joined me once I left the taped-off area, and I became vaguely aware that he was keeping irate humans from my back.

I jogged down the street, ignoring everything but that scent, and at last, we left the outraged humans behind.

Sometime later Clayton clicked on a flashlight when we entered darkness not penetrated by streetlights, and when I glanced at him, I saw he held a silver chain in his free hand.

I sniffed the air and slowed my jog to a walk, determined that before the night was over, I would give the humans yet another reason to hate the vampires.