Boaz dropped me off a half-dozen steps from the front doors of Haint Misbehavin’, like I could manage to get in trouble between him and the entryway. I wasn’t sure if I ought to be insulted six feet was as far as he trusted me or grateful I didn’t have to risk another late-night rendezvous with my stalkerpire.

“Shift ends in six hours.” I climbed off the bike. “I’ll catch a ride with Amelie to Mallow. Are you headed home?”

“I’ll be around,” he said vaguely. “Got your phone?”

“Yes, Mom.” I patted my cross-body purse. “I have ibuprofen in case of headaches and bandages in case of blisters too.”

“Good girl.” He let my sarcasm slide right off him and twisted his mouth up into a smile that promised nothing but trouble. “Have fun.”

Worried about what that smile promised, I hurried inside and bumped into Amelie.

“Was that Boaz?” She craned to see over my shoulder. “I thought I heard that stupid bike of his.”

“He gave me a ride.”

Her nose crinkled. “How literal are we talking?”

“For the millionth time, I’m not having sex with your brother.” Or any sex at all, despite the ridiculous injection of testosterone my life had received. “But since you spend so much time imagining us bumping uglies, if our uglies ever do bump, you’ll be the first person I call with all the juicy details.”

“You could have just told me to keep my nose out of your business.”

“We’re practically sisters.” We had been stuck like glue since I came to live with Maud, way before my boy-crazy phase made me forget about that time I caught Boaz eating his own boogers on a dare. Mostly. Okay, so not even hormones could erase some horrors. “That makes it my solemn duty to inflict as much emotional distress and mental anguish on you as humanly possible.”

“If that was your plan, then you succeeded beyond your wildest dreams.”

Voices drifted down the hall from the room where Neely held court, meaning we had a few minutes until our turns with hair and makeup. Amelie led the way into the women’s parlor, and we started pulling on our costumes. Her gown was buttery yellow and complemented her golden-blonde hair and warm, brown eyes.

The room bustled with the other female Haints prepping for the long night ahead, so we kept conversation light and didn’t talk about any of the things that mattered until Neely called for us.

While Neely worked on Amelie, I thumbed through a few of the magazines he kept scattered around his workspace. Several sported blank sticky notes over brunette models with builds similar to mine, confirming my suspicions that I dressed so poorly he had resorted to shopping for me in his head as a form of therapy.

A petite woman edging toward fifty popped her head in the room. Dressed in a black satin swing dress straight out of the fifties, with her blonde hair pinned in victory rolls, Cricket was less Southern belle and more rockabilly in mourning.

“Neely,” she mouthed around an unlit cigarette. “Enough with the primping. Amelie, get your butt in my office.” She snapped her fingers. “Move it.”

Being a good little employee, Amelie hopped straight to her feet and followed Cricket out.

Neely guided me into the chair then leaned around the corner to make sure the coast was clear.

“I didn’t want to say anything in front of Amelie, but I’ve been dying to ask.” He vibrated with excitement. “How did your date go with Volkov?”

“It was…” life-changing, terrifying, amazing, “…not bad. He’s a decent guy.”

Decent in the vampire sense of the word, which was not quite the same as the human one.

“That hardly sounds like a declaration of undying love.”

Undying. Good one. “I haven’t known him long enough for him to inspire more than the occasional hot flash.”

Honestly? I wasn’t sure how much of that was true attraction versus the lure, and I might not ever be.

“Chemistry is important.” He tapped my nose with the end of his brush. “It’s not as important as mutual respect, financial solvency or humor, but it’s up there. It’s been my experience the better you know a person, the more connected you feel to them, and the more attractive they become to you.”

Comforted by the tickle of soft bristles over the bridge of my nose, it struck me why these sessions appealed to me when I was ultimately too lazy to learn how to apply more than mascara and lip gloss. Neely’s medium might not be ink, but his brushes had been the only ones on my skin for the longest time.

“What about Boaz?” Neely shot me a look that dared me to deny we shared a spark. “The polite thing to do would have been to go with a man on each arm. They both put so much effort into impressing you. Seems a shame you had to choose. Why let one go to waste?”

“I’m not starting a harem.” Though a blond and a brunette wasn’t a bad place to start…

The grapevine would be buzzing after last night with rumors circulating about whose arm I arrived on and whose car I left in. None of that factored in Boaz’s swoon-worthy save either. I would have appeared quite the social butterfly, or worse, when nothing was further from the truth.

All I needed was for the pearl-clutchers and uptight suits with daughters of a marriageable age to think I was collecting eligible bachelors from all levels of Society. That would win me allies. Or, you know, a knife through my kidney.

“This is a judgment-free zone.” He started twisting my hair into a thick braid. “So I expect you not to judge me when I say you should get out there and see what life has to offer before you settle down with one guy for the rest of your life. You’re young. Have some fun. Break some rules.”

Most days it felt like I had broken enough rules to last a lifetime. “How much did life offer you before you settled down?”

“Enough,” he said with a sharp exhale.

I met his gaze in the mirror. “Is everything okay?”

“People just suck sometimes.”

Recalling Cruz’s hostility, I had to ask, “You’d tell me if you were having problems with someone at work, right?”

“You need this job more than I do.” He squeezed my shoulder then reached for the curling iron. “The last thing I’d do is let you step in this flaming-hot mess.”

Warmth flooded my chest that he would place my financial problems above his own equally serious ones, but that was just Neely. He had no idea this job was now a hobby for me, and selfish as it might be, I didn’t want him viewing me in a different light. Everyone else was already sizing me up for their own purposes. Until I put in my notice or Amelie blabbed, I was content to be my old ramen-slurping self where he was concerned.

But, as the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility, and I wasn’t about to let this abuse go unpunished.

“Let me know if you change your mind.” I gave myself a once-over when he stepped back to admire his work, understanding more now than I had last night what Neely meant when he said this was my character look, not my me look. “I’m off to spook the pants off my victims.”

“Just make sure you go through their pockets before you donate them.” He gave me a saucy wink. “Bring your waterproof parasol. There are showers in the forecast.”

“Ugh.” The odds for more than a good misting must be low or else Cricket would have put the kibosh on tonight’s tours. Cancellations weren’t for our benefit, naturally, but for the preservation of the dresses, suits, hats and parasols, and to save on her dry-cleaning bill. “Good thing I’ll be leaving with Amelie. I hate riding Jolene in the rain.”

A shudder rippled through him. “I don’t know how you can stand to ride her at all.”

“Bikes are freedom.”

“Motorcycles are what happened when a man looked at a perfectly respectable bicycle and thought, How can I transform this into a flaming death machine?”

A laugh sneak attacked me, and I wheezed through the corset. “It’s not for everyone, but still. Don’t knock it until you try it. Bring Cruz to my house sometime. I’ll give you guys lessons.”

His demeanor softened. “He would look good in leather.”

“See?” I swished toward the door. “It’s a win/win.”

On my way past the bulletin board, I pulled down the envelope with my list of victims and skimmed the details on each group. Fifteen in one and eight in another. A grumble worked its way past my lips before I remembered tips weren’t do-or-die tonight. Armed with that comforting thought, I headed to The Point of No Return.

“Excuse me, miss,” an all-too-innocent voice drawled behind me. “I’m a last-minute addition to your tour. Here’s my ticket.”

I stopped walking and started counting backwards from ten. “Boaz, what do you think you’re doing?”

“Cricket said your groups were light tonight.” He pressed a torn stub into my hand. “She was thrilled to sell me tickets for back-to-back tours.” He rubbed his hands together. “Let’s see what you got.”

Mentally, I rerouted the later tour so he wouldn’t have to trudge along the same path. “I expect you to behave.”

“I’m a paying customer.” He slapped his palm over his heart. “Whatever happened to the customer’s always right?”

“That only counts for actual customers and not annoying big-brother types.”

With a twist of my wrist, I stuck out the parasol I’d been using as a walking stick, a habit Cricket abhorred, out in front of him. Busy watching the swish of my skirts, Boaz tripped and stumbled into an awkward crouch on the pavement.

“Oh, sir. Are you all right?” I projected my voice to reach my victims and cranked up the charm. “I do apologize. Please forgive little ol’ me. I hope you aren’t injured.”

“No harm done.” His smile promised retribution. “Can you give me a hand up?”

It was a trap. It had to be. I did not want to give that man my hand while he had that look in his eyes, but we had the crowd’s attention now, and there was no going back. “Of course.”

He stood without applying an ounce of pressure on me and brought my hand up to his mouth where he pressed a lingering kiss into my palm then closed my fingers over the spot his lips had caressed. I angled my body away from the group then rolled my eyes so hard they whirled like tops.

Still in character, I bobbed in a neat curtsey, reclaimed my hand and strolled toward the gathering. Several of the women sized Boaz up with slow perusals, wetting their lips like they couldn’t wait to taste him. A few of the men puffed up at the shift in attention away from them, but their chests deflated upon noticing I was the sole target of Boaz’s lethal charm.

Lucky me.

We set out after I gave the booze talk, Boaz leading the pack, and I guided us down one of my favorite routes, the one that passed a haunted brewery open to the public on the weekends.

“The Clark family owns the Black Dog Brewery. The bar is street level, and there’s a fantastic garden out back. I highly recommend the stuffed jalapenos, but I’ve heard good things about their burgers too. The downstairs is under renovation at the moment, and it’s got its own creepy history, but tonight we’re going to focus on the two stories above the bar that are so haunted the ghosts refuse to allow the renovations necessary for the business to expand.”

I got a few interested murmurs out of that one, so I pushed ahead.

“The last time Mr. Clark attempted to have the second floor brought up to code, he got calls from his furious workers demanding compensation for their ruined equipment. Apparently, several guys had left their larger, and therefore more expensive, power tools upstairs overnight, and when they came back the next morning, all the windows had been thrown open—even the ones painted shut—and their drills, saws and nail guns had been tossed out onto the street.”

“That can’t be true,” a gruff man argued.

The teen boy next to him smirked. “What? You don’t believe in ghosts, man?”

“No.” He shifted on his feet, uncomfortable in the spotlight. “I don’t believe that thousands of dollars’ worth of power tools would still be on the street in the morning.”

Tittering laughter rippled through the crowd, and I joined in. “I can’t argue that logic.”

“How do you know this stuff actually happened?” a girl asked from under the boy’s arm. “Are y’all given a script or something?”

Unlike my annoyance with out-and-out skeptics who seemed to book tours for the sole purpose of making the guides’ nights miserable, I could appreciate a healthy dose of honest doubt.

“Each guide is required to study the history of the locations on every individual route. That information is pulled from books, old newspaper clippings and the internet.” I gave what I hoped was a winning smile to the man who asked the original question. “We’re all guilty of exaggeration to create a juicier story.” I held up a hand to forestall their next questions. “But, and this is an important but, the bare bones are true. Go home. Google. You’ll find all the information I covered tonight and so much more.”

“Cool,” the teens murmured in sync, cementing my assumption of their coupledom.

“Any more questions?” I must have done something right because the crowd shook its head in unison. “In that case, y’all can follow me right across the street to the oldest restaurant in Savannah.”

“You’ve got them eating out of the palm of your hand,” Boaz murmured near my elbow.

“Stepping into a role is freeing.” The job helped me feel normal for a few hours a night. As much as any Southern belle spewing grisly horror stories for tips can be called normal. “It’s a fun job.”

“Amelie’s always loved it.” He appeared thoughtful. “She’s going to miss it when she graduates and picks up full-time work in her field.”

“Once a Haint, always a Haint.” I twirled my parasol. “She can always pitch in at Halloween if she starts pining for the good old days.”

“Hard to believe she’ll have her MBA in a few years.” He shook his head like it might help him absorb the fact his little sister was growing up. “A Master’s in Business Administration. What will she even do with that?”

Jealousy, that old green-eyed monster, reared its ugly head, and I’m ashamed how long it took me to defang. I hated that petty side of me. Hated how I envied Amelie’s bright future. Hated being so screwed up I kept enabling the cycle.

We had always planned on sharing a dorm room, or maybe getting a small apartment off-campus, but that hadn’t happened. Obviously. Living at home had to be saving her a ton of money, though. So there was a bright side in there. And it’s not like it was her fault that when I held the future we’d planned against the one I’d been handed, I fell short.

I’d earned my GED after a few weeks of classes, but there were gaps in my formal education as well as my necromantic one. In a prison where parole was a pipe dream and the inmates were drugged until all they could string together was drool, the Society wasted no funds on bettering us. And, with Amelie nearing her final stretch, I had no hope of catching up to her.

Just the thought of being the new kid again…

“Marketing,” I answered after too long of a pause, quoting the answers she’d given me when I’d asked the same question. “Accounting. Management. Computer information systems, whatever that means.”

“I have an associate degree in criminal justice.”

“Really?” I glanced over at him. “I didn’t know that. Congrats. I bet the pics of you in your cap and gown—” I tried picturing him all solemn and dignified. Instead, I remembered the catastrophe that had been his high school graduation. “Did you wear clothes under the gown this time?”

His eyes crinkled at the corners. “That’s between me and the goddess.”

I burst out laughing. “That’s a no.”

“Cut me some slack.” His wounded act failed courtesy of the mischief glinting in his eyes. “I’m trying to impress you here.”

Impress? Boaz had been as naked as the day he was born under that gown, and he wanted me thinking long and hard about what I’d missed out on. Emphasis on the long and the hard. That part of Boaz’s anatomy had ceased to be a mystery the day he walked on stage, accepted his diploma with one hand and hiked up his gown to moon the crowd with the other. To this day, I’m not sure if I ought to be thankful I didn’t get the full moon, or if the side-peen I glimpsed was somehow worse.

Exhibitionism was apparently a turn-on for him. Shocker.

A prickling sense of unease swept over me as we neared the restaurant, and I slowed my pace.

“Keep walking, Squirt.” Boaz waited for me to catch up to him. “They won’t make a move in front of so many witnesses.”

They? Three men played checkers on the swayback front porch. When we got within five yards of them, the tallest one lifted his head, met my gaze and winked at me. “It’s my stalkerpire. Looks like he brought friends.”

“Stalkerpire?” He chuckled before patting a chest pocket on the leather jacket he hadn’t removed. “Don’t worry. I brought friends of my own.”

Stakes? There were no laws that said you couldn’t arm yourself against other supernatural races. But the Society found the notion of self-defense so unseemly as to punish those who got caught brandishing weapons sharper than their wit.

They were under the mistaken impression that, as the race who created vampirism, vampires were somehow beholden unto necromancers. While that might be strictly true, and most were respectful enough, the perfume had faded from that rose long ago. Vamps didn’t appreciate being treated as second-class citizens, but the Society never let them forget their place, as evidenced by their subfloor seating at the Lyceum.

“What are the odds of this not ending in blood?” I whispered out of the side of my mouth while smiling back at my victims, hoping they believed the lie they saw written on my face and ignored the clanging of their inner warning bells. Running from a predator was a bad idea. It turned those warning bells into dinner bells real quick. “I need to get these people to safety.”

“These people are your safety.” Cannon fodder was what he meant. “These guys have been following us for the last five blocks. That they got here ahead of us is a bad thing, Grier. It means they’re learning your routes.”

Hunting me like feral cats with one mouse to split between them. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“There’s nothing you could have done, so why worry you?”

His logic was sound, and I got why he’d kept his mouth shut, but his attitude reminded me so much of Volkov at that moment I was amazed when smoke didn’t pour out of my ears. Protecting me was one thing. Coddling me was another. I didn’t care if my only choices were exsanguination or exsanguination with a side order of kidnapping, I wanted to make that call for myself even when the answer was obvious. I wanted the courtesy of being asked instead of having my fate decided for me. Again.

“I’ll do what I can to drag out the last three stops, but we need to hash out a plan.”

“I’ve got it covered,” he assured me.

“I bet you do.” I stormed off to begin my recitation. Though my skin crawled when I turned my back on the vamps, I trusted Boaz to save me from becoming a pincushion. “This is the Rumrunner, founded back in 1789 by the pirate…”

The vamps gave up all pretense of playing their game to listen in and sneer at us. The crowd got restless, their hindbrains twitching without understanding why, and I hurried through the rest of my talking points. As my group hit the sidewalk heading toward a more residential area, with brighter streetlights, they shook off the worst of their unease.

“Why were those guys being so rude?”

I located the speaker—the teenage girl—and took a moment to pause and address the group. “The sad truth is some locals get their jollies by heckling guides and their groups. I don’t see the appeal, but it happens at least once a week. I’m sorry it happened to you.”

At least the skeptics I got. They wanted a forum to voice their contrary opinion, and they were willing to pay money to one-up a guide peddling the opposite of their beliefs even when it ruined what should have been a fun outing for everyone else. A total waste of cash, if you asked me, but whatever.

Locals showing their backsides, though? That I didn’t get. Sure, the Southern-belle thing might be a tad ridiculous, but that was half the fun. Ghost tours were a booming industry in towns with a claim to a bloody heritage. We helped the tourist trade. We kept history, albeit the gorier side of it, alive. Where was the harm? Why the hate?

Of course telling my group that vampires were stalking us was more likely to end with my faux victims becoming actual victims when they swarmed the vamps and started quizzing them on their undead lives and asking the usual questions about how one went about getting bitten. Receiving the bite was easy. Heck, there were vampire restaurants where they chose willing humans right off the menu. But much like the misguided warg lore claiming one bite would turn you into a slavering wolf on the nights of the full moon, a vampire bite wouldn’t turn you immortal either. Neither would drinking their blood, though I did once see a human get high that way.

Want to become a vamp? You need a willing necromancer, a signed contract, and a verified money transfer before that happens.

The group shuffled, eager to keep moving toward the lights. These victims were getting the short end of the stick tonight between the tool debate and the leering vampire debacle. I sensed a few of them were ready for this to end so they could go back to their hotels, and I hated their evening had been a downer. We breezed through two stops when the crowd remained listless. The vamps had trailed us. I could sense them in the prickling of the fine hairs down my nape. Or maybe that was my imagination running wild.

We reached The Point of Hey You Made It Back, and the crowd dispersed in an eager rush. Boaz ushered me inside then set off toward a cluster of shadows pooling under a Bradford pear tree heavy with white blossoms. Amelie met me in the hall dressed in jeans, a tee and sneakers. Wasting no time, she shackled my wrist with her fingers.

“We’re going out the back.” She hauled me toward the rear exit. “Boaz is distracting them for us.”

“I can’t leave. Cricket would murder me if I left in one of her gowns.” I pulled against her. “And I still have one tour left.”

“Not quite.” Neely swaggered from his makeshift salon and struck a pose in the hallway. His dark-gray trousers looked painted on, but his matching frock coat hid a multitude of sins, and his cravat, tied with an intentional air of negligence, made him appear quite the dandy. The stovepipe hat he doffed in our direction completed the ensemble. “I have one tour left.”

I let Amelie drag me a few more steps. “You don’t have to do this.”

“Sure, I do.” He shoved up my skirt in the front, untied the bow cinching the hoop skirt in at my waist and shoved the frame down around my feet like a coiled Slinky. “That’s what friends are for.” He drew back and inspected me. “That’ll do. This way you’ll fit in the car.”

“Thanks, Neely.” I kissed his cheek. “You’re the best.”

“Yes, well, your boyfriend’s tip paid for Cruz and me to rent a cabin for the weekend up on Stone Mountain. It’s the least I can do.”

Caving to Amelie’s sense of urgency, I followed her out the rear exit. “What about your tours?”

“I’m done. Remember when Cricket pulled me into her office? She was telling me the private tour I had tonight cancelled. The bride has mono.” She herded me toward her car. “With Neely covering for you, we’re both off the hook.”

“What did you tell him?” The truth wasn’t an option. “Why does he think I had to ditch?”

“I didn’t have to tell him anything except you needed a favor.”

Stupid tears wavered in my vision. Neely was a good egg.

“Where are we going?” I climbed in her car and waited for her to join me. “I’m guessing Mallow is out of the question.”

“Boaz said to get you home.” She cranked the engine then sped out of the lot, hands white-knuckled on the wheel. “We can have burgers delivered if you want. I don’t have anywhere to be since I’m off early. For once, I don’t have any studying to do either. Classes don’t start back until next week.” She glanced over at me. “It’s been forever since we spent more than five minutes together.”

“Burgers it is then.” I pulled up the app for our favorite pub and started ordering. “To molten lava cake for dessert or not to molten lava cake for dessert?”

“How is that even a question?”

When she was right, she was right.