CHAPTER EIGHT

EASY LOVER

There was no bouncer, no line of supernaturals behind a velvet rope. There was only a door, solid and metal.

We walked toward it, Ethan’s magic shifting around us as we moved. I was only a secondary recipient of his glamour—he wasn’t trying to make me do anything—but I could still feel the breadth of its undulating power. A powerful vampire was Ethan Sullivan.

He rapped on the door with the heel of his hand, two hard strikes. Five seconds passed, and a small panel slid open with the grating sound of metal on metal.

A man’s face appeared—pale skin, large eyes, and a flattened nose with a mole at one corner. If he was supernatural, I couldn’t tell. At least, not through the door. Other than Ethan’s, I couldn’t feel any magic at all, and I’d have expected plenty to have seeped from a building full of aroused supernaturals. Maybe the building had been warded.

The man looked at Ethan, then me. “What?”

“Sésame, ouvre-toi,” Ethan said in melodious French.

I bit back a smile. The password was literally “open sesame,” albeit in French. Supernaturals loved a bad joke.

The doorman’s caterpillar-thick unibrow dipped low between his eyes. He bared large teeth. “That’s an old password.”

His tone threatened a violent response, and I had to stop myself from touching my sword. But I’d given Ethan my word, and I kept my composure.

Ethan managed a tone of mild boredom. “It’s an old password because I’m an old client. I’m not going to explain myself to you. Get approval if you must, but open the door or I’ll do it myself.”

The bouncer stared at us for another ten seconds before slamming the grate closed again.

An old client? I repeated. Add that to the list of things we’ll discuss later.

I have nothing to hide, Ethan said.

Why did hearing that make me think exactly the opposite?

It took a full minute before the door was wrenched open. We joined the bouncer in a box of a room barely large enough to fit the three of us.

The bouncer slammed the front door shut, which made the urge to grab my katana even stronger. No time for that now. We were in, and we were committed.

When the exterior door locked, the door on the opposite side of the room opened with a click, revealing a long hallway with oak floors, pale yellow walls, and a dozen more doors. Each door was wooden and unremarkable and looked exactly the same.

And we’ve officially gone through the looking glass, I said silently.

You might reserve that judgment, until we’re actually in there, Ethan suggested.

Right on cue, a door on the right side of the hallway opened, and magic flowed out like water. More evidence, I thought, that the building had been warded, and that a sorcerer was at work in the neighborhood.

A vampire stepped into the hallway. Tall, thin, with remarkably pale skin. He wore an old-fashioned tux, spats, and white kid gloves fastened with pearl buttons.

“This way, sir,” the vampire said in a crisp English accent, bowing slightly as he stepped back from the door and motioned us inside.

And away we go, Sentinel.

We walked inside.

When I thought “supernatural bordello,” I imagined hunky elfish guys in tight leather pants with white hair and pointed ears, vampy women with corsets and long nails, their eyes silvered with lust and emotion. I always imagined anything with vampires would be heavy on Goth, lace, and candles, but it never was. I’d been in all three of the city’s Houses—Cadogan, Navarre, and Grey—and I didn’t think I’d seen anything mildly gothic in any of them.

There also wasn’t anything gothic in here.

The large room, lit by wavering hurricane lamps, had wooden floors that were covered with expensive rugs and groupings of large leather furniture outlined with brass tacks. There were two walls of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves stacked with leather and gilt volumes. The room smelled of leather and fragrant smoke.

It took me a moment to realize what I was supposed to be seeing—an English gentlemen’s club, or La Douleur’s version of it.

There were, at my guess, a dozen supernaturals, mostly men. I looked for familiar faces first—Reed or his cronies, supernaturals I knew, the bearded vampire who’d killed Caleb Franklin. No one looked familiar. But they did look as old-fashioned as their surroundings. They’d adopted the dress, Victorian suits or dresses with pinched waists and high necks. They generally sat in couples or groups, chatting, kissing, or sharing blood.

We followed the would-be butler, who escorted us to a high-backed settee and gestured to it. “Please.”

Sit at my feet, Ethan said, before I could move.

He must have felt my hesitation.

It is part of the illusion, of the theme of this particular room. Remember your word.

Since I’d given it, I bit back a sneer and sank to the floor at the edge of Ethan’s chair as graciously as possible.

He stroked a hand over my head. “Very good,” he said, signaling to the room that I’d pleased him.

I’d learned to bluff a long time ago, and if ever there’d been a time to use the skill, this was it. Dutifully, I rested my cheek on his knee.

“What may I obtain for you, sir?” the butler asked.

“Cognac, for the moment. We’ll see how well my pet behaves.”

I began to make very specific plans for Ethan’s quid pro quo. If I had to sit at Ethan’s feet, he’d damn well better be prepared to sit at mine.

The butler nodded, walked to a brass cart, poured liquid from a cut-crystal decanter. He brought it back to Ethan and then began checking with the other sups.

Do you recognize anyone? Ethan asked.

I trailed my fingers up and down his leg. I don’t. I count several vampires and shifters, but no sorcerers.

Caleb Franklin’s killer?

I looked them over. None had a beard, although that could have been removed easily enough. But the killer had also been tall and well muscled, and none of the vampires here seemed to have the right proportions, Ethan excluded.

I don’t see him, I said.

Me, neither.

But there’d been other doors in the hallway. There are other rooms? Themes?

Yes. All varied in the degree of their explicitness.

Do any of them have black lace and candles?

Goth, Sentinel? Really?

Someday, I was going to wander into a lair of Underworld look-alikes and my prejudice would be rewarded. Until then, Is there any way we can get to them? Inspect them?

Likely not without a fight.

I have no objection to a good fight. Especially since I’d come out on the losing end of my last one.

The butler carried a drink to a female vamp with pale skin and long, dark curls. She wore a scarlet bustier and a fluid skirt in a matching fabric, her lithe form draped across a chaise longue. A male vampire, naked but for his spill of long, dark hair and snug, hip-hugging leather pants, stood like a statue behind her. He stared at nothing in particular, seemingly waiting for her command.

There were bruises across his face, across his collarbone.

The butler spoke quietly to the woman, but she shook her head, waved him away.

Across the room, a slender man in a three-piece suit, a fedora pulled low over his head and a slim leather book in hand, lifted his hand to signal for service. The butler moved to him, bent slightly at the man’s words, then nodded, disappeared from the room.

Neither of them had looked at us, so it didn’t seem likely that had been a signal about us. But one could never be too careful.

Fedora, two o’clock, I told Ethan, nipping lightly at the fingers he brushed against my cheek.

I’m watching, Ethan said.

I turned my attention to the rest of the room, searching for magic, a forgotten alchemical symbol, some hint of that metallic magic. But there was nothing. Just the prickly air of excitement, of sensual anticipation. Considering the number of vampires in the room, I presumed there would be blood.

I looked up at Ethan, working my features into an expression of total adoration. If this is the appetizer, what’s the main course?

Ethan sipped at his cognac, kept a hand on my hair, stroking, his eyes on the room. The hallway door opened, and the butler escorted a young man inside. He was tall and leanly built, with dark skin and hair in short braids. He wore black slacks and a white button-down shirt, and his eyes glimmered with excitement.

I believe he would be the entrée, Ethan said.

Two female vampires with tan skin, high cheekbones, and straight hair pulled into high knots rose together from a sofa with an ornate back. They wore black silk dresses that snugged their bodies to midcalf, where the fabric pooled around their bare feet as they walked toward the young man. They were beautiful, and the man stared at them with obvious desire.

They took his hands, guided him toward a round, tufted ottoman in the middle of the room. They unfastened the buttons on his shirt, let it fall to the floor.

His neck and arms were dotted with scars, which the women caressed and flicked with eager tongues. It wasn’t hard to guess the scars’ origins; he’d given blood before, many times.

As the women lowered the donor to the ottoman, the butler appeared at our side. “If you’d come with me?”

Ethan kept his eyes on the ottoman. “And why would I want to do that?”

“Because Cyrius wishes to have a word with you.”

Ethan rolled his eyes, playing at a man unaccustomed to being beckoned, which wasn’t much of a stretch. But I caught the tightening of his jaw.

“I’m trying to relax, and I don’t know who Cyrius is. If he wants to speak with me, he can do so here.”

Trouble?

Cyrius runs La Douleur, Ethan said. I’ve not met him, but I know his name.

Another vampire entered the room—an enormous woman with freckles, brown hair, and silvered eyes that were focused on us. A katana in a lacquered black sheath was belted at her waist, and she probably had five inches and eighty pounds on me.

Good, I thought, as I met her threatening gaze. That might make us even.

Steady, now, Sentinel.

I won’t move unless I have to, I assured him. But I hoped that I’d have to. Even vampires bored of posturing.

“Now,” the butler insisted, all pretense of politeness—and the British accent—gone. “Or we do this here.”

Ethan rolled his eyes. “This was once an establishment of some gentility.” But he put aside his drink, rose, held up a hand for me.

I nodded, rose obediently, and followed Ethan and the butler to the door where the vampire waited. When I looked back, the vampires had descended on the man on the ottoman, and the scent of blood rose in the air.

The man in the fedora was gone.

•   •   •

We were marched into the hallway again, then through the open door at the far end into an enormous concrete room, probably a dock for the store that had once filled the slip. A rolling overhead door was open, letting in an astringent, chemical breeze.

There was a desk in the middle of the space piled with papers, and white cardboard file boxes lined the walls, some bursting with paper.

“Excuse the mess.” A man emerged from columns of boxes. A human of medium height, with pale skin, a round belly that hung over camouflage pants, and a gleaming head bounded by a perfect semicircle of dark hair. “We moved recently. Still organizing our inventory and whatnot.”

Ethan and I didn’t respond, but we watched him walk to the desk, pull out an army green chair, and take a seat. It creaked with his formidable weight.

He linked his hands on the table, looked up at us. His eyes were gray, and they narrowed as they took us in.

“Let’s start at the beginning,” he said. “You’re Ethan and, whatsit, Merit? From Cadogan House? Glamour don’t work on me,” he explained, “which makes me perfect for this job.”

So our cover was blown, and thank God for it. Playing meek was absolutely exhausting.

Ethan let the glamour slowly dissolve and flutter away. I rolled my shoulders with relief. The magic might not have had mass, but it still weighed heavily on my psyche.

I felt the vampire move closer, and I slipped a hand to my katana. The feel of the corded handle beneath my fingers was comforting.

“I wouldn’t, if I were you,” he said, gesturing to the vampire behind us. “She’s very good with that steel.”

There were many ways to bluff. You could preen and exaggerate your strengths, or you could let others believe you were less than you were. I opted for the latter, and managed to stir up a worried glance as I looked at the vampire over my shoulder.

She unsheathed her katana and smiled at me, lifting her chin defiantly. The steel of her sword was smeared and cloudy. She hadn’t cleaned it recently. Catcher, who’d given me the sword I carried, would have my ass in a sling for that.

I swallowed heavily, playing up my fear, then looked back at the man again. He looked very pleased.

“I’m afraid you have us at a disadvantage,” Ethan said, understanding exactly the game to be played. “I take it you’re Cyrius?”

“Cyrius Lore. I manage this club.”

“For who?”

“For whoever the fuck I want. It’s no business of yours. The fact is, you came into my club with an old password. I don’t like interlopers in my club.”

“Surprising, since you’ll allow virtually anything else.”

Ethan’s words were slow and dangerous, but Cyrius snorted. “You think I’m intimidated by you because you’re head of some vamp house? No. I manage a club; you manage a club. That makes us equals, far as I’m concerned.”

“I don’t allow my vampires to harm innocents in my ‘club.’”

Cyrius held up his hands defensively. “What happens among consenting adults is their business, not mine. I don’t police what happens here.”

I didn’t buy that everyone here was consenting, or that Cyrius didn’t know exactly what went on in his club.

But that was irrelevant, because he’d just shown us the only bit of business that mattered. On the inside of his right forearm was a forest green tattoo—an ouroboros, an old and circular symbol made up of a snake eating its tail.

It was the symbol of the Circle . . . and therefore of Adrien Reed.

Son of a bitch. Cyrius’s ink, I said to Ethan, and watched his gaze slip discreetly from Cyrius’s face to the symbol on his arm.

Cyrius Lore managed La Douleur, and the Circle managed Cyrius Lore. If we were right about the alchemical symbols, this was part of the sorcerer’s territory. We had a link between Adrian Reed and the sorcerer, the alchemy. Reed’s sorcerer and the alchemy sorcerer weren’t two different people. They were one and the same, part of his criminal organization. I wasn’t sure if that made me feel better or worse.

And once again, it raised questions about Caleb Franklin. Had he known about the Circle? About Reed?

Probably sensing our magic, Cyrius nodded and the vamp stepped closer, unsheathed her katana with a dull whistle of sound. I’d bet the edge was dull, too. She really needed to take better care of her blade.

She stepped forward, put the blade against my neck.

Maybe it was the place, maybe it was Reed. Maybe it was the residual effect of Ethan’s magic. Whatever the reason, my blood began to hum beneath the cold steel, aching to fight. Ethan tensed with concern, but my adrenaline was already flowing.

Focus on him, I said silently. She’s mine.

“Now,” Cyrius said. “Why don’t you tell me why the fuck you’re in my place when you weren’t invited?”

“We want information about Caleb Franklin.”

Cyrius frowned, which didn’t do his mug any favors. “The fuck is Caleb Franklin?”

“A shifter under the protection of Gabriel Keene,” Ethan said. Not entirely the truth, given the defection, but true enough for our purposes. “He’s dead.”

“I don’t know shit about him or who killed him.”

“He lived nearby,” Ethan said.

“We’re in Chicagoland. Few million people live nearby. I know nothing about him, which means you’ve wasted your time and mine.” Ugly or not, Cyrius’s face didn’t show any hint he was lying. Maybe he was just a good liar.

But the vampire was another matter. I didn’t need to see her face to know she had knowledge; the fizz of magic in the air was enough.

“What makes you think you have the right to walk into my place, disrupt my club, and ask me questions about anything?”

The vampire adjusted her position. Her sword was still at my neck, but she’d moved closer to Ethan, and her eyes were on him. In lust, in fascination, in hope. Maybe she had a crush on our photogenic Master. I could probably use that. And considering the current position of her sword, wouldn’t feel bad about exploiting it.

“I had the password,” Ethan said drolly.

“Your password is garbage.” Cyrius linked his hands on the table. “You know the penalty for trespassing?”

Ethan’s gaze flicked to the tattoo, up again. “For trespassing on Reed’s land, you mean?”

Cyrius shifted his arm to hide his ink, and his face went beet red. Maybe because of anger he’d been challenged, but more likely because of fear. Reed wouldn’t be happy that we’d discovered his bordello.

He offered a mirthless laugh, full of false confidence. “You don’t know shit about shit. But you just wrote your ticket out of here in a body bag.”

It was the kind of lead-in I’d probably heard a dozen times. The prelude to a command of violence to be meted out by someone else, by their weapon and their sweat.

And I was ready for it.

Cyrius signaled the vampire with a flick of his finger, a death penalty handed down with no effort on his part. I understood he believed us a threat—and he was right about that—but I didn’t have respect for people too lazy to fight their own battles.

Duck, I told Ethan, and when the vampire shifted her weight to bring the sword to bear, I moved. I put my hands on the arm of the chair, pushed up my weight, and as Ethan dodged, twisted and kicked. I caught her shoulder, sent her stumbling backward.

Ethan vaulted from his seat, jumped toward Cyrius, who’d pulled open a desk drawer. I caught the glint of metal, felt the buzz of steel in my bones. He had a gun.

Damn it. My arm had only just stopped aching. I did not want to get shot again this week. I’d let Ethan handle that one.

You got him? I asked Ethan.

I’ve got him. She’s yours.

Damn right she was.

I unsheathed my katana as the vampire regained her footing. I could give credit where credit was due: She’d held on to her sword, and was resetting to face me again.

Good. That would make the fight more interesting.

“You should tell me your name,” I said, raising my blade so it hovered in the air between us. “I mean, if we’re going to fight like this.”

She lifted her chin. “Leona.”

“Merit,” I said.

“I know who you are. The spoiled little rich girl.”

There weren’t many insults that would hit me dead-on, but that was one of them. I felt the sting, opened my mouth to argue that I wasn’t spoiled. And while I was mentally trying to justify my existence, she moved.

She wasn’t as fast as me, but she was big, all of it muscle that gave her plenty of power. Smiling, she moved forward, holding the sword aloft the way a knight might have carried a broadsword. She sliced down, the katana whistling by my head as I ducked away.

I’d barely pivoted when she tried another strike. Her arms were long, and she had a lengthy reach. I hopped onto a stack of the file boxes, jumped over the arc of the katana she swung at my feet. That made three strikes in a row for her, whereas I hadn’t managed one since my initial kick.

I considered using that as strategy—letting her wear herself out while I tried to stay in front of her. But that wouldn’t be much fun.

I bounced up and flipped over her head, spun my katana horizontal, and sliced across her torso. The blade caught leather, carved right through it, and stripped a line of crimson across pale skin.

She roared with agony and fury, brought the katana’s pommel down hard onto the arm I’d injured the night before. Pain jolted through my arm—a needle-sharp stab surrounded by a column of deep, dull ache. Tears sprang to my eyes, an involuntary reaction, and my knees went wobbly.

“Little rich girl,” she said, fairly singing it as I groped for the nearest column of boxes, tried to keep myself upright while my brain struggled back against pain.

Sentinel?

I’m fine, I said, risking a glance at him and Cyrius. Ethan had gotten the gun away; it was tucked into his jeans. But Cyrius had found a pearl-handled knife and was thrusting it toward Ethan.

You could use the gun on him, I pointed out.

How dull that would be, Ethan said, dodging a thrust. You need help?

That question was enough to have me rolling my shoulder, demanding my brain ignore the pain. I adjusted my fingers around the katana’s handle.

“It’s my father’s money,” I said. “Not mine.”

“Like it matters. All you Housed vampires are the same. You think you’re better than everyone else.”

This time, I wasn’t going to wait for her to nail me again. I took the offensive, moving forward, setting the pace and driving her back. I sliced horizontally, and she met my sword, blade against blade, the strike of steel against steel clanging through the air. I struck again, switching up my positions and direction.

Leona was bigger than me. I wouldn’t beat her with sheer strength, and maybe not with stamina. But I was faster and better trained, and could probably force her into a bad move.

“You know,” I said, “Reed’s got plenty of money, too. It doesn’t make sense you hate me, but work for him.”

Leona scoffed, spittle at the corners of her mouth as she worked to counter my strikes. “I don’t work for Adrien Reed. He’s a businessman.”

She used the world like a shield. “Yeah, keep saying that if it eases your conscience. But you know it’s only half right.” I switched up my attack, went for my favorite shot—a side kick that she batted away with an enormous hand. She tried to grab my ankle, but I cleared her, then spun and brought the katana around again.

Another clang of metal against metal. The sound made my teeth ache and my chest tighten with concern. The katana’s cutting edge was sharp, hard steel. It was designed to slice and too brittle for prolonged blade-on-blade strikes.

Another overhead strike—one of her favorites. This time, I spun the blade in my hand to raise the spine, which was less brittle, into the blow to protect the sword’s integrity. I still had to deal with Catcher, after all.

The woman had power, and the shock of impact passed through me like one of Mr. Leeds’s concussions. But it must have passed through her, too. When she raised the sword again, her muscles quivered with effort.

We’d reached the desk again, and I jumped onto one of the chairs, then over it, putting space between us.

She kicked the chair out of the way, stalked forward, spinning the katana in her hand.

“Did you know who killed Caleb Franklin?” I asked her.

“No,” she said, but the answer was belied by her fumble with the katana.

“Was he murdered to protect the alchemy?” Or given what we’d learned tonight, “Or to protect Reed?”

That was enough to have her lunging forward, the sword raised again.

Leona might not have been as good at bluffing as Cyrius was, but she was a hell of a lot braver and probably more loyal. I wasn’t sure I’d actually be able to get any information out of her.

Darling?

Ethan’s question, polite and casually curious, had me biting back a smile. He might as well have asked when I’d be home for dinner.

In front of me, Leona swayed side to side, shifting her body weight as she prepared to move. She looked tired, and I’d managed to get in a couple of deeper cuts. They’d heal, but use precious resources in the meantime.

Nearly done, I said, and glanced left, as if accidentally signaling my next move.

She took the bait, dodging left. I spun into a low kick and this time nailed my target. I kicked her legs out from under her. She hit the floor hard enough to make the building shake, her head bouncing once against concrete, her eyes rolling back.

I snatched up her katana, pointed both swords at her. Her chest rose and fell slowly. She was out cold.

My enemy vanquished, I glanced back at Ethan, found him standing over Cyrius. This time, Ethan had both the gun and the dagger. Cyrius sat on the floor, legs splayed in front of him, holding his arm at an awkward angle. Ethan looked healthy enough.

I walked to Cyrius’s desk, pulled open a drawer, found exactly what I’d expected to find: a pair of silver handcuffs.

It seemed likely I’d find some in a place dedicated to kink. But I decided not to think too carefully about how they’d been used before.

I walked back to Leona, pulled her hands in front of her, and cuffed her. She was too heavy to flip over; besides, I planned to be long gone before she woke.

“He answer your questions?” I asked, when I’d blown the bangs out of my eyes and walked back to Ethan.

“He did not.”

I grinned predatorily at Cyrius. “Can I have him?”

“No!” Cyrius said, which made Ethan grin.

“Not yet, Sentinel. Let’s see, first, if he’ll identify our murderer. Cyrius?”

When the man didn’t answer, I knelt in front of him, rested my elbows on my knees. “He asked you a question. Answer him, or he’ll give you to me. And you don’t want that.”

“That good-cop, bad-cop shit don’t work on me,” Cyrius said. But beads of sweat had popped across his forehead, and the words seemed to stick in his throat.

Ethan kept his expression mild. “You don’t get it, Cyrius. We’re both bad cops.” He held up the weapons he’d confiscated from Cyrius, gestured toward my swords. “Tell me about Reed.”

“He’ll kill me.”

“No, he might kill you,” Ethan said with a terrifying smile. “We definitely will.”

We wouldn’t, of course. Not a man unarmed, who’d been no real threat to us even when he’d been pretending otherwise. But he didn’t need to know that.

Cyrius wet his lips.

“You only get one chance to answer,” I warned him, patting his knee collegially before I rose again. “So choose that answer carefully.”

“He’s right,” Cyrius muttered, wiping his face with the forearm of his uninjured hand. “You’re monsters. No better than anyone else. He’ll fix it. He’ll fix all this. Bring some goddamn order to the world. Make things right again.”

Ethan’s brows lifted. “Is that the story Reed’s been telling you? That if he was dictator, if he ruled Chicago, life would be better for you?”

“He’ll clean up the streets.”

“He’ll continue to pollute the streets,” Ethan said. “He’s a crime lord, for God’s sake. He doesn’t belong in charge any more than Capone did.”

But Cyrius just shook his head. Whatever nonsense Reed had been spouting about his new world order, Lore seemed to earnestly believe it.

I stepped forward again and lifted the point of Leona’s katana to his neck.

“Who killed Caleb Franklin?” I asked him.

“I don’t know!” Spit accompanied the frantic words. “I don’t know.”

I pressed incrementally forward, until a droplet of crimson rolled down the blade.

“I don’t know!” Cyrius yelled. “I don’t know who he is. I’ve never met him or Franklin. I just know the vamp belongs to Reed.”

“And the sorcerer?” Ethan asked.

“I don’t know!”

“I’m tired of hearing that answer,” I said, adding a little crazy to my voice for impact and digging the point a millimeter deeper.

Cyrius lifted his eyes to Ethan. “Stop her. For Christ’s sake, stop her.”

Ethan looked unmoved by the pleading. “Why should I? You said we’d leave here in body bags.”

Cyrius didn’t have a good answer to that. “I swear to God I don’t know who the sorcerer is. Just that Reed’s got one. We aren’t allowed to know. We aren’t allowed to get close.”

Now, that was interesting. “Why?” I asked, pulling back on the blade, just a little. Cyrius’s gaze flicked to me again.

“He’s off-limits.” He swallowed, now all cooperation. “The sorcerer’s got something big planned with Reed. Something really big.”

Reed, the alchemy, the sorcerer. All of them part of something bigger. And confirmation, again, of something I didn’t really want to discover.

“Is the plan to do with the alchemy?” Ethan asked.

Cyrius’s expression seemed genuinely blank. “The fuck is alchemy?”

Ethan shook off the question. “What big thing does he have planned?”

“I don’t know. I just know we aren’t supposed to bother him with mundane shit. Not right now. Not while he’s focused.”

Ethan considered the answer for a moment, then crouched down in front of Cyrius. “I’m going to do you a favor, Cyrius Lore. Before I call the CPD, I’m going to give you time to get out of here.” He took Cyrius’s chin in his hand. “Tell him what happened here tonight. And tell him we’re coming for him.”

“He’ll kill me.”

“You lie down with dogs,” Ethan said, rising again, “you risk a bite.” He looked back at me. “Let’s get the hell out of here, Sentinel.”

When we stepped into the hallway again, La Douleur was in chaos. They’d either heard the fight or word had traveled. Doors were open, sups in costume—black latex, sexy nurse, eighteenth-century French aristocracy (which was so very vampire)—hustling toward the front door and the cover of darkness. I felt momentarily bad about interrupting consensual activities, but that guilt was erased when a woman with bruised eyes, tears streaming down her face, pushed through the crowd to the door.

We stepped into darkness with the rest of them, threw into the stream the weapons we’d confiscated. And, like the rest of the supernaturals hurrying out of the club, we disappeared into the night.