Too late, I realized why Kael had chosen the old meat-packing plant as the venue for our meeting and cursed myself for not realizing sooner - I was getting sloppy in my eagerness to find Layla.

Even before I entered the building itself, the stench of dry blood and death overwhelmed my nostrils. Vampires can smell like dogs - as in, we have a sense of smell akin to canines, we don't stink of old blankets and dog food - most of the time we can control it and use it as a tool. But when there's spilled blood about, then it's a different matter. Fresh blood blinds a vampire to any other smell, old blood is less potent, but when there's this much of it, then it's just as bad. I don't know how long the meat-packing plant had been active, but long enough for the whole damn building to be soaked in blood. It might have been washed off the walls and floors, and the place had been abandoned for years, but the blood had gotten between the tiles, soaked into the masonry and woodwork, dried in every crack. You'd have to raze the place to the ground for a vampire not to be able to smell it a mile away.

Agreeing to this as a meeting place had been my first mistake, and meant that I didn't notice Kael, Milo and Gage approaching until they were in the building. It wasn't the end of the world, I still fancied my chances, even against all three of them, but it was careless, which was something I really couldn't afford to be. I needed to stay sharp.

"Thanks for coming," said Kael as he approached. "I believe you know everyone."

Was that a sly comment on the fact that I'd slept with all three of them? Did he know I'd had his roommates while he'd been flirting with mine? Did Milo and Gage know that he'd banged me in an alley the night before I met them?

I needed to stop thinking about this stuff. I'm way too old for this teenage crap. Not that I was ever in this situation when I was a teenager - I may be three hundred and forty-eight years old, but this was still a new one on me.

"We've met," I nodded curtly. "Let's breeze past the social niceties, okay? I want to know why you're sniffing around me. I want to know who and what you are. And I want to know anything you know that might help me find Layla Parish." She had taken my name when I turned her. "You can start with that last one."

"Can we?" Kael raised a sardonic eyebrow. "How kind."

"You tell me what I want to know and I'll tell you what I know."

"Here's a different approach," suggested Milo, conversationally. "Why don't you tell us everything you know about Layla Parish, and maybe about Michael Wambach, and then we'll tell you what we can?"

I nodded. "I like that idea - lots of good points - but I still feel like you talking first would be better."

"How about; there's three of us and one of you?" said Gage, not threatening, just pointing out.

"How about; I'm a scary vampire and you three are skin sacks full of my favorite beverage?"

"We hear you've been drinking too much lately." Kael fixed me with his gaze, his dark eyes seeming to bore into me. "Maybe you tell us about that?"

"Bottom-line," I laid down the law with all the confidence a girl gets from almost three and a half centuries of life, "you tell me everything you know about Layla, or I walk."

"Then walk."

Damn. He had called my bluff. My best chance had been to hope that they did not realize how important Layla was to me, but perhaps I had tipped my hand. They knew I wasn't going anywhere without the information they had - or that I hoped they had - because every moment was precious. On the counter side, they were apparently prepared to be patient, because they didn't have a sister in danger.

I had three options. I could walk away and hope they called me back - which seemed unlikely to work. I could kill, or incapacitate, two of them and persuade the third to talk. Or, I could tell them what they wanted to know.

"Okay, I'll tell you what I know." That had been the agreement and it kept my options open. If they refused to spill their guts after I had talked, then I could still spill theirs for them. "Layla is my blood sister. I'm assuming you know what that is. But she's nothing like me. She's an innocent who never hurt a fly. She was never cut out to be a vamp and she drinks as sparingly as she can and only from willing humans. If you've looked into her history even a little, I guess you know that. I don't know who killed Tyler Gray, but I will guarantee you it wasn't Layla. She's not like me, she's..."

Suddenly I was very aware of their eyes on me and I felt uncomfortably warm.

"She's a good person," I finished lamely. "Sometimes, I wish I'd never turned her in the first place. It was that or leave her to die - some other vamp had all but drained her and left her for dead. Sometimes, I think I should have let her die. Maybe she'd be better off. I don't know. Maybe that's why I feel so responsible for her. Why I..." Holy shit, was I going to cry? That wasn't a good look. "Why I protect her the way I do. Except when it mattered. I should have been there that day - the day she got taken from the Lawkeeper car. I could have been there but instead I was chasing down fucking Tyler Gray to kick his ass for accusing her. I let my temper get in the way of protecting her and she got kidnapped."

"And some Lawkeepers died," pointed out Kael.

"You gonna blame me for that?" I snapped back.

"No. I just wanted you to know that you're not the only one with skin in the game." That was as good as an admission that they were Lawkeepers. "Since she was taken, you've gone off the rails a bit? Punishing all humans for what they did - or might still be doing - to your 'blood sister'?"

"No," I said defiantly. 'Punishing all humans'? What the hell did he mean by that? There had been deaths - I wasn't about to deny that - and some had been as a consequence of my actions. But all of those dead had been people who were implicated in Layla's disappearance, and though I might have taken great pleasure in 'punishing' them, that was not what had happened - they had died in the course of my investigations. I wasn't claiming to be blameless, but 'punishing' made it sound vindictive.

"I don't know where you're getting your information from," I said, not backing down, "but I'm not punishing anyone, and certainly not all humans."

"People just have a habit of turning up with their throats ripped out when you're around?" suggested Gage. "Tyler, for example."

"I thought Layla killed Tyler," I reminded him sarcastically. "That's typical of you guys; if you can't pin it on one vamp then the next nearest will do."

"You gonna say Colt Harris was another coincidence?" asked Milo. "I was there."

"Saw him die, did you? You saw him like I found him; already dead." That Milo thought I killed Harris was something - he had slept with me thinking that. That took balls.

"It's not like they're the only ones," Gage put in. "Arnie Wilde."

"Who?"

"He was a small time fence..."

"Yeah, yeah," I interrupted. "I know the guy. He pawned Layla's jewelry so I went to find out where he got it from and he tried to stake me. I killed him, but only in self-defense."

I saw Milo whisper something to Kael - maybe there had been evidence to back up my story? Or maybe, someone had planted some that would blow it to bits…

"I'll save you time on the rest," I snapped, feeling out of sorts and irrationally angry at their doubt. Who cared what these guys thought of me? I had one job and one job only. Save Layla. "Michael Wambach? I'm guessing you know as well as I do that he was on the take. I was trying to get him to talk - to tell me who he was working for - I pushed too hard and he died. Luther Sparks and that fat dude with the beard that looked like his face was trying to get away from it? Same deal. They were bad guys, and you can pin their deaths on me if you want. But punishment? No way. I wasn't punishing anyone, I was trying to get my sister back, and if you think I care about the deaths of people like that stacked up against getting Layla back, then you're crazy."

"What about the rest?" asked Gage darkly.

"What rest?"

"India Weaver," Gage went on, "Cassie Kennedy, Mark Sanchez. I can go on if you like."

"Maybe you should," I frowned. "Eventually, I might recognize one of these names."

"Don't even care who you kill, huh?" observed Kael.

I shook my head. "Let's get one thing dead clear before we go any further. I’ve got three deaths on my conscience since Layla was taken. Four, if you count the fence. I'm not sorry about any of them. Now, you can believe me or not about Gray and Harris - that's up to you - but I didn't kill them. But that's still only six deaths total. No idea who you're talking about."

I could see them shooting suspicious looks between each other, unsure whether to believe me or not. For the first time since we arrived in this badly chosen site, they were the ones who seemed to be on the back foot. They were doing their best to hide it but something was not adding up for them and they weren't at all sure what their next move was supposed to be.

None of which mattered much to me. Let them sort out their shit on their own time.

"Look, guys, I've told you what I know - and whether it tallies with what you've been told or not, it's the truth. We had a deal, and I expect you to come through on your end of it. And while we're at it, maybe you can tell me where that list of names came from and who told you I had anything to do with their deaths."

The three men looked at me and I tried hard to read their expressions. If they refused to tell me what I wanted to know, then this was very quickly going to go bad. And bloody.