“Exactly my point.”

“—and I doubt I’ll ever share your passion for preserving them without question or restraint, but Verity, I’m not blind. These people…” He hesitated, clearly at a loss for words before he continued, “These people are people. Those men were hurt by the death of their sister. When your cousin made me take her to get your coffee, she didn’t remember to pay, but she remembered to tip, she smiled and was pleasant to the barista, she was trying. I’m not certain what these people are. It’s become increasingly difficult to view them as monsters.”

I blinked, twice, before doing something I’d expected never to do again. Stepping forward, I leaned up onto the toes of my sneakers, and kissed him. Dominic slipped his arm around my waist, providing the stability he needed to lean into me without toppling over. The alley around us smelled terrible. Rats rustled in the garbage lining the walls, and the scum on the pavement made the sewers look like a pleasant vacation spot. It was still one of the best kisses of my life, and when Dominic pulled away, it left me gasping.

“What was that for?” he asked, taking his arm from around my waist.

I smiled a little. “Having a learning curve.”

“Your family still betrayed our sacred order.”

“I can live with that.”

“The servitors are still horrific perversions of nature.”

“I can live with that, too. We’ll have to agree to disagree on the dragon, but hey. Maybe the two of you will get along.”

“I sincerely doubt that,” said Dominic slowly.

“I guess we’ll find out.” I looked up, gauging the time by the narrow strip of sky visible between the buildings. “We’re going to need to do our body recovery fast, or I’m going to be late for work.”

“Your place of employment, is it … I mean, is that where you…” He gestured vaguely in the air, indicating either an impractically short skirt or the sudden uncontrollable need to make jazz hands.

“Yeah, that’s where I got the uniform I was wearing the night you caught me.” I shrugged. “It’s a strip club—and no,” I added, seeing his semi-stricken expression, “I don’t strip. I’m generally a no-nudity zone.”

A small smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. “Really.”

“Unless the mice have a ritual that demands I get naked, really.” His smile vanished, replaced by almost comic uncertainty. Even given the gravity of our overall situation, I had to laugh. “God, Dominic, I was kidding. The mice don’t dictate my state of undress. The uniform is how all the cocktail waitresses have to dress. It helps us keep our tips up, and you’d be amazed by how many weapons I can fit under that skimpy little outfit.”

“I look forward to performing a census, but you needn’t worry about timeliness. I can retrieve Piyusha on my own.”

I blinked. “Are you sure? There were a lot more servitors down there with her.”

“I’m sure. You go and do what must be done. I’ll return Piyusha to her family, and then—where should I meet you?”

“I’m not sure what time I’ll be able to get out of my shift; feel free to just head back to the apartment. Sarah will either ignore you completely or kick your ass at chess, and either way, she’ll be happy to keep you busy until I get home.” I thrust my bag of gingerbread at him. “Take this with you. To the apartment, not into the sewers, if you can help it. The fastest way to the hearts of my mice is through their tiny, overactive stomachs.”

“I’ll take it to your apartment before I descend,” he said. “You’re sure you’ll be all right?”

“I’m a Price girl, remember? We’re like the antithesis of damsels in distress. Besides, I’m spending the evening at a strip club, waiting on drunk businessmen and frat boys who don’t know how to pick a watering hole.” I flashed a smile. “I’ll not only be perfectly safe, I may get paid for breaking a few fingers.”

“Good,” he said, and kissed me again. It was a gesture that was becoming pleasantly familiar. He was getting seriously better at it, too. I’d be happy to help him get a lot more practice. “I intend to hold you to that.”

“Don’t worry about me,” I said flippantly. “I’m the bad thing that happens to other people.”

Sometimes I think the universe listens for lines like that one, so that it can punish the people who use them. At that particular moment in time, standing in a smelly, deserted alley with a hot Covenant boy and two bags full of the world’s best gingerbread, I found it difficult to care.

That was my first mistake.

Twenty-two

“Never tell anyone to be careful, never ask what that noise was, and for the love of God, never, ever say that you’ll be right back.”

–Evelyn Baker

The roof of Dave’s Fish and Strips, a club for discerning gentlemen, only ten minutes late for work

I HIT THE ROOF OF THE STRIP CLUB at a speed that probably qualified me for the free running Olympic trials. I slowed myself down by using the lip around the edge of the roof as a sort of high-speed balance beam, finally hopping down when I was sure I wouldn’t twist an ankle doing it. All the muscles in my legs were complaining in that happy “feeling the burn” way that meant I’d be able to get through my shift without feeling the need to shove my foot up someone’s ass, largely because I wouldn’t feel like lifting my feet that far off the floor. The rooftop door was unlocked. I opened it and went inside.

Candy and Istas were in the locker room when I arrived. Istas stood in front of the mirror making the final adjustments to her coquettish pigtails. Watching a waheela try to play the Gothic Lolita is so wrong on so many levels that I immediately skipped to Candy, who was involved in the much less worrisome process of applying sparkly pink lip gloss. “Hey, guys,” I said, heading for my locker. “Sorry I’m late.”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Candy, flashing me a quick, stiff-looking smile. Guess Mae West told her to play nice.

Istas grunted. All things considered, that was probably the friendlier and more sincere of the greetings. Waheela are solitary creatures, coming into the company of others only when they absolutely have to, for things like reproduction and paying the cable bill. I’ve never been able to figure out what evolutionary advantage they got from being able to turn into humanoid bipeds, since their default big-ass wolf-bear shapes—or, as I like to call them, “please God don’t eat me”—are a lot better suited to their natural habitat in Northern Canada. In her human form, Istas was a cute and curvy Inuit girl with slightly too-sharp teeth and a tendency to talk to people’s jugulars. If she was just grunting, not attacking, she was in a good mood.