I didn’t mind the offer, but I knew the Quarter better than I knew the guy who’d just asked Tadji to dance. I didn’t get any bad vibes from Burke the materiel guy, but better safe than sorry. And besides: cheese.

I shook my head. “Don’t worry about me. You stay with Tadji. Keep an eye on her. And when they’re done dancing, find out which materiel he’s responsible for. Use your copious charm.” I spread my hands in a dramatic rainbow. “Think dairy.”

“That’s my hilarious girl,” he said, but concern flashed on his face. “There were three wraith attacks last week. Are you sure you’ll be okay walking back alone?”

He’d told me about each attack to warn me, to keep me on my guard. He hadn’t realized the irony.

“It’s only four blocks,” I said, “and there are Containment agents everywhere.” That was a blessing and a curse. “I’ll probably have to push them out of the way just to get inside the store.”

Gunnar didn’t look thrilled, but his pressed his lips to my temple. “Be good, Claire. And be safe.”

I told him I would.

And I really had meant it.

CHAPTER THREE

Instead of heading down Royal Street, I walked around the Square to Decatur. It was only a block out of the way, and I liked the route better—I liked seeing the river and imagining the world hadn’t really changed, that life as we’d known it hadn’t really ended. That my father and I still lived in a house in Central City, and I was worrying about dating and getting a good job. That a giant prison wasn’t lurking behind me.

When I was younger, I’d roam through the store’s antiques, making up adventures. I’d always thought it was cool that so many people who lived or worked in the Quarter knew my dad, considered him a friend. It was like being part of a secret club—the secret guild of folks who weren’t just tourists but who knew New Orleans. I guess I had a little of that now—Burke seemed to know who I was, for example. But it wasn’t the kind of familiarity I’d expected. And now it was dangerous.

I turned up Conti, reached the building that held the Louisiana Supreme Court, an enormous marble structure that took up an entire block between Royal and Chartres. It was square on the Royal side, and rectangular on the Chartres side with rounded towers on each end.

I’d heard the city had spent tons of money restoring it in the late nineties, only to have most of the back half destroyed in the war. Now the building was abandoned, and the few surviving palms and magnolias around it overgrown. The windows were supposed to be boarded over, but plywood was a valuable commodity, so it disappeared more often than not. This time, someone had gotten creative, removing the plywood from enough windows in one curved flank that the dark holes looked like a grinning skull.

You could take the people out of New Orleans, but you’d never get all the crazy.

I rounded the corner, saw movement near one of the magnolias. From the very unfortunate groans, War Night or Drink or both had gotten the best of someone.

I nearly smiled in sympathy before she burst out of the foliage. She couldn’t have been more than eighteen or nineteen, and she was screaming like a maniac.

She didn’t see me in front of her and hit me full on, so we struck the sidewalk together like felled trees. Pain sang through the elbow I’d inadvertently used to break my fall, and the skin scraped against still-hot asphalt. She tried to get to her feet, kneed me in the stomach.

I grunted, tried to help her up, but she wore only shorts and a tank top in the heat, and her skin was slicked with sweat. “What the hell?” I asked.

She didn’t respond, and she was panting when she finally crawled off me, climbed to her feet, and loped into the street. She was limping.