Cass found me curled up on the couch when she came to retrieve her car and plopped down beside me.

“You look rattled.” She flicked the end of my robe’s sash back and forth like an irritated cat swishing its tail. “Want to talk about?”

“Boaz dropped by tonight. He’s investigating the Turner situation.”

“That’s not ideal, but we can manage.” She crossed her long legs and kicked her foot, smiling an evil little smile at the silver tip on her boot, a taunt for Gustav. “He’s got no reason to think you’re involved, and he doesn’t know me from Adam.”

A weird caving sensation filled my middle. “I invited him to stay here.”

“Smart.” She tapped my knee. “This way we can keep an eye on him.”

That was the plan, but he had keen eyes himself. Who would be watching whom? How much had I slipped up tonight? How much had he noticed? How would I explain any of this if I got caught?

“Turner isn’t the first.” I might as well tell her the rest. “He’s the latest in a string of ritual murders.”

“Vampire murders?” She rolled her eyes. “There are always idiots who fancy themselves vampire slayers. You would not believe the quality of stakes I’ve been assaulted with in my time.” She slipped into her mocking humans voice, low and brutish. “I sharpened a pencil.” She mimed stabbing me in the chest. “Fear me!”

“First of all, you only did that to cop a feel.” I slapped her hand off me. “Second of all, the Society wouldn’t get involved if it wasn’t serious.”

Boaz was an Elite, a special class of sentinel. They wouldn’t spend him on a case that wasn’t priority.

“The Society loves to stick its nose into vampire business. They’re helicopter parents if you ask me.”

The Society was responsible for resuscitating humans, using necromantic magic to transform them into vampires, but they only cared for their offspring up to the point when the check cleared. Past that, as long as they weren’t making waves among humans, the Society would sit on its hands and allow the vampire masters to police their clans. Or not. Obviously. Or I would be out of a job.

I wasn’t buying that, but I was no detective. I was a bounty hunter, not even a certified one. I couldn’t risk the paperwork tracing back to me to apply for the license.

“Before I forget.” She reached between her boobs, taking far too long, and pulled out a wad of cash. “There’s your cut.”

“How did you manage this?” I gawked at the money I never expected to see. “The cleaners took the body into custody, right?”

Cleaners kept the paranormal world from bleeding over into the normal, and that meant cleaning up our crime scenes and disposing of bodies before they were discovered by humans.

“Do you remember Frank?”

“The human who thought he got turned into a vampire because you bit him during sex once?”

“That’s him.” She chuckled at the memory and then sighed with amusement. “He’s a cleaner these days. I talked him into giving me the head after the rest had been catalogued.”

“Won’t that get him in trouble?”

“Probably.”

“Don’t you care?”

“Not especially.” She frowned when I gave her the look. “Please don’t lecture me, Addie.” She bared her fangs then pointed at them. “I’m carnivorous. Dare I say, a maneater.” She hooked her fingers into claws and raked the air with them. “This is what I do. I use them, and then I throw them away.”

“So basically, you’re a predatory litterbug.”

“I don’t believe in double dipping.” A shudder rippled through her. “Do you know how many alcohol wipes I used before I bit him? Five. And now he’s always baring his throat around me and talking about blood exchanges like he’s seen in the movies.” She gagged a little. “He believes everything he sees on TV. It’s ridiculous.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

I didn’t remind her of the week she spent as my uninvited guest, the better for me to play nurse to her, after she accidentally drank the blood of someone who had eaten pizza for dinner. Convinced she was going to die from garlic poisoning, she wouldn’t leave my bed or put on clothes, determined to leave the world the way she came into or some such nonsense. Also something she saw in a movie.

After seven days, her lucky number, she rose from the bed and proclaimed herself cured by the grace of—I wasn’t really listening. At that point, I had a week’s worth of naked vampire to wash out of my sheets before I could sleep in my room again. Plus, she had been sipping her warmed blood in bed and spilled it all over my good comforter.

“What will you do if your man sneaks into your room at night?”

“He’s not my man.” Just my future husband. “And I’ll stab him with the stake I keep under my pillow.”

Given my line of work, I had to be prepared a vampire might follow me home one day. From where I sat, the trick worked on fiancés who followed me home too.

“Bloodthirsty.” She chuckled. “I like it.”

Finding a man pinned to my wall, a macabre butterfly caught midair, would make her century.

“Of course you do.” I nudged her with my foot. “What is that? Are you…purring?”

“Am I? That’s embarrassing.” She touched her lower stomach. “Oh. No. It’s my phone. I set it on vibrate.”

“You set it on vibrate, and then you shoved it down your pants.” I was never borrowing her phone again. No matter how much hand sanitizer she used after the fact. “Like a normal person.”

“I’m not a person,” she said absently. “I’m a creature of the night.”

She bared her fangs halfheartedly and hissed for emphasis.

“Who’s calling?” I nudged her again. “Gustav?” I leaned over. “I noticed you wore his favorite boots.”

“Clan Willis has put out a BOLO on Angelo, Ron Turner’s lover.”

“Do you think he heard about the murder?”

“The preliminary findings must have been uploaded into the cleaners’ database.” Her lips twisted. “I was on-scene. I provided the identification. The gory details can’t have been listed yet, but his name might have been enough to send Angelo into a tizzy.”

“Vampires are so dramatic.”

“Live as long as we do, and you begin to crave sensation. What is love if not sensation? What is loss if not the ultimate sensation?” She tapped the end of my nose. “And he must look good while doing it.”

“Are you telling me he’s at the tailor’s getting fitted for mourning attire? That he would ditch his clan, tell no one where he’s gone, and duck out just to get a new black ensemble?”

Depending on his age, he might commission enough black suits to last him a full year.

Vampires: The original drama llamas.

“The news can’t have been delivered.” She sniffed. “He has to hurry before it’s formally announced.”

“I held my sister’s hand while she died. I was in my pajamas, and so was she. I cried until I passed out and had to be carried to my room. The last thing on my mind was dashing out for a quick fitting.”

Cass did a thing she hated almost as much as germs. She apologized and meant it.

“I’m sorry, Addie.” She touched my leg in a mostly nonsexual way. “Humans love differently than we do. We might have been human once, but we lose that spark. What’s left is an echo of mortality and morality. You have the biggest heart of anyone I know, which is why it was so easy for me to insinuate myself into your life and bend you to my will.”

What she wanted from me then was a desperate partner in crime, someone willing to do the dirty work. The literal dirty work. Anything that might result in contamination from germs, diseases, so forth and so on. How she made it as a prostitute for so long boggled my mind. Sex was the ultimate fluid swapping experience, and she had been paid for it long before condoms, birth control, or STD preventives, let alone treatment.

Unless she was willing to coexist with germs until after she became a vampire. It happened like that sometimes. A weird trait, a personality quirk, a bizarre affectation ballooned until it took them over.

“Does that mean you wouldn’t mourn me if I got my throat ripped out on the job?”

“No.” A low rumble laced her voice. “It means I would rip the flesh from anyone who dared, strip by strip, and feed it to them. I would then hang them from their pinky toes, slash their throats, and let them exsanguinate. Once that was done, I would coffin them in cement and have the block dropped in the ocean.”

Touched by her twisted affection, I had to swallow back tears. “But would you look good doing it?”

“Dearest, darling one.” She plumped her cleavage. “I would look amazing.”

A familiar ringtone had me reaching for my phone. With Dad upstairs and Cass beside me, I had few guesses as to the culprit. The caller ID didn’t work, but I risked answering anyway. “Hello?”

“I’m going to be late,” Boaz said grimly. “Are you sure you want me to come back to your place? I can crash in the barracks. I don’t want to be an imposition.”

The slight pulling sensation in my chest drew me upright, and Cass too. “What happened?”

“There’s been another murder.” A siren muffled his voice. “I can’t get into the details, but I need to go.”

“Another murder,” I echoed. “As in two? As in someone else died tonight?”

“Yeah.” He exhaled hard. “Just wanted to let you know so you wouldn’t worry.”

Beside me Cass mashed her index fingers together and twisted them back and forth while making kissing noises.

Annoyance with her bled over onto him. “How presumptuous of you.”

“Just a turn of phrase.” His voice came out tired, defeated even. “I didn’t mean to imply, well, anything.”

A frustrated scream rose up my throat, but I couldn’t let it out. Once I started, I might not stop.

“I didn’t mean to snap at you.” Palming Cass’s forehead, I shoved her out of my face and hopped off the couch to begin pacing. “I appreciate the call. I would have worried if I woke and you weren’t here.”

Turning, I bumped into Cass, who had moved on to dry humping the doorframe while pointing at the phone and mouthing Boaz’s name. Recalling where she had been keeping her cell, I wished for bleach or a time machine to undo the last five minutes of my life. Or the last five years. I would take what I could get.

“You don’t have to patronize me.”

“I’m not.” I made a fist and hit myself in the forehead. “I’m just having a bad night, and it’s wrong for me to take it out on you.”

“The offer stands. I can go to the barracks.” He lightened his tone. “Hell, I can stay there all week if it’s easier.”

Two vampires dead. One a bounty of ours, the other…I would have to pester Gustav for those details.

There was no reason for me to think it had anything to do with me, or Cass, or even Gustav, but I couldn’t let it go. The killings, so close to home, bothered me. Having Boaz this close, in my space, bothered me too, but he was a handy conduit to information. He was also the man I agreed to spend the rest of my life with, so I had to play nice. I had to smooth this over. I had to make this work.

Goddess, I was tired all of a sudden. Even the comforting weight of cash doused with Cass’s perfume did nothing to alleviate the dread coiling around my throat, tight as a noose.

“Come home,” I said, hating the waver in my voice. “I’ll be waiting.”

“All right.” He hesitated. “You’re good people, Addie.”

Good people didn’t invite their future husbands into their homes to spy on them.

Good people didn’t consider how far they were willing to go to keep their secrets.

Good people didn’t wish, even a little, that the label would stick, that the epithet was true.

I couldn’t afford to be good, and what’s worse, I couldn’t afford to let him catch me being bad.

Copyright © 2019 Hailey Edwards
All rights reserved

The front door on the old Whitaker place creaked open, and Boaz straightened from his lean. The motorcycle behind him, Wilhelmina, didn’t budge. She was built like a brick house, and it had been love at first sight across the crowded dealership floor. Too bad women didn’t come with operation manuals. Maybe then he’d have more luck understanding what made them tick, or how he always managed to tick them off.

The curvy blonde who stood in the doorway was just his type, which was a good thing, given she had agreed to marry him.

Gathering the takeout bags off Willie’s handlebars, he set his smile into familiar lines then approached.

“Sorry I kept you waiting.” Adelaide clutched the halves of her robe together at her throat. “I wasn’t expecting company tonight.”

The leather boots were the lace-up kind you wore to make a statement, usually a sexual one, but on her he couldn’t puzzle out what they meant. She wore them underneath a ratty green housecoat that fit what he knew of her personality. The sultry/slumpy combination confused the hell out of him. Still mulling over her choice in loungewear, he didn’t think to ask how she beat him inside without him noticing her park or enter.

Unless… Had she been here the whole time?

Boaz didn’t know her well enough to call her on a lie he wasn’t certain she had told, and it wasn’t like he was sharing his life story with her all in one sitting, so he didn’t push her for explanations. 

Still, the flush in her cheeks fit with a woman who had run down the stairs to greet him, convincing him she had been up in her room. Maybe with a lover? Why else the red face? The slight breathlessness that didn’t come from her attraction to him. So far, she had shown none. That worked for him. For once, he wasn’t eager to jump straight to the physical.

“No problem.” His gut knotted so hard at the thought of sex the smell of takeout made him want to run to the nearest bush and vomit. “I wasn’t waiting long.”

I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.

Two words stuck on repeat in his head. Damn it. At this point, he couldn’t say he if he meant them for her or for Grier or for both.

Maybe he meant them for himself too.

Goddess, I don’t want to be here. I want to go home. I want to pretend none of this happened—not Amelie’s arrest, not her disownment, and not this attempt to fix it—and for our lives to go back to normal.

This must be the karma he had been warned so many times would jump up and bite him on the ass one of these days. Well, sure enough, it had finally sunk its teeth in him and was having a good chew at his expense.

“That smells delicious.” Adelaide retreated behind the door, only her hands and head visible, but it didn’t erase the memory of those boots or the light dust coating them. “Let’s eat in the living room. The kitchen feels empty these days.”

Medical bills had drained the Whitakers’ coffers until a rundown house, a rare beauty in its day, was all they had to show for their station. They were an old family, a well-respected one, and most importantly— They were too poor to be picky about Adelaide accepting him to be used as damage control for his own family name.

“Works for me.” He carried the food in and waited on her to direct him. “Do you have any beer?”

“I don’t drink.” A slight hesitation then she cleared her throat. “Beer, I mean.”

So much for the hope alcohol might numb him to this required courtship, not that she was bad company. Her father was nice enough, but Boaz had yet to see the man sober. He struck Boaz as a scotch or whiskey drinker. He should have asked for that instead of a beer, but it was too late to backtrack now.

“That’s fine.” He flashed a practiced smile and received the expected response in the corresponding curve of her lips. “Water?”

“We might be poor,” she said, shutting the door behind him, “but we can afford sweet tea for guests.”

Kicking himself in the ass, he faced her. “That’s not what I—”

“I’m kidding.” She tucked the robe tighter until she became an Adelaide burrito. “Three doors down on your left is the living room. I’ll grab what we need and meet you there.”

Afraid he might trip over his tongue again, he kept it simple. “Okay.”

On his way past the staircase, he couldn’t help noticing more of the dirt that dusted her boots had left prints on the carpet runner. The rest of the house was spotless, though he doubted they could afford help for the cleaning. That told him she was no stranger to hard work. Anything this family had, he felt certain was owed to Adelaide. And here she was, with him, ready to sacrifice herself yet again. He respected the hell out of her for that, and he hated himself a little more for taking advantage, but not enough to halt the proceedings.

The living room was shabby but comfortable, and its threadbare furniture put him at ease.

You’re a bull in a China shop. 

That was his mother’s go-to description of him, and she hadn’t been wrong when he was a teen, forever bumping into her knickknacks and breaking her doodads. The army helped him grow up, and the Elite polished him to a shine, but he still hated elegant spaces decorated with breakables and baubles that served no purpose but to spark insecurities in visitors.

A wall of gloomy portraits distracted him from thoughts of his own family, and he didn’t hear Adelaide until she placed cups, plates, and utensils on the low coffee table with soft clinking noises.

Cranking his head toward her, he watched her set their places. She hesitated over the second one every time, as if reminding herself to put out two of everything instead of one. It led him to believe she ate in here often, and alone. That wasn’t the only thing he noticed about her.

“Nice shoes.” He set his jaw, but it was too late. Might as well roll with it. “You like frogs?”

“Love them.” She waved him over and took the food to begin plating it. “They’re adorable.” 

She stuck out one leg and rotated her foot, showing off a plush treefrog house slipper she hadn’t been wearing earlier. The top of her foot was red with creases from the bootlaces, but he refrained from mentioning them. She would tell him if it was any of his business. Until they got married, she was free to play dress-up with other men. It’s not like he could ding her when his mind drifted back to Savannah every time he let himself slip.

Forgive me, Grier. Goddess knows you deserve better.

Damn it.

Even his own mind refused to cut him a break, not that he deserved one.

“You okay?” Adelaide paused. “You look like you’re hurting. Headache?”

Heartache, but he couldn’t tell her that. “I skipped lunch.”

“I’ll grab you some ibuprofen.” She passed him a glass of tea. “Drink that. The caffeine will help.”

Head cocked, he watched her dash into the kitchen, heard her too. So her shoes weren’t to blame for her earlier stealth. Now that was interesting. Not many people could sneak up on him, but she had with no problem. Silent appeared to be her default, as if she had to remind herself to make noise.

The suspicion blossoming in his gut wilted when she opened a cabinet, and he spotted the rows upon rows of medicine bottles that must have belonged to her little sister. Adelaide must have taught herself to be quiet for Hadley’s sake. Or, depending on how long their father had been an alcoholic, for her own.

Thanks to Boaz’s mother disowning his little sister, he had lost Amelie in name but not in the flesh. He could see her, talk to her, hold her. Amelie might not be a Pritchard anymore, but she was still alive. Adelaide had lost her sister and her mother, and he felt like an ass for admitting that it had made her all the more appealing.

Amelie couldn’t be a Pritchard again, that ship had sailed, but she could become a Whitaker. She might not be his sister legally, thanks to the disinheritance, but she could become his sister-in-law if the muleheaded imp took advantage of the opportunity he had arranged and stepped into the deceased Hadley Whitaker’s shoes.

Adelaide ought to have kicked his ass from here to the moon for asking her to turn her misfortune to his advantage, but she was as desperate as him. Neither of them could look too close at the other for fear their golden ticket might start flaking and reveal the tarnish underneath.

Arm braced on the cabinet door, Adelaide hung her head and sucked in a deep breath, girding her loins for dealing with him. A problem most women were happy to have. He liked her better for the glimpses of her struggle. That she was fighting to make the best of their situation, the same as him, meant something. What, he couldn’t say, but something.

Glancing away, he gave her privacy, and noted a gleaming pair of keys tossed in a decorative bowl on one of the side tables next to the couch. The dull set beneath it must belong to the dinged-up sedan he spotted in the garage, the one she drove to their first meeting. Unless he was mistaken, and a gearhead like him never was when it came to cars, that was the Ferrari logo on the fob.

“Here you go.”

Caught snooping, Boaz bristled like a spooked cat. Damn but the woman was quiet as a wraith. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” She touched his shoulder, but there was nothing sexual in the press of her fingers. It was more of a guiding hand, urging him toward the food and away from the keys. “So…Keanu?”

Intrigued by her mysteries, he searched Adelaide’s face for more than the exhaustion that plagued her, but he found no clues. “Only if you promise not to spoil the movie for me.”

“I’m a talker.” She winced. “I talk through them, over them, and after them.”

“Can two people with differing movie ethics coexist without killing one another?”

“Put a TV in the bedroom if you need your own.” She shrugged. “This one is mine. My TV, my rules.”

The forty-inch flat screen was pristine but dated. Clearly Adelaide took care of what was hers.

Encouraging as far as revelations go, but it made that damn noose of obligation cinch tighter. He didn’t need a caretaker. He needed…

Grinding his teeth, he clamped down on that useless line of thought.

This wasn’t about his needs. Otherwise, he would be sitting on a couch in Woolworth House, stealing kisses—or trying to—from Grier. This was about family, about keeping his word, and about being the man Adelaide deserved.

“Bedroom?” He took a seat on the sofa beside her. “I figured you would move to Savannah with me.”

“Oh. Yeah. I plan on it.” Her voice softened. “I wasn’t thinking there for a minute.”

As the eldest daughter, she had inherited the title of Matron Whitaker. Had their finances not suffered, she would have brought a man into her family, into her house, and given him her last name. Instead, she had agreed to give up that title in favor of becoming Matron Pritchard. Losing her identity had to hurt, but his hands were tied. That was one line in their marriage contract he would not strike.

“You’re welcome to stay here, as long as you can handle your duties remotely.” He hadn’t meant to make the offer, but her expression begged him for some glimmer of hope he provided on reflex. “My parents are in good health, and there’s my little brother to consider too. We’ve got a packed house.” He tucked into his meal. “That doesn’t mean I can’t make room for you, and your dad, but you’ve got options.”

“Dad won’t leave this house.” She toyed with her food, pushing it across her plate. “As much as I’ll miss him, I won’t miss it. I’m looking forward to a fresh start, away from all the memories.”

“There’s no rush,” he assured her. “We can take this as slow as you like.”

“I appreciate that.” Her timid smile told him she was still trying, and he couldn’t ask for more than that. “I could use more time for Dad to adjust to the idea of me leaving, though. I’ll need to set up housekeeping too, since I won’t be around to clean or cook for him.”

“I’ll make it happen.” He didn’t imagine the relief in her expression, or the quick lash of her temper for daring to let someone else shoulder a burden that was hers. “You can pick the housekeeper, and I’ll vet them.”

“Ah.” She stabbed a dumpling with her fork. “You don’t trust my judgment, but you want brownie points for framing the offer as if you do.”

Prickly, prickly. Handling her when money was involved might require wearing gloves.

“The person you choose for the job is up to you. I won’t interfere with that decision. I just want to make sure we’re leaving your dad with someone we can trust to take care of him.”

We.

Just like that, she and he were a we.

The room spun around its edges, and his throat grew tight. This was moving too fast. Way too fast.

And Grier had no idea. No goddessdamn idea.

She would hate him for this, but not half as much as he despised his cultivated reputation for the message it would send her.

You’re better than me, Grier, better than I ever will be. I hope you know that.

“Giving up control is hard for me.” Adelaide kept nudging her food back and forth. “You don’t deserve me snapping at you.” She angled her head toward him but not her eyes. “You’ve been very kind, about everything.”

“We’re in this together.” For better or for worse. “We’ll figure it out.”

“Together,” she whispered, as if trying it on to see how it fit.

The phone in his pocket buzzed, and he checked the caller ID. “I have to take this.”

“No problem.” She ditched her fork for the remote. “I’ll get the movie set up before our food gets cold.”

Standing, he walked across the room for a modicum of privacy. “Boaz.”

“We got another one.” Chambers exhaled across the receiver. “This one down at the railroad museum.”

“I’ll be right there.” Boaz itched to get moving. “Hold the cleaners off as long as you can.”

Adelaide rose as he ended the call. “Work?”

“Yeah.” He scrubbed a hand over his prickly scalp. “Looks like I can’t stay after all.”

“No problem.” She tossed the remote aside. “I’ll walk you out.”

An honest laugh escaped him. “That eager to get rid of me?”

“No,” she said, dragging out the word like she was still making up her mind. “I was remembering what you said about a case keeping you in town. I didn’t want you to think you had to stay on my account.”

An hour or two made no difference to the dead. Boaz could have blown off work, plopped back down, and gotten to know Adelaide better on her home turf. That’s what he should have done, but he was a coward.

When Adelaide stared at him, his future looked back, and he couldn’t see Grier even on the periphery. The loss gutted him. So, yeah. He could have stayed and done the fiancé thing, played his role, but she gave the impression of being just as eager to get rid of him as he was to escape her.

“Night, Adelaide.”

“Goodnight, Boaz.”

Goddess, this was it, wasn’t it? The beginning. So why did it feel so much more like the end?

Railroad museum sounded much fancier than the reality. It was more of an abandoned train station you donated five dollars to tour than an actual museum. That meant no handy walls to pen in our vamp. He would bolt if he scented us, scented me, since necromancers smelled alive in a way that parched vampire throats. Cass was old enough to smell like the ruffle of brittle pages in an old book. Unless she had eaten recently. Since baby vamps were prone to bloodlust, she fasted while on the job.

Music throbbed in the darkness ahead. “Do you hear that?”

Cass rolled her eyes so hard, she could have counted her own vertebrae. “What do you think?”

“Dumb question.”

“Yes, it was.” She patted me on the head. “But you’re adorable for asking.”

With a growl, I snapped my teeth at her.

“You’ve spent too much time with Gustav if you’re trying to bite people for petting you.”

“I’ll tell him you said so.”

“Please do.” Her smile turned wicked. “It’s no fun pulling his tail if he doesn’t feel it.”

Signaling for her to hush, even though I had been the one to blab first, a rookie mistake I blamed on the call from Boaz yanking me out of my zone, I drew an ash stake from the holster on my thigh and began stalking the origin of the pounding beat.

Effortless in the way of vampires, Cass strolled beside me on the loose gravel without making a sound.

I envied her stealth when my best was nowhere near her worst, but not the cost of it. 

Cass never talked about who resuscitated her or why, and I didn’t ask. She didn’t talk about why she belonged to a different clan than the one she had been born into, and I didn’t ask about that either.

Prostitutes in her day couldn’t have afforded to pay a necromancer for the service. Not even a madame of her renown. That meant a vamp had paid for it him—or her—self, had wanted Cass by their side for centuries longer than the decades granted to a human, and yet she lived alone.

I didn’t want to poke her tender spots any more than I wanted her to poke mine.

Under a longnecked overhead light, the newest of the engines gleamed ahead of us. Its paint, once the color of ripe tomatoes, had turned rusty as old blood over time. The music poured from a compact Bluetooth speaker propped on the left rear wheel. The range on the device connection couldn’t be far, maybe thirty feet or so. He must be within that radius.

A familiar series of hand gestures informed me of Cass’s intent to circle the outer perimeter in case our heartbroken runaway had made new friends.

One vampire, I could handle. Two would be iffy. Three, and I might as well ring the dinner bell.

Careful to keep several of the behemoth antiques between me and the speaker, I began my hunt in earnest.

A dozen steps later, the front of the engine came into full view, and I found our runner.

Used to blood and death, I didn’t lose my lunch, but I tasted it perched at the back of my throat.

Ron Turner had been staked through the heart and the groin with railroad spikes the killer left in him. Spread-eagle over the tracks, he stared up at the night sky. Or he would have, if his phone hadn’t been placed over his eyes like a sleep mask.

Out of my depth, I held my position, waiting on Cass to circle back to me.

“Well, that was easy.” She didn’t bother crouching, a sure sign we were alone. “Let’s bag and tag him.”

“He’s dead.”

“For about the last six months judging by his current state of decomp.”

Baby vamps were still…juicy…when they died. Only the old ones turned to dust like in the movies. Whoever was responsible for this bit of theater knew that. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have bothered with the symbolic staking or the placement of the phone.

“Okay, smartass. I get he was a vampire, and therefore dead.” I pointed at my chest. “Hello, necromancer? I mean he’s dead-dead.” I reached for my phone. “The kind even we can’t reset.”

“Please don’t do what you’re thinking about doing.”

“This was murder. A ritualistic murder.”

“This is a paycheck.” She rubbed her fingers together through blue nitrile gloves. “A big, fat paycheck.”

“Cass.”

“Addie.”

“Cass.”

“Addie.”

“Boaz is a sentinel,” I confessed, hating how his name popped right into my head. “An Elite.”

“He would rat you out in a heartbeat if you called to tell him you found a dead vampire in a closed railroad museum.” She flung her arm toward him. “The same vampire whose bounty ticket we planned on punching.”

“I didn’t say I was going to call him.” I rubbed my palms over my face. “I don’t know why I mentioned it.”

“He’s posted in Savannah, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

Used to her flexible morals where bounty met the law, I scowled at her all the same.

“Here’s your problem,” she continued. “You’re feeling guilty because he thinks he’s buying Suzy Q Homemaker with his money, but you’re more like Buffy if Spike was a girl and also your partner but still incredibly sexy. Oh! Or maybe if Willow and Spike had a baby.”

“Bisexual badass. Gotcha.”

“Yes.” She toyed with the laces on her corset, exposing a hidden pocket with yet more gloves. “But born during one of those alternate universe episode deals. Otherwise, you’d be changing my diapers, Buff. I can’t help you kick ass if I can’t even wipe my own, you know?”

A sigh gusted past my lips. “Does this have anything to do with me and my situation or…?”

Vampires often got swept up in their own mythos, donning silk-lined capes and fake Transylvanian accents, but Cass didn’t have that problem. Not exactly. She didn’t binge every single vampire movie and TV show, read every comic and book series, for the entertainment value. She considered it research. On how to kill vampires. Or even slightly inconvenience them. And then she did everything in her power to avoid those triggers, no matter how ridiculous.

Just my luck the one vampire I actually liked turned out to be a hypochondriac.

“You’re thinking how often we clash with law enforcement.” She was still chugging, full steam ahead. “You’re wondering if you can give this up after your problems are solved by hopping in the sack with your husband, since he’s got enough money for you to retire and do whatever dull thing Society matrons do with their time.”

“You…might be onto something.” I hated admitting it, but there you go. “Who am I after I marry him?”

“A woman who did what she had to for her family.” Cass brushed her fingertips across my cheek, comforting me instead of perving on me for a change. “We painted ladies don’t cast stones, Addie. Stop hunching like you expect to be hit.”

Forcing my shoulders back, I shrugged off her kindness, unable to stomach it.

“You kept your sister alive.” She wasn’t done with me yet. “You kept a roof over her and your father’s heads. You’ve busted your ass to make sure he doesn’t have to swim up from the bottom of the bottle he’s always floating in these days.”

Throat tight, I withdrew. “That’s enough.”

“He’s not the only one grieving. You lost your mom. You lost your sister. And now you feel like you’ve lost yourself.”

Crushing my eyes shut, I blocked out her and her acid-churning truths. “I have to call this in.”

“I’ll do it.” She shoved me toward the exit. “Go home.” She dug in her pocket then tossed her keys at me. “Take my car. I’ll find my own way.” She adjusted her breasts. “Handsome sentinels can be so gosh darn helpful when properly motivated.”

Metal bit into my palm when I closed my fingers around my escape route. “Are you sure?”

“I can take the heat.” She reached for her phone. “I’m out of the closet.”

Until I tied the knot with Boaz, I had to keep my extracurricular activities hidden from him. Otherwise, he would call off the engagement. After all, he was buying my family’s good name to expunge the scandal from his own. He would cut me loose the second I couldn’t uphold up my end of the deal if I didn’t cross the finish line with him before my cover got blown. If that happened, he would wash me off his hands before the mud splattered from my family name onto his.

Society engagements could drag on for years, but I didn’t have that long. As much as my heart wished it otherwise, my obligations would force my hand. Until I put a ring on his finger, and he made a deposit into my account, I was the sole provider for my family. 

I could not mess up with him. Could. Not.

Twitchy from the murder, and cold from the bargain I had made, I didn’t give Cass’s car a second appreciative glance. I had been brought too low for it to be more than transportation, too mad to care it was a dream to drive.

I startled when a phone rang through the speakers, the number flashing on the screen familiar.

Oh, goddess, no. How did Boaz get this number? How did he know…?

Only one way to find out. I mashed accept. “Hello?”

“Where are you?” He chuckled softly, I think at himself, but I didn’t get the joke. “I brought takeout and a movie. I guessed on both. I hope you like dim sum and Keanu Reeves.”

The strain in his voice from trying caused a sympathetic twang in my chest. It’s not like arranging a marriage was his idea of a good time either. Neither of us had much say in our engagement, not with our families in such rough shape.

His little sister had gotten into trouble in Savannah. He didn’t want to talk about it, but it was bad. Bad enough he wanted to give her Hadley’s name to start over fresh somewhere else. Bad enough he was willing to court a woman far beneath him. Only the scandal had brought him so low, and wasn’t that depressing? Not half as depressing as me agreeing to his terms in order to save what I had left, but still.

“I went for a drive,” I blurted, relief making me dizzy as I remembered Cass’s car syncing with my phone earlier. “I have no objections to dim sum, but which Keanu are we talking here? Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure? Speed? A Walk in the Clouds? The Matrix?”

“You recited those like you’ve got a list in front of you.” His laugh came out sounding genuine this time. “I might be in over my head here.”

“My best friend watched Bram Stoker’s Dracula one too many times and fell in love with Jonathan Harker. Well, the actor who played him. Not the character.”

Cass viewed movies as falling into one of two categories: Vampires and Keanu Reeves.

“You’ve already seen John Wick,” he realized. “I can download something else—”

“John Wick is fine.” I almost smiled. “I can respect a man who goes on a killing spree over his dog.”

“Bloodthirsty,” he teased. “I’m going to chalk Keanu up as the first thing you and I have in common.”

Common ground? He cared about that? It was more than I expected from him, and I couldn’t tell yet if it made me happy he cared or downright terrified I would flub this on some compatibility component.

“I thought you were going home?” I noticed an incoming call but didn’t know how to switch lines without dropping him, and the car didn’t provide any helpful pointers. “To Savannah?”

“That was the plan.” He sounded tired all of a sudden. “I stopped by the sentinel outpost to say hi to an old friend and got drafted for my trouble. Looks like I’ll be in town a few more days.”

Dread swam the backstroke through my gut, and its form was perfect. “Drafted?”

“A vampire was killed here three days ago. The method resembles a case I’ve been working on and off in Savannah, so I’ll be consulting.”

On and off? Existing case? Crap. There went my hope Ron’s death had been a simple lover’s quarrel.

“Oh.” I searched for my voice. “That’s horrible.”

And it was about to get worse once he found out there had been another murder.

“It’s a worry for tomorrow.” He tied off that conversation with a deft twist in topic. “We didn’t get much time to really talk earlier. We just got down to brass tacks. My schedule is clear until I report in officially at dusk, so I thought I would drop in to see you in a less formal setting.”

Part of me wondered if this date night was Dad’s suggestion, but it was more likely Boaz wanted to follow up after Dad called him to make sure I wasn’t following in his inebriated footsteps.

“Just stay put.” I flexed my hands on the wheel. “I’m on my way.”

A pleased laugh at my eagerness brightened his tone. “I’ll be here.”

Fumbling for more conversation, I blurted, “Where are you staying?”

“The barracks.”

“We have plenty of room.” I dusted off my manners. “You’re welcome to one while you’re here.”

Boaz hesitated a moment. “Are you sure you want me underfoot?”

My fiancé of twenty-four hours sleeping down the hall from me? Not ideal. But this way I could keep an eye on him while ensuring he couldn’t return the favor. With proper incentive, he might even talk up his cases and give me an idea of what Cass and I were dealing with if the killer wasn’t finished in my town.

“It’s no trouble,” I promised him in a rush. “No trouble at all.”

Now I just had to figure out how to change before he saw me dressed in hunting gear and got his hopes up he was marrying a dominatrix.