“Don’t do that,” he muttered, wiping the moisture away. But his embarrassment was tinged with understanding.

I’d be content with that, but before I could teeter back and see if Nick would open one of those government-issue energy bars for me, Jenks stood, one hand on the wheel, the other holding his cap to his head. “Ah, Rache?” he said over the roar of the engine and the brush of wind. “Your eyes might be better than mine. Is that Ivy on the dock?”

Seventeen

Squinting into the wind, I sat on the copilot’s chair watching the decades-old rusted gas pumps on the dock become clearer. Ivy was standing with the sun glinting on her short black hair, leaning casually against a piling. She was in jeans and a long sweater, but with the boots and shades, she managed to look svelte as well as ticked. A frumpy older man was next to her, and worry went through me at what had gone so wrong in Cincinnati that she had to come and get me. Unless she’s here because she thinks I can’t handle this.

The man beside her looked both nervous and excited in his faded overalls, holding himself a careful five feet away as the breeze shifted his plaid coat open to the wind. They probably didn’t get many living vamps up here, and he was clearly more curious than wary.

Jenks decreased our speed, and I could hear the sounds from the shore. My emotions were swinging from one extreme to the other. If Ivy had come because she didn’t think I could do this, I was going to be pissed—even if it wasn’t going that well. If she was up here because there was a problem back home, I was going to be worried. I’d thought she couldn’t even leave Cincinnati, so whatever it was, it must be bad.

My weight shifted as the boat slowed, and I fidgeted with worry. Jenks cut the gas to idle and we drifted closer. “Can we tie up here?” he shouted to the man, who was probably manager of the marina.

“You bet!” he called back, voice high and excited. “Take her right down to slip fifty-three. Your friend already paid for it.” He pointed where he wanted us to go, looking flustered. “That’s a big dog you got there. We have a leash law this side of the straits.”

I watched Ivy for her reaction to seeing me as a wolf, but her expression behind the sunglasses was amused, as if it was all a big joke.

“Come on down when you get settled,” the man said, hesitating when he saw Nick hunched under his blanket. “I need to register you.”

Swell. Proof we were here.

Ivy was already walking down the empty dock to the slip the man had indicated. Behind me, Nick shuffled around, finding the docking ropes and flinging bumpers over the sides. “You ever dock a boat before?” he asked Jenks.

“No, but I’m doing okay so far.”