“No.” The sound of water trickling into the coffeemaker blurred her voice. “Piscary doesn’t care one way or the other. Peter isn’t important to him. To anyone. To anyone but his scion, anyway. It’s likely that he’ll simply fade from DeLavine’s awareness when he’s distracted by more exciting things.”

Like you? I thought, but I didn’t say it aloud.

Ivy turned, her black hair swinging to show her earrings. “I’m making coffee,” she said. “Do you want some?”

Not if it was laced with Brimstone. Crap on toast, I was tired. “Please,” I said, feeling Nick’s gaze heavy on me.

“Jenks?” she offered, getting a tiny hotel mug down from the bare cupboard.

Jenks looked appraisingly into the box of fudge, hesitating before he closed it and set it aside. “No thanks,” he said, starting to mess with my spelling supplies.

“Rachel,” Nick tried again. “Can I sketch a pentagram for you or something?”

Ivy’s head came up, and I moved my fingers to tell her I could handle it. “No,” I said shortly, pulling my demon book closer and opening it up. My eyes lifted to the artifact, wondering if Nick had had the opportunity to switch it out with a fake, but I didn’t think so. And there couldn’t be two such ugly things.

“Ray-ray—” Nick tried again, and Ivy slammed the cupboard.

“What the hell do you want?” she said virulently, brown eyes fixed on him.

“I want to help Rachel,” he shot back, stiff and a little afraid.

Jenks snorted, crumpling up the empty bag and throwing it away. “You can help Rachel by dropping dead.”

“That’s still an option,” said Ivy.

I didn’t have time or the energy to deal with this. “I need quiet,” I said, feeling my blood pressure rise. “That’s all I need. That’s it. Just quiet.”

Nick stepped back, his arms crossing over his faded shirt to make him look alone. “Okay. I’ll…” He hesitated, gaze flicking to Ivy and Jenks beside me, taking up all the room so he couldn’t come in. His held breath slowly escaped him, and not having finished his thought, he walked away, his movements full of frustration. Slumping into the chair Peter had been sitting in, he stretched his long legs out and ran his hand through his hair, staring at nothing.

I would not feel bad for him. He had sold me out. The only reason I hadn’t walked off from this was because the Weres would hound me forever if they didn’t see the thing destroyed, and for that I needed Nick. And I needed him cooperative.

Jenks pulled a chair from under the kitchen table and sat beside me. I blinked in surprise when I realized he had correctly put everything into three piles. “Do you need any help?” he asked, and Ivy snickered.

“Help from a pixy?” she scoffed, and Jenks bristled.

“Actually,” I said before he could start swearing at her, “could you get Nick out of here?” I didn’t want him to see the transference curse. God knows who he would sell it to. He couldn’t invoke it without my or demon blood, but he could probably get some from Al in exchange for my underwear size.