Dropping her head, she thanked the priest, and after he’d closed the partition, she took a deep breath, picked up her bag, and stepped out of the confessional. Next to the one she’d been in, she could hear the voice of the other sinner. Soft. Muffled. Utterly indistinct.

As she walked down the side aisle, paranoia had her eyes going all around the cathedral. The pair of women with veils were still there. The man who’d been praying was gone, but two others had come in and taken his place at the back.

She hated looking over her shoulder and wondering whether she was hearing her name and worrying if she were being followed. But ever since she’d pulled out of Las Vegas, she’d been hypervigilant and she had a feeling she would always be like that.

Outside, she jogged over to her car and she didn’t breathe easy until she was locked in. For once, the Camry turned over on the first try, as if her adrenaline were being transmitted to the engine, and she drove off to the club.

By the time she pulled into the parking lot of the Iron Mask and got out with her duffel, her paranoia was irritating the hell out of her. No cars had followed hers. No dark shadows were moving in for the kill. Nothing was out of the ordinary—

Her eyes went to the alley where the bodies had been found…and she was reminded of precisely why she worried all the time.

“How you doing?”

Marie-Terese spun around so fast, her duffel bag slammed into her. But it was only Trez, waiting by the back door. “I’m…good.” As his eyes narrowed, she put up her palm. “Don’t prod me. Not tonight. I know you mean well, but I can’t handle it right now.”

“Okay,” he murmured, stepping back so she could pass by him. “I’ll give you the space you need.”

Fortunately, he was true to his word, leaving her off at the locker room so she could change. When she was in her god-awful uniform, with her hair fluffed out and her lids caked with eye shadow and her mouth all greasy, she walked down the long hall to the club proper, completely dissociated from who and where she was.

As she trolled the fringes of the crowd, it didn’t take long to find business. A little eye contact, some hip, a slight smile and she had her first candidate of the night.