I nodded. “Yeah, it did. Thanks. I really appreciate it. Um . . . did you think I would forget to give it back?”

“No.” He stashed the pendant in the pocket of his leather vest, then removed his sunglasses, revealing dilated pupils in those ice-blue eyes. “I felt a great outpouring of anger from you this morning. It concerned me.”

“It most certainly didn’t concern you,” Cody muttered.

I ignored him. Yep, definitely still jangling. “You . . . felt that?”

The protestors had abandoned their marching and chanting, and stood milling around us, craning to hear.

“Now that you’ve willingly allowed me to taste you, I’m attuned to you, Daisy,” Stefan said calmly. “Of course I felt it.”

“You what?” Cody repeated. “You let him taste you?”

I felt my face get hot. “It was an emergency, okay? And you might have mentioned that little side effect before you let me say yes,” I added to Stefan.

He didn’t exactly smile, but a dimple came and went alongside the corner of his mouth. “I might have. As you observed, it was something of an emergency. But you are well, I trust? Nothing is amiss?”

“I’m fine.” I glanced around at the gawking protestors and tourists. I sure as hell wasn’t going to mention Meg Mucklebones in the middle of this crowd. “Thanks for checking on me, but we’ve really got to go.”

“We should share information again, Hel’s liaison,” Stefan said. “Where are you bound? I’ll follow you.”

My temper stirred. “Look—”

Cody tapped my shoulder. “Actually, Daisy, this gives me an idea. Go ahead and follow us,” he said to Stefan. “I’ve got a request for you.”

“Of course, Officer.” Stefan’s face took on a neutral expression. “I’m pleased to assist if I can.”

As he turned to go, one of the protestors found an unexpected surge of courage and stepped forward to confront him. She held up a pendant of her own, a shiny gold cross, thrusting it toward Stefan’s face.

“No sanctuary for Satanism!” Her voice shook a bit, and the cross trembled in her hand, but she stood her ground. “Begone, fiend!”

Several tourists on the outskirts said, “Ooh!” And I swear to God, a pair of teenage girls were dipping into bags of caramel corn and shoving it into their mouths like they were watching a movie.

More protestors joined the bold one, closing ranks with her. “Go back to whatever hell you came from!” one shouted. “Leave the mortal world to God’s children!”

Once again, the chant arose.

“No sanctuary for Satanism! No sanctuary for Satanism!”

Stefan went very still.

It was the same deep, cool well of stillness I’d felt when I let my anger pour into him at Thad’s funeral, but this time it radiated outward, encompassing the protestors and the gawking tourists.

The chant faltered.