“Of course not.” She smiled at him, and he swore he could almost see her glowing. “I granted your wish. Apparently, it’s what we do.”

“News to me! What exactly did I wish for? To have you in my life, or to see you?”

“I don’t know, but it’s kind of nice that you got it all in one package, isn’t it?”

He supposed it was.

A Fiend in Need

Author’s Note

The events of this story take place in February of 2006, following the events of Undead and Unreturnable.

Also, I have changed Chicago’s Chinatown to suit my needs. It’s a wonderful city, but I just couldn’t leave it alone. That’s a failing in me, not the city of Chicago.

I did the same thing, again, with Summit Avenue in St. Paul. A lovely city. Just couldn’t leave it be. Sorry.

“We shall find no fiend in hell can match the fury of a disappointed woman.”

—COLLEY CIBBER, Love’s Last Shift, Act 2

“Like a fiend in a cloud
With howling woe, After night I do crowd,
And with night will go.”

—WILLIAM BLAKE, from Poetical Sketches

“Don’t threaten me with love, baby. Let’s just go walking in the rain.”

—BILLIE HOLIDAY

Prologue

Bev Jones took a deep breath and stepped out onto the roof. She’d snuck to Chicago’s Chinatown on her lunch break because she wanted to die with the smell of fresh potstickers in her nose.

She walked slowly to the edge of the roof and peeked over. The winter wind ruffled her short, dark hair, but for a miracle, it was almost a nice day—nice for Chicago, anyway.

It was a typically busy Friday afternoon…the Friday before Valentine’s Day, in fact. And if she had to spend one more Valentine’s Day alone—or worse, with only the company of her psychiatrist—she would kill herself.

People said that a lot, but Bev never said anything she didn’t mean. And so here she was.

She put her hands flat on the ledge and got ready to boost herself up. Given that she was wearing snow pants and a down-stuffed parka, it might take a while—say, her entire lunch break. Ah, well. If nothing else, she was mildly curious to find out if there was an afterlife. Would there be potstickers and noodle nests in the afterlife? She didn’t—

“Bev! Hey! Wait up!”

She started—the last thing she’d expected on a rooftop was to hear someone calling her name—and turned around. And instantly assumed she’d gone crazy: there was a woman running toward her, a woman who—whoop!—just jumped over the Chinese arch separating the two buildings. And now—was she?—she was! She was hurrying right over to Bev.