“You need to take me to this meeting,” he said. “Zee says that Underhill won’t leave them alone. They can’t afford for me to escape.”

“We’re not giving you to them,” I told him.

“Excuse me,” said Adam. He covered the mouthpiece, looked Aiden in the eyes, and said, “You stay here. No question.”

Aiden opened his mouth to argue, but Adam stared him down. Only when Aiden dropped his eyes did Adam go back to his call.

—

We agreed to meet at Uncle Mike’s. It was as close as we could come to neutral territory. The once bar was in east Pasco near the river, on the edge of the industrial district. The bar had been shut down for more than half a year. I expected it to smell musty or unused. But when Uncle Mike opened the door, his face somber, it smelled exactly the way it always did: alcohol, sawdust, peanuts, and the scents of hundreds of individuals. The last were faded and mixed into a musk from which it would have been impossible to coax a single thread free. And it smelled of magic.

When it had been open, the light had been kept low. But all the lights were on, and it was nearly as bright as it would have been had there been windows. Most of the tables were stacked in a pyramid in one corner of the room, large tables on the bottom, smaller on top. The chairs were mostly stacked, too, awaiting the day when the bar reopened.

One of the big tables had been set in the middle of the mostly empty room, and chairs were set around it.

“The others are here,” said Uncle Mike, “in the back. I’ll get them.”

He left us, Adam and me, alone in the room. The rest of the pack, all of them, were at our house protecting Aiden and Jesse. Darryl hadn’t been happy that we weren’t taking any extra wolves with us. But the fae had no reason to kill us, and the pack could protect Aiden and keep him safe. Or else, I’d been happy to point out to Darryl, nothing we could do would keep anyone safe at all.