I tucked my arm through Adam’s, and we started for the hotel. We hadn’t gotten three steps from the car before the sound of hard wheels on blacktop had us both turning to see a skinny teenager approaching us rapidly. Casually, I dropped Adam’s arm and stepped back. The kid hopped off the skateboard with a kick that threw the board up so he could catch it without bending down. He stowed it under one arm as he walked.

“Hey, man,” he said, his voice familiar from the early-morning call, but it was far more laid-back—less meth-head and more stoner. “I looked you up on the Internet to see why suddenly I’m dealing with the werewolves and not the vampires. Nice work on that troll.”

“Was it?” asked Adam. “There aren’t many trolls left, I am given to understand.”

The boy spat on the ground. “They can all rot for all I care. Nasty pieces of work, trolls—killing ’em ain’t no cause for tragedy. Now, I’d like to get paid and get out of here before someone wonders why I’m riding around on this toy at five in the morning.”

“What did the vampire look like?” I asked.

He shrugged, but there was something sly in his eyes when he said, “Weren’t me what saw him.” He held out his hand.

Adam handed him an envelope. The goblin in human guise dropped the skateboard back on the ground and hopped on the battered and scarred surface. He didn’t stop it when it started to drift backward. He gave Adam a salute with the hand that held the white envelope, dropped a toe, and spun his board around to speed off into the night.

Three cars down from where Adam had parked there was a white Subaru Forester with California plates. I remember cars, a hazard of my job. I tugged Adam to a stop and examined it more carefully.

Subaru Foresters weren’t uncommon—there were three others in the parking lot. But I’d followed this one for miles last winter. I sniffed at the driver’s-side door and smelled a familiar vampire.

“Thomas Hao,” I said. I’d fought beside Thomas a couple of months ago, and we’d helped Marsilia destroy a nasty vampire. I wondered if Marsilia had known who he was when she turned him over to us this morning. I considered the goblin’s half lie about not being the one who saw the vampire and decided she did.

“This should be interesting,” said Adam after a moment, but he’d relaxed a little, and so had I.