“I don’t remember.” I dunked the brush and started in again, but the hush of linen against paper brought me upright. “Hey!” I protested, wiping my hands dry on my robe to make the tie come undone. “You can’t do that. It’s illegal to open mail not addressed to you.”

Jenks had landed on Ivy’s shoulder, and they each gave me a long look over the invitation in her grip. “The seal was broken,” Ivy said, shaking to the floor the stupid little white tissue paper I had carefully replaced.

Trent Kalamack was the bane of my existence, one of Cincinnati’s most beloved councilmen, and the Northern Hemisphere’s most eligible bachelor. No one seemed to care he ran half of the city’s underworld and worked a good slice of the world’s illegal Brimstone trade. That wasn’t even considering his punishable-by-death dealings in genetic manipulation and outlawed medicines. My being alive because of them was a big part of my keeping quiet about it. I didn’t like the Antarctic any more than the next person, and that’s where I’d end up if it got out. That is, if they didn’t just kill me, burn me, and send my ashes to the sun.

Suddenly having a demon trash my living room didn’t seem so bad.

“Holy crap!” Jenks swore again. “Ellasbeth wants you to be a bridesmaid?”

Jerking my robe closed, I stalked across the sanctuary and snatched the invitation out of Ivy’s hand. “It’s not an invitation, it’s a badly worded request for me to work security. The woman hates me. Look, she didn’t even sign it. I bet she doesn’t even know it exists.”

I waved it in the air and shoved it into a drawer, slamming it shut. Trent’s fiancée was a bitch in all ways but the literal. Thin, elegant, rich, and bitingly polite. We had gotten along really well the night we had breakfast together, just her, me, and Trent caught between us. Course, part of that might have been from my letting her believe that Trent and I had been childhood sweethearts. But she was the one who decided I was a courtesan. Stupid Yellow Pages ad.

Ivy’s expression was wary. She knew better than to push me when it came to Trent, but Jenks wouldn’t let it go. “Yeah, but think of it, Rache. It’s going to be a hell of a party. The best of Cincinnati is going to be there. You never know who will show up.”

I lifted a plant and ran my hand under it—my version of dusting. “People who want to kill Trent,” I said lightly. “I like excitement, but I’m not insane.”