“Hell if I know. Pallas agrees with you. She believes it could also have been caused by a Porter who couldn’t control his or her magic.” She gave me a pointed look. “When you fought those vampires yesterday afternoon, did you have any problems?”

“You mean did I lose control and blow up half the building?” I shook my head. “Not this time.”

A moth tapped against the sliding glass door, drawn to the light. Deb stared for several moments, searching the darkness before turning her attention back to me. The fingers of her right hand fidgeted against her leg. “If someone were recruiting, you’d be the perfect choice. Resentful, eager to get back in the game . . .”

“Oh, sure,” I said easily. “I’ve got access to the Porter database, too. But resentment isn’t going to launch me into a sociopathic killing spree.” I sighed. “You and I both know they made the right call.”

I couldn’t have admitted it without the drug, but Doctor Shah had been right to recommend I be pulled from the field, and Pallas had been right to act on that recommendation. I had anger and resentment aplenty, but most of that was directed toward myself.

“What happened?” Lena asked quietly.

“I broke the rules.” My chest felt like someone had hollowed it out with an ice cream scoop. “I was putting in my time in the field, hoping to earn a research position. I’d been tracking a drug called Iced Z. Powdered zombie brains. Nasty stuff. You do not want to be anywhere near a Z addict when he gets the munchies.

“Two victims had shown up in the medical center out on Mackinac Island. The doctors didn’t know what to do with them. They thought it was some kind of antibiotic-resistant Necrotizing fasciitis. Flesh-eating bacteria. The first victim died of an overdose. We snuck in so Smudge could cremate her before the body rose again. I managed to save the second one, though she lost about twenty percent of her brain function. She was coherent enough to tell me where she got the stuff.”

I had never talked about what happened that day to anyone except Doctor Shah, but the magical drug coursing through my blood had loosened the floodgates. “They were using the horses. Automobiles aren’t allowed on Mackinac Island, so it’s all bikes and horse-drawn carriages. The dealer had set up an entire stable of undead horses behind this beautiful Victorian mansion down by the port. He’d been selling this shit to tourists for about two months.