Vivian said nothing as she pulled my mom’s car into a low-budget chain with very little neon on the sign. “We’re not staying,” she said when Trent voiced his disgust. “We’re taking a break, and we’re stopping here because you won’t get past the front desk of one of the big hotels without being recognized.” She turned to him, her childlike face smiling cattily. “You want to be recognized?”

Trent said nothing, and satisfied, she put the car in park at the front office. “You’ve been nothing but a pain in the ass,” she said as she grabbed her purse, just about the only thing she had since we’d kidnapped her. “No wonder Rachel doesn’t like you. I don’t like you, and I like everyone.”

His hand went to his chin, and Trent silently looked out the window, clearly peeved but seeing her logic. Ivy, though, was stirring, putting her boots back on and grabbing her purse.

“Is that Elvis?” I had to ask, seeing a Were in a white leisure suit and gold boots coming out of the office door. The stitching was glowing in the shadows. The man was wearing neon, and he had a Chihuahua in his arms. The dog’s collar was neon, too.

Vivian reached for the door handle, barely glancing at him. “That’s Bob and Chico,” she said shortly. “I lived here before I moved to the coast. Well, not here, exactly, but just outside town. The ley lines are spectacular.”

Really? I thought as she opened her door and got out. I’d heard they were numerous, but I had always thought it was part of the sell line.

“Everyone stays here, okay?” she said from outside, looking harassed, a hand on her hip and her clothes rumpled. She hadn’t put on any makeup, and her once-slick hair was more like straw now. It made her trendy purse look like a cheap knockoff. “I’ll get a room and then you can all go get something to eat,” she said, eyes narrowed in annoyance. “I don’t need a bunch of you in the office with me. I can handle this.”

Ivy, of course, was getting out, and Vivian gave her a tired look. “I don’t trust you,” Ivy said with absolutely no remorse or guilt. “No hard feelings.”

“None taken,” the small woman said with the same detachment. “The rest of you stay.”

Jenks’s wings hummed, but he didn’t move from the tissue-lined ashtray. “I gotta pee,” he grumbled, but Vivian had shut the door, and the two walked in together, Vivian looking small next to Ivy’s bruised and battered height.

“I really have to pee,” he said again, this time his eyes beseechingly on mine.

I cranked the window all the way down, and he rose unsteadily into the air. “When did Vivian become everyone’s mother?” I said, and he flew in a wobbling path outside. “Stay close, okay?” I said, noticing that he didn’t have a scrap of red on him.

“Yeah, whatever,” he said, then flew giggling to the sheared rosemary lining the path to the door.