And for that reason alone, I would go back to Moldavia. With or without backup.

“Kind of quiet back here tonight,” said Sam, our usual waiter, as he sidled up to our table. “I’d ask if somebody died, but that’s typically why y’all are here.”

None of us looked up or even cracked a smile.

“Wow,” laughed Sam. “Okay. Anybody want a slice of Death by Chocolate to go with their Doom and Gloom?”

“I’ll take some more ketchup,” Patrick said, even though he’d killed off most of his fries already.

“Well,” said Sam as he pivoted. “At last one of y’all’s acting normal.”

I scanned the table after Sam left but sighed when, again, no one would meet my gaze.

“So that’s it,” I said. “That settles it. I’m on my own.”

“Now, wait just a second.” Wes raised a pale palm to me. Like I was one of the entities he liked to rebuke. “Might I take this moment to remind you that, despite your surly sea captain attitude toward us, none of us has said no. We’re just trying to be sure there is, in fact, a plan. One that we’re all in on this time.”

“Because, you know,” said Patrick, cutting me off before I could say a word, “we do all have things like permanent records, reputations, and major arteries that will suffer the consequences.”

“And if we roll up into this house,” added Wes, “break in, and start trying to find Stephanie in the walls? At best we stand to get arrested.”

“Yeah. And at worst we stand to get killed,” added Patrick, pulling out his phone after it buzzed with an alert. “Which, by the way, is why you need to give us a solid heads-up before you omit any more vital information or Leeroy Jenkins into any more crazy shit. I do not have time to be dead.”

“You mistake our apprehension for doubt,” said Wes, raising a finger. “And how can we help it when, if what you’re saying is true, and Stephanie was taken by—”

“Zedok has her,” I said, not caring anymore if I sounded crazy.

Wes cringed at my use of the entity’s name, but I didn’t care about that, either. Whatever I needed to do or say to get through to them, I would.

“Yeah,” said Wes. “That guy. It’s just that . . . if what you’re telling us is true, then that means that the whole ‘Phantom Fury’ episode wasn’t a hoax. And if what happened to Rastin was real, that also means this thing really did kill Joe Boq. And—”

“Car,” said Patrick suddenly, prompting the three of us to glance his way. He held his cell phone closer to his face, eyes scanning its screen. “Black Beamer. Just now, on the trail cam. I saw it pull onto the lot.”

“Another cop,” Wes said, which was what I’d been thinking, too.

“No,” Patrick said quickly. “I don’t think so.”

“Who, then?” asked Charlotte.