“No. Some of us sleep in.” Truthfully, my blood supply had run so low I’d begun to ration, and my energy had begun to wane. I didn’t know what shape I’d find Cyrus in. If they’d turned him, I’d have to keep him alive until we got back to Michigan. With what I’d managed to save, we still might both starve.

“There’s a place just over the Nevada border that caters to your kind.” The way he stressed the last words of the sentence begged questioning.

Rolling my eyes, I shifted the phone from one ear to the other and groped for my jeans in the tangled sleeping bag. “My kind?”

He chuckled again. “Lady vampires. There’s a brothel about twenty miles past the state line. All pretty men, female clientele only.”

“It’s a donor house,” I accused.

“It’s a brothel. But if you pay them extra, they’ll bare a little neck.” He gave a sigh of nostalgia. “Lucky you.”

“Sorry, I don’t feed from humans.” I’d done it twice, once on Dahlia, once with Ziggy, and both times had provided more than adequate doses of guilt.

“Really? Where do you get the blood you drink, then?”

I bristled at the monster logic that was sure to follow, the same rationalizations Cyrus had used to manipulate me. “Where I get my blood is none of your—”

“Hey, I’m not judging. I’m just trying to give you some pointers. Surviving in the harsh, untamed West is a lot different than your posh, midwestern life. At least, that’s what Road Dog has been telling me.”

“Road Dog?” I remembered his hirsute companion. “For some reason I can’t imagine him saying that.”

“Well, I read it from his body language. When he was eating a trucker.” Byron paused. “So, do you want the address?”

Eyeing the cooler, I sighed. “Can I get it in bulk there?”

“With dry ice.”

“Fine. Tell me the directions.”

It was almost sunup when I reached the elegant, redbrick manor. Despite the fact it was located on a barren back road in the middle of the desert, the lawn surrounding the house was lush and green. At least, from what I could tell between the slashing bars of the tall iron fence surrounding the place. There wasn’t a neighbor for ten miles, but I knew their security concerns didn’t extend to simple burglars.

A sleek intercom console was posted at the gate. I pushed the button to ring the buzzer.

A voice crackled over the speaker a second later. “State your business.”

I recited the password Byron had given me, feeling dirtier by the second. “Withdrawal.”