“Are you sure she hasn’t seen you?”

“Please.” This time the shrug was pure disdain. “From her angle I’m just another guy, and there’s no shortage of guys around this neighborhood. The gym on the second floor of the hotel is one of the best cruising spots in the city. She’s not going to expect us; she thinks I’m still completely fucking clueless.”

“Good. I imagine that a wizard on her own ground with a chance to prepare a welcome can be very, very dangerous.”

“You imagine?”

“This is my first wizard, too, Tony. They’re not something you run into every day.”

“But you can handle her, right?”

“I don’t know.”

“She knows you walk in shadow. I didn’t tell her; she saw you at the night shoot and she just knew.”

“Probably because she’s a wizard.”

“You think?”

“Best that one of us does.” Tony rolled his eyes and, Henry was pleased to see, looked as though the verbal sparring had helped him regain control of his emotions. For Tony’s sake then, he was glad he’d managed to keep the edge from his voice. If this wizard had seen him at the night shoot, seen him with Tony, knew what he was, and still used her power on one of his . . . he’d do what Tony needed him to but the whole slightly ludicrous situation had just become personal.

They slipped into the building as one of the tenants left, a tan Chihuahua cradled in the crook of his arm. The tenant took one look at Henry’s face and higher brain functions dealing with self-preservation in the twenty-first century kicked in, assuring him he had not seen what he thought he’d seen. That he had, in fact, seen nothing at all. The dog curled her lip and, in spite of the relative size differences, informed the invading predator he could just get the hell out of her building.

“I just don’t get the whole gay men and Chihuahua thing,” Tony muttered as they headed for the elevators. The shrill, indignant yapping could still be heard fading into the distance.

“How do you know he was gay?”

“You means besides the Chihuahua?”

Three elderly women watched them pass from the safety of the laundry room. Before they could decide whether or not to raise the alarm, the elevator door closed and made the decision for them.

Tony jabbed at the button for the fourth floor, then bounced heel to toe as they slowly rose. “The stairs would be quicker.”

“I doubt it.”

“It’s just Lee’s out there, with that thing in him . . .”

“You saw this happen?”

“Yeah. I’ve been seeing lots of weird shit with shadows, Henry. That’s what Arra made me forget. But she said the next shadow would take over someone in the studio to get information about this world and I saw it take over Lee.”

“And that made you remember?”

“Maybe. No. I don’t know. I just did.”

Hard to keep his lips down over his teeth. “Well, we’ll speak to her about that, too.”