Jenks flitted up, then down, staring at Nick until the man put his hands back on the wheel. “No,” the pixy said. “I mean it. Give her some time. She heard your message and is calming down.” Jenks flew to sit on the dash before me. “Man, what did you do to her? She was going on and on about not being able to protect you, and that Piscary was going to be angry with her, and she didn’t know what she was going to do if you left.” His tiny features grew worried. “Rache? Maybe you should move out. This is too weird, even for you.”

I felt cold at the undead vampire’s name. Maybe I hadn’t pushed her too far; maybe Piscary had put her up to it. We would’ve been fine had she quit when I first said to. He’d probably figured out that Ivy wasn’t the dominant one in our odd relationship and wanted her to rectify the situation, the little prick. It wasn’t his business.

Nick put the car in gear, and the tires cracked and popped against the gravel lot. “Church?” he questioned.

I glanced at Jenks, and he shook his head. It was the wisp of fear on him that decided it for me. “No,” I said. I’d wait. Give her time to collect herself.

Nick seemed as relieved as Jenks. We pulled out into traffic, headed for the bridge.

“Good,” Jenks said. Eyeing my lack of earrings, he vaulted up to sit on the rearview mirror. “What the hell happened, anyway?”

I rolled my window back up, feeling the coldness of the coming night in the damp breeze. “I pushed her too far while we were working out. She tried to make me her—uh—tried to bite me. Nick knocked her out with my spell pot.”

“She tried to bite you?”

I looked from the passing night to Jenks, seeing in the light from the car behind us his wings go still, then blur to nothing and go still again. Jenks looked from Nick’s embarrassed face to my worried one. “Ohhh,” he said, his eyes widening. “Now I get it. She wanted to bind you to her so only she could make your vamp scar resonate to vamp pheromones. You turned her down. My God, she must be embarrassed. No wonder she’s upset.”

“Jenks, shut up,” I said, stifling the urge to grab him and toss him out the window. He would only catch up at the first red light.

The pixy flitted to Nick’s shoulder, eyeing the lights glowing on the dash. “Nice truck.”

“Thanks.”

“Stock?”

Nick’s gaze slid from the taillights of the car ahead to Jenks. “Modified.”

Jenks’s wings blurred, then steadied. “What’s your top end?”

“One fifty with NOS.”

“Damn!” the pixy swore admiringly as he flew back to the rearview mirror. “Check your lines. I smell a leak.”