The lights were up high while the wait staff cleaned, and where the large room with it log-cabin walls had looked mysterious and exciting, now it looked dirty and tired. Kind of like me. The shoulder-high wall of stained glass that divided the room was broken. A petite woman with hair to her waist was sweeping the shards of green and gold toward the wall. She stopped to lean on the broom as I came in. There was an odd smell at the back of my throat, rich and cloying. My feet faltered as I realized the vamp pheromones were so thick I could taste them.

At least Ivy had put up a fight, I thought, realizing most of the vamps were sporting a bandage or bruise, and all of them, with the exception of the vamp sitting at the bar, were in a bad mood. One had been bit, his neck torn and his uniform ripped at the collar. In the bright light of morning, their glamour and sexual tension had been wiped away, to leave only a tired ugliness. My lip curled in distaste. Seeing them like this, they were repellant. And yet my scar on my neck started to tingle.

“Well, look who showed,” the vamp sitting at the bar drawled. His uniform was more elaborate than the rest, and he took his name tag off as he saw my eyes on it. It read Samuel, the vampire that had let Tarra upstairs the night we were there. Samuel got up, leaning to flick a switch behind the counter. The open sign behind me in the window went out. “You’re Rachel Morgan?” he asked, his vamp-confident voice slow and patronizing.

Clutching my bag, I boldly walked past the wait here for host sign. Yeah, I was a bad girl. “That’s me,” I said, wishing there were fewer tables. My feet slowed as caution finally worked its way past my anger. I had broken rule number one: going in mad. I would have been okay if I hadn’t also broken the more important rule number two: confronting an undead vamp on his own turf.

The wait staff was watching, and my pulse quickened as Samuel went to the door and locked it. Turning, he casually threw the wad of keys clear across the room. A figure by the unused fireplace raised his arm, and I recognized Kisten, unseen in the shadows until he moved. The keys hit Kist’s palm with a jingle and disappeared. I didn’t know if I should be angry with him or not. He had dumped Ivy and driven off, but he had tried to stop them, too.

“This is what Piscary is worried about?” Samuel said, his beautiful face sneering. “Skinny little thing. Not much on top.” He leered. “Or bottom. I thought you’d be taller.”