Ivy had once had money, and still dressed like it, but her entire early inheritance had gone to the I.S. to pay off her contract when she quit with me. Put simply, she looked like a scary model: lithe and pale, but incredibly strong. Unlike me, she wore no nail polish, no jewelry apart from her crucifix twin black chain anklets about one foot, and very little makeup; she didn’t need it. But like me, she was basically broke, at least until her mother finished dying and the rest of the Tamwood estate came to her. I was guessing that wouldn’t be for about two hundred years—bare minimum.

Ivy’s thin eyebrows rose as she looked Glenn over. “Bringing your work home again, Rachel?”

I took a breath. “Hi, Ivy. This is Detective Glenn. You talked to him this afternoon? Sent him to pick me up?” My look went pointed. We were going to talk about that later.

Ivy turned her back on him to unpack the groceries. “Nice to meet you,” she said, her tone flat. Then to me, she muttered, “Sorry. Something came up.”

Glenn swallowed hard. He looked shaky but was holding up. I guess Edden hadn’t told him about Ivy. I really liked Edden. “You’re a vampire,” he said.

“Ooooh,” Ivy said. “We’ve got a bright one here.”

Fingers fumbling around the string of his new amulet, he pulled a cross from behind his shirt. “But the sun is up,” he said, sounding as if he had been betrayed.

“My my my,” Ivy said. “And a weatherman, too?” She turned with a snide look. “I’m not dead yet, Detective Glenn. Only the true undead have light restrictions. Come back in sixty years and I might be worried about a sunburn.” Seeing his cross, she smiled patronizingly and pulled out from behind her black spandex shirt her own, extravagant crucifix. “That only works on undead vamps,” she said as she turned back to the counter. “Where did you get your schooling? B-movies?”

Glenn backed up a step. “Captain Edden never said you worked with a vampire,” the FIB officer stammered.

At Edden’s name, Ivy spun. It was a blindingly fast motion, and I started. This wasn’t going well. She was starting to pull an aura. Damn. I glanced out the window. The sun would be down soon. Double damn.

“I heard about you,” the officer said, and I cringed at the arrogance in his voice, which he was using to cover his fear. Even Glenn couldn’t be stupid enough to antagonize a vamp in her own house. That gun at his side wasn’t going to do him any good. Sure, he could shoot her, and kill her, but then she’d be dead and she’d rip his freaking head off. And no jury in the world would convict her of murder, seeing as he killed her first.