“Because I could do worse than kill him,” Maverick muttered darkly.

  “How could you do worse?”

  He shrugged. “I’m a blood warlock. Do you know what that means?”

  I’d heard of blood witches and warlocks, but I couldn’t say I really understood what either meant. I opened my mouth to tell him so, but paused when I felt Indie’s reaction to his words. And it was a big reaction. In fact, her mental presence recoiled like she’d been faced with a large and particularly ugly cockroach. The fact that he was a warlock had already earned him her distaste. Now that contempt deepened to actual disgust.

  What’s the big deal about a blood warlock? I asked.

  A blood witch is a witch who has her magic tainted by vampire blood. And that vampire blood makes a witch’s power dark, unpredictable, and capable of violating the laws of nature. A blood warlock has been unheard of until now. There have been very few warlocks in the history of our people, and none of them were what you’d call stable. A warlock’s power is already dark and possibly bent towards madness. Now his is tainted with undead blood which makes him infinitely more powerful and more liable to go ape shit crazy. I’m surprised he’s even still alive—that he wasn’t condemned to death by his coven. We usually purge our lines with fire when something like this happens.

  I swallowed thickly, hoping that I was hearing her wrong. Are you saying you burn blood witches and warlocks at the stake?

  Immolation is the only way to ensure the purge is successful.

  Oh my God.

  Hey, we don’t like it any better than you, trust me, but ask any sane witch and she’ll tell you she’d rather burn than become a half-vampire or allow herself to be tied to one.

  Well then, most witches were stupid. There shouldn’t be a situation in the world that would necessitate burning someone at the stake. What kind of Spanish Inquisition shit was that?

  I didn’t say anything, but Maverick could guess the answer to my question from my expression. He gave me a knowing look before lowering his hand to the wound.

  “So, if you’re not healing him, what are you doing?” I asked.

  “Trying to get a reading on what did this to him.”

  “A reading?” I repeated.

  He nodded. “Some races leave magical signatures behind. This was the work of something supernatural, not a mundane with a hockey mask and a machete. It’s hard to hurt a dragon, even in human form. Whatever did this is dangerous—dangerous and big and powerful and not something we’re going to want to tussle with.” He took a deep breath, then gave me another pronounced glare. “Now hush. Let me get a reading and then I’ll do what I can to help him.”

  Maverick’s eyes closed, and he began mouthing words under his breath again. I wasn’t sure what he was doing or saying, but I could feel his magic like smoke wafting over my skin. The hairs on my arms stood on end when his aura collided with me. I didn’t have to have any magical know-how to realize that Maverick was powerful.

  Which just makes this more of a nightmare, Indie grumbled. All the better to kill us with.

  You have no room to throw stones about killing things. After what I just learned about you… yeah, I’d shut up if I were you.

  She did.

  Angelo returned a few minutes later. “I searched the house and there’s no sign of Florence anywhere.”

  “She’s the zombie who lives here?” I double-checked.

  Angelo looked at me and nodded. “The bedroom is trashed, so I think whatever did this to Ivan dragged Florence from there. If I had to guess, it attacked Ivan and Florence, they fought back, and the neighbors mistook the fight for a husband beating on his wife. The unlucky deputy found himself at the wrong place at the wrong time. He probably tried to shoot the thing and only managed to piss it off.”

  That sounded depressingly likely. Maverick opened his eyes, then turned his attention to Ivan. He whispered Ivan’s name and tapped his face a few times, obviously trying to wake the dragon shifter up. It took a frighteningly long time to rouse him. But then Ivan sucked in a long, gurgling breath.

  “An... Ang...”

  “I’m here, Ivan,” Angelo said, and for once there was no glibness in his voice. “Hang on. An ambulance is coming.”

  “Flo… or… e...”

  “Florence,” I finished for him. “We know. We’ll find her. Save your strength. You can tell us more when you’re stable.”

  Maverick touched a spot on Ivan’s stomach, and the dragon hissed in pain. His speech was slurred, but I thought he said something nasty about Maverick’s mother. Maverick actually grinned, and agreed with him. Ivan tried to speak again as Maverick slung a pack off his back, rummaged through it, and produced a first aid kit. Maverick gave him a halting look.

  “You should talk less.”

  Ivan gave him a rude one-finger reply, which Maverick seemed to find amusing as hell. He was smirking when he began treating the wounds he could while putting pressure dressings on the ones he couldn’t. He cut away some of the dragon’s shirt to get at the rest of his injuries. The more skin that was exposed, the worse Ivan looked. The skin of one of his legs was thoroughly minced. His shoulder had been ripped open like a paper bag. Blood pulsed from deep gouges in his now exposed stomach, framed by already yellowing and purpling bruises.

  “What happened?” I asked, thoroughly unsettled.

  Maverick shrugged. “Some kind of animal. Big.”

  “How big?”

  He cocked his head to the side as he studied Ivan. “I’d say it’s at least human-man sized if not larger and possibly bipedal, given the spacing of the claw marks.”

  “The spacing of the claw marks?” I repeated.

  Maverick nodded. “You’d see a different pattern if the creature was smaller or in its complete animal form.”

  “Any guesses as to what it could be?” I asked.

  “It could be a werewolf, I guess. A male, though. The females are too timid.”

  “N... No...” Ivan tried.

  “No?” I asked. “As in, it’s not a werewolf?”

  He nodded. Okay, so it wasn’t a werewolf. That just left pretty much everything else in this town.

  “Do we need to call someone?” Angelo asked. “After Ivan’s carted away to the hospital, I mean? Do we need to convene the Council?”

  “We’d be crazy not to,” Maverick replied. “This is huge. The mundanes will be spooked. That’s dangerous for all of us. Taliyah can do damage control, but she can’t sweep all of this under the rug.”

  “I knew we should have stayed inside,” Angelo muttered. “How do I keep getting tangled up in this shit? I just want to be a realtor again. No rescues, no bloodshed, no drama. Just good old-fashioned sex and selling. Is that so much to ask for?” He sighed as I mentally cringed at his comment about ‘sex and selling’. “And speaking of your boss, Maverick, where the hell is she? I left a message on her phone, not yours.”

  “She was called out to Libby’s house. There was a disturbance at the duplex a half hour ago. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that both places have zombies in residence.”

  “Okay and?” Angelo continued.

  “And I think revenants are the targets here, and the rest of the victims were just… cannon fodder. Wrong place, wrong time sort of thing.”

  “Fuck,” Angelo swore.

  Maverick looked up at him. “My sentiment exactly. Anyway, Taliyah’s going to meet us at the hospital.”

  Ivan groped for my hand. His palm was slick with blood, and his fingers were stiff when he tried to give my hand a squeeze. The tips of his fingers were blackened like he’d suffered severe frostbite. That seemed wrong. The elements were blowing into the house, but the furnace was still running. He wasn’t in sub-zero temperatures and he hadn’t been down long enough to develop that level of frostbite, even if we’d found him in a snow drift.

  “I’m here,” I whispered as I smiled down at him. “You’re going to be just fine, I promise. I’m not going anywhere until you’re safe,” I continued. “We’re going to find who did this to you,” I continued, squeezing his hand back. “We’re going to find Florence and we’re going to make that thing pay. I promise.”

  Ivan’s eyes fluttered closed at the same time that a distant wail of an ambulance split the night air.

  Chapter Ten

  Lydia

  Police Chief Taliyah Morgan was waiting for us in the central waiting room.

  In an unlikely turn of events, the place was deserted except for a few of Haven Hollow’s supernatural citizens. Taliyah was pacing, her coat draped over one arm, looking thoroughly unsettled. The waiting room was about twenty degrees cooler than the rest of the hospital. Being in proximity to a spooked faerie princess of Winter felt a lot like waltzing into a meat locker.

  She turned to me when I walked into view. Some of the nervous energy bleeding off her lessened. Her eyes softened when she said, “Hey. How is Ivan doing?”

  “He’s in surgery right now,” I answered. “Doctor says he should be fine.” I frowned as something occurred to me. “Uh... aren’t you guys a little afraid that Ivan’s going to heal too quickly?” As I understood it, most supernaturals had the ability to heal faster than ordinary humans. “I mean, wouldn’t that raise suspicions with the human hospital staff?”

  “It would, normally, but Wanda and Maverick came up with contingencies for these types of situations,” Taliyah said.

  “What sort of contingencies?”

  Taliyah shrugged. “They make their own medical supplies with various spells and potions laced into the material.”

  “Like healing potions?”

  “Healing potions mixed in with other things,” she nodded. “The doctors had to have come into contact with the supplies on Ivan while they were operating, so they’ll be very fuzzy about this particular patient. Maverick will take care of the rest when he’s well enough to travel.”

  “So, let me get this straight,” I began. “You guys are going to... Jedi mind trick Ivan out of the hospital with no one being the wiser?”

  “That’s pretty much the skinny, Dollface,” the dark-haired woman in the corner piped up. “Since we ain’t got no supernatural doctor ‘round here, we do what we can.” Then she paused and gave me a huge grin. “Why don’t you sit down? Watchin’ both of you dolls pace is makin’ me real dizzy.”

  The woman looked vaguely familiar. I remembered she’d attended meetings of the Black Cat Cocktail Club. The few I’d been to, at any rate. I’d been busy setting up my shop, so my time was usually better spent sober elsewhere.

  Regardless, she was also friendly with her big, girlish grin. Currently, her hair was tucked under a cloche hat. She looked to be around my age, though she had the porcelain fine features I could only dream of. There was a classical look about her, but I couldn’t put my finger on what in particular gave her that quality.

  The quality is age, Indigo answered. She used to be a ghost, remember? Dead over a century?

  Oh, that’s right. What was her story again?

  The coven’s High Witch, Wanda, had her power blighted by a vampire. She created all the abominations in town.

  ‘Abomination’ is a harsh word, I thought back. And not every single one of them was made by Wanda. Florence was the creation of a former Blood Witch named Betanya Tayir.

  The irritating exchange did work in my favor, though. The shock of our discovery had made things fuzzy for a while. Now the details were coming back to me. The woman in the corner was an ex-ghost named Darla. She and Libby the zombie used to live together, but as I understood it, Darla now lived in Taliyah’s brother’s house, because he’d been murdered and now he was possessing Darla or something like that. And he had been the former Police Chief of Haven Hollow, which probably explained what Darla was doing here—Taliyah wanted her brother’s take on what had happened to Ivan.

  Two blood witches in this goddess forsaken town, Indie spat. That’s so much better.

  Again, glass house. Rock. Throw at your own risk, Indie. Because from where I’m standing, you were already cut to slivers by your own hypocrisy.

  She didn’t say anything to that, but I got the sense I’d hurt her feelings. Good. It was probably cruel of me, but there wasn’t a reason I could fathom that would excuse what she’d been a part of.

  “Are you okay?” Angelo asked. He wrapped his fingers around my arm, squeezing gently. I didn’t respond immediately, and he frowned. “Hey, what’s the matter? What happened?”

  “Other than the obvious?” I asked with a bleak laugh.

  “Yeah, other than that.” He continued to study me and then shook his head. “But it’s not just that that’s worrying you. Talk to me.”

  I took a deep breath. I didn’t expect it to be as shaky as it was. “Nothing. I’m fine, just worried.”

  He gave me another scrutinizing look. “No, that’s not worried. I know worried, worried is Rodney opening credit cards in your name. This isn’t worried, this is something else.” He leveled his gaze with mine. “Talk to me, Lydia.”

  I swallowed hard. “It’s silly.”

  “Tell me what’s wrong.”

  I paused. “I think I need to talk to Marty first.”

  I didn’t mean to let the thought slip out and regretted it almost instantly. Put like that, there were only so many ways that Angelo could take my meaning, and none of them were close to the truth. I’d have to spill Marty’s secret if I wanted to back out of this one and I wasn’t going to spill it—not when I’d given him my word that I wouldn’t.

  Instantly, Angelo’s expression shifted from concern to suspicion. “Why?”

  “Because,” I said quickly. “He’s... he’s sort of looking out for me.”

  “I’m looking out for you,” Angelo replied tightly.

  “Right. I, uh, I guess you both are.” I didn’t meant to sound so sheepish, but there it was.

  Angelo’s expression said he was pissed and then some. “I went to literal hell to find you. Marty takes you to lunch and buys you tofu or something and now you both are best friends?”

  “I... It’s not...” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “It’s not like that.”

  “Then what is it like?”

  “I’m not dating Marty. We’re... he’s... well, he’s...”

  “It’s okay,” a gentle voice said from the doorway.

  My head snapped up, and I twisted at the waist to watch Marty stroll in. He looked like he’d just rolled out of bed and put on the first thing he’d found. The jeans had what looked like an oil stain on one calf, and his shirt needed a date with an ironing board stat. His graying hair stuck out in every direction, and dark shadows ringed his blue eyes. Still, his smile was good-natured and handsome, like it always was. He shoved his hands into his pockets, staring at me expectantly.

  “Marty...” I began.

  “Go ahead and tell them,” he answered.

  “But—”

  “—it has to happen sometime, and Tally needs to hear whatever you have to say too. This is about more than just me or you now.”

  My throat constricted painfully. Marty was a good guy—too good to survive this world for long. This world of monsters tended to chew you up and spit you out—and that was if you were lucky. If you were unlucky, you got the Roman candle treatment like Indie had.

  My eyes were burning with the effort it took not to cry. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blurt anything out.”

  “It’s fine.” Another big, boyish grin. “And you really didn’t blurt anything.”

  Marty took the steps that separated us and took me by the hand, tugging me to a row of empty seats. I didn’t struggle when he pushed me down into one of the cheap, green chairs that lined the wall. He took the one across from me and leaned forward in his seat.

  “What happened?” Taliyah asked, making a fresh circuit of the room. Angelo made no motion to do anything, just stood there staring at Marty and me, and his expression wasn’t a happy one. Meanwhile, frost was spiraling out from every slap of Taliyah’s shoes on the tile. The rings of ice shone for a few seconds and then began to melt without magic to keep it cold. I wondered how she didn’t slip in the water and fall on her ass. Then her face clouded as she settled her eyes on Marty who, as I understood it, was actually her cousin. “What are you doing here, anyway?”

  “I have lots to tell you,” he started.

  Taliyah’s jaw tightened even further. “Marty, you better start telling me what the hell you know about what happened to my deputy, to Ivan or to Florence,” she demanded.

  He held his hands up defensively. “I don’t know what happened to Florence and Ivan or your deputy.”

  “Then I’ll repeat my question—what are you doing here?”

  “I’m supposed to look out for Lydia, that’s all.”

  “You,” Taliyah repeated skeptically. “You’re supposed to look after her?”

  Marty’s smile was sheepish. “Yeah, kind of. There are dangerous people after her and Jonathan Moses thought she needed someone who couldn’t be bespelled watching over her.” He took a breath. “And you might remember, I’m a null.” He looked proud of himself when he said it.

  “Jonathan Moses?” Taliyah repeated, and looked completely flummoxed. And also still annoyed.

  Marty nodded. “We’ve been working on ferreting out what Indigo was up to before she was killed. Lucretia Boline, the head witch of the Hexus Rangers—”

  “—I know who Lucretia Boline is!” Taliyah interrupted.

  “Well, she’s given me all the details she has about this whole Indigo situation, but even those details fall short of what Lucretia suspects was going on.”

  “What does any of that mean?” Taliyah asked and scrunched up her eyes like she was getting a headache.

  “Since Indigo isn’t alive to testify against her criminal buddies, Lydia is the next best thing,” Marty explained. “So, we are trying to get everything we can from Lydia’s dreams.”

  “Jonathan Moses,” Angelo repeated, sounding out the words like they didn’t make sense. “Of the Hunter Guild of America?”

  Marty shrugged as he looked over at Angelo. “Yeah, that’s the one.”