Chapter One
Present Day
Salvatore’s Restaurant
Outside of Little Italy, Caldwell
“She wants the tossed salad, no dressing, the grilled vegetables, and
she can have the broiled chicken. No sauce.”
Princess Dennesha, blooded daughter of Queen Catra, heir
to the throne of the Shadows in the Territory of the s’Hisbe, beloved
blooded daughter of His Highness the Prince Consort iAm, looked
away from the woman who’d refused to meet her eyes since the moment
the couple had been seated in the section Denne was covering. The man
on the other side of the two-top was fiftyish and thick-necked to the
point of busting out the open collar of his shirt. With the shoulders of
a former football player, the girth of a current drinker, and the orbital
brow of a Neanderthal, it was clear he put the “thug” in “aspirational
asshole.” Suit was expensive, watch was an AP Royal Oak, and she
hadn’t noticed the shoes, but she was betting they had logos on them.
Gucci. LV. Or Ferragamo.
“I’ll have the antipasto and the lasagna al forno,” he announced as he
ran a meaty paw over his slick-backed hair. “You can bring me another
old-fashioned with the bread. T’anks, sweetheart.”
The smile that was sent her way was so dismissive, the flick of the
man’s chubby hands was unnecessary.
Denne glanced back at the woman. She was so much younger
than him and had the darting eyes and tense posture of someone who
dodged a lot of slaps. Dressed in a blue sheath that came down to her
mid-thigh on the bottom and nearly her belly button on the top, she
had dark skin and a blond weave that fell to her waist. Her shoes were
high, strappy, and about as practical for the winter weather as a pair of
Toothpicks.
“Hello?” the guy demanded as he shot over a glare. “You forget your
brain or sumthn?”
“No, I didn’t,” Denne murmured.
Pulling a pivot, she walked it for the kitchen’s flap doors. The res-
taurant was running at seventy-five percent capacity, pretty typical for a
weeknight at seven p.m. Most of the folks were regulars, older couples
eating the same thing and business types entertaining clients, but there
were a few girls’-nights-out happening, clutches of moms sharing a nice
meal and a glass of wine. As for the asshole, she didn’t recognize him
specifically, but she’d certainly seen versions of the suit-and-shiny-shoes
gangster shit before. Of course, if he’d been a real high roller, he would
have been seated in one of the banquettes in the bar area. Instead, he’d
been given a table in the middle of the tourists’ room.
So he hadn’t tipped the maître d’.
Sal’s was an Italian institution in Caldwell, with ties that went all
the way back to the NYC La Cosa Nostra a hundred years ago in the
1950s. It was the kind of place where real mobsters still came for the
food and wannabe tough guys just had to flex—and the latter did tend
to bring that kind of too-thin, twitchy, younger woman with them,
another thing they felt they owned.
The actual OGs only came with their associates.
Pushing her way into the kitchen, things were hopping, sous chefs
sautéing at the stove, dessert staff pulling pastries out of the ovens, the
dishwashers the only people loitering, because the first wave of dirties
from the entrées hadn’t come to them yet.
“Marco, we got an anti-past, a lasagna, a roasted chicken with veg.”
She kept a curse to herself. “No sauce. I’ll do the salad.”
“You got it, Denne.”
Head chef Marco Andrello was a full-bred Italian who rode the range
like a maestro, even though he was only in his thirties. As humans didn’t
live very long, she was glad for him and for Sal’s. He still had a good forty
or fifty years of doing what he loved to do, and no one could argue that his
passions were misplaced. He’d managed to get them a Michelin star, some-
thing that was unheard of for a place like this where the portion sizes were
normal, the prices reasonable, and the history not of the snotty variety.
Swinging by the bread station, she nodded at the kid who was
cutting fresh slants off the loaves. He handed her a basket, and she
grabbed a butter plate.
“Thanks, Peter.”
She hipped out the other set of doors to the bar. Julianne was their
tender, and the sixty-year-old grandmother of two was tough as they
came. Nobody got away with nothing at her counter, as she liked to say.
“Another old-fashioned, please.”
“Sure thing, D.”
As a rocks glass was slammed down on the prep pad, Denne looked
out through the archway. The fucker with the big-boy attitude was on
his phone, his elbows planted on the table like tree trunks, his jacket
riding up on his thick biceps and pooching at the shoulders. Across
from him, that woman was like the place settings, perfectly arranged
and gleaming in all her immobility.
Except for her eyes.
They continued to dart around, even as her head didn’t move and
there was no blinking.
Humans are not your business, Denne told herself as she turned back
to the bar. Never had been, never will be.
When his lordship’s old-fashioned was ready, she went back to the
table. The guy didn’t look up as she swapped the full with the empty.
Then again, he was busy screening profiles of other women, the swipe-
rights going like the wind—
A stiletto stretched out from under the table, blocking Denne’s way.
Glancing down, the first thing that registered was a pattern of
bruising on the thigh. The fan of discoloration was exposed as the short
skirt rode up and it was clearly from a hard grip. And then the woman
put her hand out in an unusual position with the thumb down on the
palm and the other four fingers extended outward.
In a movement too deliberate to miss, those fingers curled in and
re-extended. Curled in . . . and re-extended.
“Where’s the bread,” the guy demanded.
Shit, she thought as she looked at her empty left hand.
With a quick look over her shoulder, she saw the damn basket back
on the bar. “I’ll get it right now.”
“Sir.”
“I’m sorry?”
His stare flipped up from his phone, and the cold calculation was
like he already had a hand on the front of her throat and was squeezing.
“Right away . . . sir. Put some respect on it, wouldya.”
Denne’s fangs tingled in the roof of her mouth. “I’ll be back with
the bread.”
She could feel his aggression follow her as she returned to Julianne’s
zip code, and the soundtrack in her head was a pounding beat to the
tune of leave-it-leave-it-leave-it.
“I woulda brought it to you,” Julianne said as she hit the blender
on a bunch of limes and liquor. More loudly, she tacked on, “But I’m
makin’ four daiquiris. Who the hell orders frozen fruity drinks in
January.”
“I dunno, I never drink them.”
The bartender hit an even higher gear with a stubby punch. “That’s
’cuz you got taste buds. Might as well suck on fabric softener.”
On the second trip back, the man had turned his chair to face out
from the table and he was staring through his eyebrows like he ex-
pected Denne to insult his mother’s virtue—and was hoping she did so
he could hit her. Also, with his knees spread wide, he was clearly imply-
ing he was packing a monster in his pants.
Denne put the bread down and turned away, because sometimes
a brush-off was the best way to knee an asshole in the balls. And as a
couple of other diners glanced up from their cabernet sauvignon and
their carbonara, she was reminded that there were advantages to those
rats without tails being everywhere. If she were alone with this guy?
God knows what she would do to him.
Public places could save fucking lives, they really could.
“Leave it,” she said under her breath. “Denne, you leave this alone.”
Except maybe it was the fact that the woman’s skin was dark like
her own. Or that fragile perch on the chair, like she was about to shat-
ter. Or the fucking poser’s arrogance . . .
When she got back into the kitchen, she headed down the hall that
led to her little office and the rear exit of the restaurant. Just inside her
door, her parka was hanging off a hook that had been screwed into the
concrete wall, and she grabbed her phone out of a pocket. Even though
she had a feeling what the hand signal meant, she looked the thing up
Online.
“Goddamn it,” she muttered as she clicked her screen off.
She was shoving her cell back into the puffy jacket when the door
in from the parking lot opened wide and one of the other servers hus-
tled in along with a lot of cold and a swirl of snowflakes.
“Oh my God, thank you for covering!” The young man stomped his
boots on the matting and started unwinding a red scarf from his neck.
“Me and Nick are totally scrambling with the wedding coming up. I
never knew it would be so exhausting—”
When the fast syllables dried up, she looked properly at her friend.
Willie Newley was six feet twelve hundred inches tall, as his fiancé al-
ways said, thin as a soda straw, and dressed in the mandatory black
server’s uniform. Ichabod Crane meets dopamine: He was always in a
good mood, and he carried his optimism and cheerful vibe like a rain-
bow he intended to share a feel-great head cold.
The smile faded. “Girl. What’s going on.”
“Oh, nothing. S’all good—”
“Nuh-uh. Your face is scrunched up like when you have to close out
receipts for the month.” He put his hands on his hips. “You have three
hours to tell me. If you haven’t by the end of the shift, I’m calling Nick
in on this.”
Denne laughed a little. “Okay, there is no reason to escalate that far
this fast.”
“I should have known better than to put you on the floor.” He yanked
the scarf off and started peeling his layers. “You don’t do well with peo-
ple. At least you can stay in your sanctuary for the rest of the night now.”
“I’m keeping sixteen.”
“What are you talkin’ ’bout.” Willie waved away the comment.
“Your computer is waiting. Those numbers can’t add up themselves.”
“I’m just going to finish things with that one.” She stepped out into
the hall and put her hand up. “That’s it.”
Willie stared at her for a long moment, like he was an internal med-
icine specialist looking for a disease.
“Okay, you do you.” He put his arm around her shoulders and gave
her a hug. “And I owe you. But you’re still going to tell me what’s up.”
“We are totally even, actually.” She leaned into all of his bones as
they started walking together. “You didn’t ask me to be in your wedding
party. That’s priceless.”
“See, I do love you.”
They separated as he broke away to head for the locker room and
she went out into the kitchen to the garde-manger. As she made up the
woman’s plate of mesclun, one of the newer hires, Christia, was almost
finished with the asshole’s antipasto.
Oh, if only she were in s’Hisbe, Denne thought. As a Shadow, she
had a whole lexicon of “spices” she could have added to that plate.
Shadows were great cooks, after all. Particularly if they were pre-
paring their enemies to be the protein source.
With the greens-no-dressing all set, she crossed her arms over her
chest and eased back against the counter while Christia finished with the
display of cured meats and marinated peppers and olives. All around, the
kitchen was ordered chaos, kind of like her mind. Everything had its pur-
pose, and there was a system governing it all, but total disintegration was
just one hiccup away, one stalled decision, one misstep.
Like getting involved in that young woman’s three-hundred-pound,
misogynistic problem.
“You want me to take them out?” Christia said.
The girl had started about six months ago, and she was a good
worker. Always on time, no drama, working her way through SUNY
Caldwell. It was hard to say whether she would be here for six months
or become another Julianne, who was a lifer.
“No, I’ll do it.” Denne forced a casual smile. Which was a nice trick
considering her fangs had fully dropped. “Thanks.”
Before she put everything on a tray, she snagged an empty rame-
kin and ladled out a serving of the red wine vinaigrette. Tilting the lit-
tle crock-ware container on the edge of the salad plate, she snagged
the antipasto, got the load up on her shoulder, and butt-first’d the flap
doors. As she entered the dining room, the chatter of the customers
was something she’d been hearing for the past decade, and there was a
peacefulness to the white noise. She couldn’t say she loved Sal’s. That
was her father, iAm. But she was used to it, and there was something to
be said for the predictable.
Especially when she felt like she had no direction at all. Which was
kind of a problem for someone with a crown in their future.
Back at the asshole’s table, she kicked out a stand and put the
tray down. After serving the antipasto, she took the mesclun with the
contraband vinaigrette and went to—
“What’s on that plate.”
Denne assumed a pleasant confusion. “Huh?”
The man picked up a fork and stabbed in her direction. “The dress-
ing. I said no dressing for her.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.” She made a show of picking up the ramekin. “I’ll
just take it away—”
You know, the great thing about vinaigrette, unlike, say, Thousand
Island, blue cheese, or ranch, was the shit had the viscosity of water. So
as she tipped the container, the dressing splashed out. Right into the
woman’s lap.
Oops.
Chapter Two
Bathe Nightclub
Market Street, bet. Sixteenth & Seventeenth
“Can I be honest with you, Al?”
Over the din of the bass, Allhan looked across the sunken
seating area at a fellow vampire he had next to nothing in
common with. Shuli, a.k.a. Arcshuli, son of Arcshuliae the Younger,
was not wearing jeans and a hoodie, but a set of black silk pajamas
with gold swirls and red accents as a pattern. And the male didn’t have
a shaggy haircut that was a month or two into growing out, but a style
that cast his silken brown hair off to the side like a Nike swoosh. And
laundry detergent wasn’t his cologne. He was wearing some luxury
brand’s scent, and whatever it was smelled like money.
Oh, and even though it was winter and there was snow falling, his
shoes were velvet slippers bearing a monogram executed in gold thread.
Allhan’s ten little piggies, on the other hand, were shoved in a
damp, cold pair of Converse high-tops.
“Um . . . yes?” he replied, in the deep voice he was still trying to get
used to.
“You’re big as a fucking house.” Shuli put both manicured hands
out. “I mean, not in the slappy, flappy fat boy kind of way. No, you’re
just . . . huge. I mean, I know that’s how the transition works. Been
through it myself years ago. But . . . this shit with you is impressive.”
Allhan glanced down at himself for two reasons. One, he was flush-
ing with embarrassment. And two, he kind of agreed. Ever since he’d
been through the change, about a week ago, he’d stared out of a dif-
ferent face, walked with a taller body, picked up things with so much
strength that he felt like he could qualify as a backhoe.
Even his hair was different. Thicker. Smoother.
“And also now look at you, you’re hot,” the aristocrat continued, loud
enough for the others to hear over the club music. “Of course, I don’t
personally go that route, but if I did, you’d be worth the double take.”
When he just stared at the guy all dumbfounded, a brow arched at
him and then the aristocrat stood up and hobbled over. With a mental
wince, Allhan zipped up his hoodie a little higher and tried to remem-
ber how to have a polite conversation with someone.
Any conversation.
Shuli sat down, crossing his legs at the knees and bouncing his velvet
slipper to the beat. As he tilted his head, the enormous diamond studs
in his earlobes flashed bright enough to create floaters in Allhan’s vision.
“I’m sorry,” the guy said. “I didn’t mean to make it weird. I’m drunk,
very stoned, and that tends to get me talking.”
“It’s okay. I kn-know it’s strange. I don’t recognize myself.”
And as he glanced around at the VIP section, he really didn’t
recognize all the stares coming his way. Men and women were checking
him out, and given that he’d been a scrawny weakling before, he kept
wondering if he had an entire head of broccoli in between his front
teeth. Or maybe a horn growing out of his head.
Bloody nose he didn’t notice? How about undiagnosed cystic acne.
“Well, Al, if you decide to upgrade from the jeans-and-hoodie bullshit,
let me know. Happy to help.” Shuli brushed Allhan’s knee gently,
like the guy knew that everything still ached. “Anyway, I gotta go. But the
boys’ll take care of you—”
There was an instant uproar from the group, all kinds of versions
of Shuli making a protest for their leader to continue to hang. Even the
human women who’d been briefly welcomed into the circle of black light
hopped on board with the hoopla, although for them, they were just
going with the flow in the hopes of being seen as second-date prospects.
Which was not going to happen.
Shuli got back to his feet and patted the air like a rock star trying to
get a crowd to settle. “Hey, you fuckers don’t have jobs like Al and I do.
We’re working stiffs.”
“We are gainfully engaged, too,” someone retorted.
“Wanking off to your investment portfolios is paraphilia, not em-
Ployment.”
A couple of cocktail napkins went flying, and their impotent paths
made Allhan think of birds shot out of the sky, that which should have
soared nothing but deadweight in the air. Meanwhile, Shuli tried to get
to the emergency exit next to their seating area. It took the male a good
ten minutes to disentangle himself, and it was always like this. He was
everybody’s social superior, richer, more charismatic, smarter—and,
because he fought in the war, a hero.
He was also ahstrux nohtrum to the heir to the throne.
And that was some real clout right there.
“Tell L.W. we said hey,” somebody else piped up. “He should come
out more.”
“Would you want him here?” Shuli peeked at his sleek gold watch.
“Although it’s not like he’s got anything better to do.”
Okay, that was a lie, but Allhan kept his mouth shut. The only rea-
son he knew what Shuli and L.W. were up to in the field was because
of the things he himself had been doing behind the scenes. Two wrongs
didn’t make a right, but they sure as hell locked you into place with any
inside information you might have stumbled onto.
Meanwhile, the illicit fighting was taking a toll on Shuli. Under-
neath the swagger, there was real tension in those shoulders, and you
had to wonder whether any of the others noticed or cared that the male
was in obvious pain. Probably a no on both fronts. Members of the gly-
mera, particularly slick partyers sowing their oats before they had to
settle down in arranged matings, were not known for empathy and this
was good news for Shuli. The male had plenty of reasons not to draw
attention to whatever wounds he’d sustained, and just as he was no
doubt glad nobody was asking questions, there was going to be no med-
ical attention for him. Not unless there was a serious infection or some-
thing that refused to heal on its own.
Which again was the way it had to be when you’d been taken off
the official fighting schedule, but were still going out into the field.
“See you, Allhan.”
Coming back to attention, he looked over his shoulder. The aris-
tocrat gave him a nod, and then the hail-fellow-well-met stuff washed
out of that strikingly handsome face. As Shuli turned away to the emer-
gency fire door, his expression became grim as death itself.
After the steel panel clapped shut and the cold draft was eaten by all
the body heat in the space, there was a tangible deflation in the energy
of everyone who’d been left behind, the Perrier losing its proverbial fizz.
Allhan checked his phone and wondered why he’d bothered to
come early. Except he knew the why. He just thought it was fucking pa-
thetic.
“How about we go to Smokes?” somebody said.
God, he still didn’t know their names. Then again, he’d been
adopted like a stray and he was way below their league socially. Not a
lot of cause for proper introductions. They also all looked alike to him,
the trim-cut suits, the open-collared shirts, the various shades of dark
hair. He’d taken to IDing them to himself by the human women they
hit on. One was into blondes, another redheads. Two of them liked to
take women back together, as if they were critique partners for the sex
and committed to real-time feedback.
He’d only paid attention to Shuli because of the L.W. connection.
And the grape-sized diamonds in those lobes.
As the six got to their feet and finished their drinks with a volley of
chatter, the rush for the cigar place struck him as ungrounded enthusiasm.
They were looking to change the vibe by a shift in location, but the trouble
was, they were the luggage they carried, and without Shuli to set an exam-
ple, they were a little lost. Still, it went without saying that he was invited
to come along even though he was nothing more than a cushion warmer:
Once Shuli had marked him as okay, he always had a seat at the table.
So he had to give them credit for that.
He glanced at his phone again. He had seventeen minutes.
Why the hell had he thought Lyric might come? Then again, a fool
and his delusions were rarely parted when it came to infatuation.
The female had found her proper mate, so she wasn’t going out any-
more, yet he’d managed to convince himself that maybe she’d swing by
here to see her twin. Yeah, except Rhamp also wasn’t anywhere in sight,
and besides, if she wanted that fighter’s company, he was her damn
brother. She could just look at him across the table at First Meal. Or
call him. Text.
IM, DM . . . Holiday Inn.
As the ancient hip-hop lyric came to him, he felt a wave of nausea
crest and eyed the table that was scattered with empty cocktail glasses.
What he needed was some ginger ale. He’d been living on the stuff since
the change, and he was becoming quite convinced that he was never
eating proper food again.
“Shall we, gentlemales?” one of the aristocrats announced over at
the fire exit. “Al? You coming?”
“No, thanks. B-but . . . thank you.”
“You know where we’ll be if you change your mind.”
Shuli’s boys started funneling out of the sunken couches, and
when the human women went to follow, the brush-offs were charm-
ing but firm. Phone numbers were exchanged, but no dialing was going
to occur. A quick trip to a club’s private bathroom stall was one thing.
Dating, relationships—mating? Or marriage, which was what the hu-
mans called it? Hard pass.
Members of the glymera did not settle down with the other species.
“Later, my guy—”
“—bye, Al—”
“—care, my man.”
All the males checked in on their way to the fire door, and he noted
the new respect in their eyes. His transition really had changed things,
hadn’t it.
Oh, look. He made a joke.
Honestly touched, he offered them waves as they took off. And in
their wake, the left-behind women looked him over with a greedy inter-
est he was wholly unfamiliar—and totally uncomfortable—with. God,
he didn’t like the smells coming off their bodies. Their arousals made
him breathe through his mouth, not because he was excited, but be-
cause he was trying to dull the scents.
“So, what was your name?” the brunette asked him in a drawl.
As she leaned down to him, her breasts were as pointed as traffic
cones and the long, fake tracks she’d put in her hair swept forward and
showed peeks of her scalp. Wow. Up close, her makeup was thick as
spackle and those lashes had to be plastic.
Otherwise, two woolly caterpillars had given their lives to make her
eyebrows look like they were double jointed.
“No,” he said with a shake of his head. “Thank you, no.”
As she seemed disappointed, he supposed the opening salvo might
have been seen as a kind of compliment. By someone else. But he was
beyond virginal, and besides, with everything he had going on, he was
not any kind of relationship material.
“Your loss,” the blond one drawled.
On that disdainful note, the bunch of them laser-sighted the
other seating areas, and he passed some time watching them size up
their options in the VIP section like they were trying to get a good
break on a car lease at a dealership. Lot of competition for them on
the other sunken sofas, but he guessed they were beautiful enough
with their long hair and low-cut dresses. They would find another lap
or two.
Maybe even some phone numbers that might pick up.
As they wandered off, Allhan rechecked his phone. Then went back
to watching the crowd.
Each of the dozen or so areas was bathed in a different shade
of blue light, and there was no mistaking why Shuli had chosen to
stake out the couches he had. The illumination here was the dim-
mest, and the proximity to the emergency exit and the alley beyond
was unbeatable.
Time to go.
Just like Shuli, he was careful getting up on his feet, and when he
went to walk, holy shit. Everything hurt. His knees and hips. His spine.
His feet. Doc Jane had told him the post-transition aches would get
better, but he wasn’t sure if she was right. It had been how many nights
now since his body had quadrupled in size?
Since he’d taken Lyric’s blood?
God, there was a special cruelty that he’d had to take her vein when
the change had hit. Nothing like getting a taste of paradise and then
never, ever having a chance to go there again.
Limping over to the steel door, he took one last look across the
space. Not even Mharta had come tonight. Good thing, actually. He
could only imagine himself trying to strike up a conversation with that
female just so he could bring things over to the subject of Lyric.
Mharta scared the shit out of him.
Punching the bar to open the way out, his skin prickled as the
winter wind rushed in to scrimmage against the interior’s warmth
like it intended to turn the entire club into a meat locker. As the door
slammed shut behind him, he shoved his hands into the pockets of
his jeans and looked up at all the snowflakes. The storm was finally
slowing down. When he’d come here on his forced night off, it had been
a positive blizzard—
Righting his head, he flared his nostrils and took in a deep
Breath.
Blood. In the alley.
Vampire blood.
Shit.