Lilith Saintcrow - Night Shift

The warehouse creaked as the side door opened. I smelled food, and Were. Dominic made no attempt to keep quiet. Wise of him.

Harp knocked back her drink in one smooth motion. I poured myself another.

"It started out in Massachusetts—this rogue is ranging further than any I've ever seen. The kills look strange, very strange. About three-quarters of the kills are a regular rogue's—tracked from a resting-site, muscle meat gone, a high level of violence, souvenirs taken. The other quarter are… well, too savage to be a Were, blood for the hell of it and no muscle meat taken." She took a deep breath as Dominic padded into the room.

"Your plates still in the same place, Jill?" He sounded unwontedly cheerful. "That Thai place on Seventy-Second is still open. Go figure."

I didn't know there was a Thai place on Seventy-Second. Trust a Were to know where all the munchies are . "Everything's where it should be," I told him, leaning back braced on my hands. "Drop the other shoe, Harp."

She did. "He's killed two hunters already. Devon Blue in Boston, and Jean-François in Louisiana. Saul's sister was running backup for Jean-Francis. Our rogue killed her. It was a hell of a fight, from what we can tell."

My stomach turned over hard. "Holy shit ." My eyes jagged over to Dustcircle, who was staring into his drink. Killing another Were's sister is a big deal. The only thing bigger is killing another Were's mother. It's one of the few completely taboo things among them.

"I'm sorry." My voice dropped. No wonder he was in a bad mood.

And Boston and Louisiana were too far apart for a regular rogue. They tend to stay in familiar territory, which makes them easier to track. Rogues are normally completely predictable, behavior-wise, at the mercy of instinct run amok. To have a rogue acting un predictably was bad, bad news.

Or it wasn't a rogue at all. But if Harp said it was…

Saul glanced up, and I thought I saw surprise in his dark gaze before Dominic came out with plates and chopsticks, carrying two large plastic bags as well. He must have bought one of everything on the menu. "Chowtime, boys and girls. Kiss, you need to eat. You look like you're trying to diet yourself to death."

"Don't call me that." I wrinkled my nose as chili pepper and coconut crawled up into my sinuses and made themselves at home. "You got everything four-stars again, didn't you."

"Live it up, baby." Dominic handed me a plate and a pair of wooden chopsticks. "We've got the files, and you might as well take a look at them. You know the city better than we do, and we'll need to start checking everywhere a rogue might go to ground."

I caught the look he flashed to Harp, and was suddenly sure there was more. "If it's a rogue Were, why is it acting unpredictably, and why does it smell like hellbreed?" But only sometimes. Still, even «sometimes» is enough to give me nightmares .

God knows I don't get nightmares easy anymore. I just dream about Mikhail.

It's anyone's guess which was worse.

"We don't know." Harp sounded cautious again. "We were hoping maybe you'd have an idea. Operations suggested bringing you in, and when the trail veered this way we thought we'd pick you up."

Aha. Suddenly more about this makes sense . I tapped my chopsticks against my plate, meditatively. "That's not what you're really asking."

Silence, broken only by the rustling of plastic. Dominic plopped down on the wooden floor between me and Saul, and Harp slithered off the couch to sit with us, folding her long legs up with inhuman grace. Warm air swirled, touching my cheek—their skins throwing out heat like sidewalks on a summer day.

Shit. Sometimes I wish I couldn't hear what people aren't saying . I set my plate down, my skin going briefly cold. Laid the chopsticks across them. They want to talk to Perry . "No way, Harp. He'll eat you alive."

"We just want to ask some questions." Her eyes met mine.

"Dinner first," Dominic said. "Eat, then argue. Come on, Kiss."

"Hellbreed don't like Weres. And this one's different, he's not your average shiny-eyed weirdo." The chopsticks rattled as I shifted, my knee brushing the plate. "Give me what you want to ask him about, I'll take it in. I've got to go in there anyway, I might as well."

And the more business I have to handle, the more I can put off going in there to make my monthly payment . My skin chilled afresh, gooseflesh prickling up hard all along my back.

"We're curious about this hellbreed, Jill. It's a golden opportunity for the Squad to find out what's going on inside his little domain. We have half a dozen cases he might have his fingers in, and nobody can get close enough to even snap a picture of him."

No doubt . "That should tell you something." I poured another healthy cupful of JD, set the bottle down, and tossed the whole glass back. "Jesus Christ, Harp. Don't push this one. You know better, Mikhail would tell you the same thing. Did tell you the same goddamn thing."

Harp decided to push it. But carefully, her voice soft and uncertain. "Not even a meeting in a neutral place?"

Perry doesn't do neutral, sweetcheeks . " No , Harper. Not a chance." I shifted restlessly, and Dustcircle twitched. Dominic, a takeout container in his hand, studied me with lambent eyes. Brown feathers in Harp's hair stirred, and the warehouse echoed, little chuckles and sighs as my voice bounced back to me.

"I had to ask. Operations feels it's a priority." She dropped her eyes, looking at her plate.

Two submissions from as many Weres in under ten minutes. It was a record of sorts, but one I didn't feel good about setting. "You can tell that snake to slither back into his hole, I'm not taking you to see Perry. I can barely keep my own skin whole around him, and looking out for you is a distraction I don't need. You know how hellbreed feel about Weres." I poured myself another healthy dose of amber alcohol, knocked it back, and set the glass down with a small, precise click. Decided it was time for a subject change. "So we have a rogue ranging out of accustomed territories, a quarter of the kills not following a rogue's standard pattern, and the stink of hellbreed. A hellbreed manipulating a rogue Were, maybe?"

Dominic busied himself with dishing up the food. Harp settled into her seated posture, rubbing at her eyes as if tired. She looked so lovely and languid, it was hard to believe she could shift and tear an ordinary human to shreds in less than fifteen seconds.

Dustcircle piped up. "A rogue Were is hard to control."

Bingo . "Easier than a Were with his wits about him." I stared at my empty plate, the white circle with the cheap chopsticks bisecting it. "You said something about files, Harp?"

"Yeah." She accepted a filled plate from Dominic with a nod of thanks, one blonde braid dipping forward over her shoulder. The feathers were brown and stippled, hawk from the look of it; her tribe was allied with the Washington D.C. hawkflight. "But not until after we eat."

Good idea . My stomach rolled uneasily, but I put a bright face on it. "The night's young. I'll peek at the files and then you can start canvassing the barrio while I go through the hellbreed clubs. I want to find out what hellbreed's tangled up in this, or we're just shooting in the dark."

"A rogue should be predictable," Dustcircle muttered, as Dominic glorped some phad Thai onto his plate. "We've missed something. But regardless, we should hunt him first."

My temper all but snapped. "You've done a bang-up job of catching this predictable guy so far. And for your information, Were , I am the resident expert when it comes to hunting hellbreed."