Flay bared his teeth at me. It could've been a grin, could've been a threat; it was hard to say. It was also hard to care either way. "Fenrik. Jaffer. Lijah. Mishka."

It seemed that Snowball, brain cell diminished or not, was as good at ignoring me as vice versa. He coughed up the names as if I hadn't just shaken stale piss on his leg. The four wolves they belonged to stared at me as if I'd fallen from the sky. White-eyed, lips stretched to nothing, and claws shredding the cardboard cards they held… they had me amending the thought. They stared at me as though I'd fallen from the sky to rape their women, turn their children into beer cozies, and try to sell them life insurance.

I grinned with faithless and malevolent cheer, then sketched a casual wave. "Hey, fellas, I'm the new guy. Bet you didn't smell that coming."

In the silence, a string of saliva dripped from one foreshortened muzzle to pool on the crate that doubled as a makeshift table.

"What? No fruit basket?" I leaned down and picked up a card, bending it back and forth between my fingers. "Poker again. You pups really have a thing for the game, don't you?"

"Auphe." It was the one that Flay had designated as Lijah that spoke. Jaffer, of the unhappily wet muzzle, simply continued to stare and drool.

"Really? Where?" I looked over my shoulder. Turning back, I rocked on my heels and folded my arms. "Oh, you mean me? Hardly. Half-Auphe at best. Maybe a hint in my profile." I tilted my head to give them the full effect. "Or in my sparkling personality."

"Definitely the humor of an Auphe," grunted Fenrik, a short but impressively squat wolf. "Funny as an infected anal gland." He took a handful of Jaffer's shaggy hair and shook the head without mercy. Clumps of fur flew. "You're a wolf, you neutered bastard. Act like one."

Jaffer cowered under the treatment and hastily wiped his mouth with a hairy arm. Fire engine red, the pelt sprang up in tufts from his arms and beneath the collar of his Yankees sweatshirt. The hair on his head he kept cut to about an inch in length, but it stood straight up. It looked like a brush fire was racing across his skull. His eyes were round and yellow and his face a furred expanse of muzzle and wet nose. Jaffer didn't go out much, I was guessing. For all intents and purposes he was an upright wolf with a buzz cut. There was no way he could pass. Not at night, not among the drunkest of humans. I felt an unwilling tug of sympathy for him. The rest of us monsters in the room could. I could fool any human. And Flay, Fenrik, Lijah, and Mishka, while not completely normal, could walk the streets with no more than a few curious glances. Actually Fenrik appeared nearly as human as I did except for his eyes. Almost white, the silver blue was the same color as a husky's eyes. His hair nearly matched. Despite that, he wasn't old, late thirties maybe. When he looked at me, I thought I saw a glitter of interest behind the repugnance. He might not love the Auphe, but he was curious to see one close-up… even the bastardized shadow of one. Fenrik would bear watching. He was smarter than the others.

Mishka had to be related to Jaffer. His hair was a lesser red, more of a dull copper, and his muzzle was really just a pronounced overbite, the nose human. His eyes were a green-and-gold hazel. Lijah was more greyhound than wolf. Whipcord lean, he had a sleek fall of brindled hair. Black flecked with gold and brown, it fell loose past his shoulders. It did a good job of concealing a pair of pointed ears and a jawline far too narrow for any distant relative of a primate.

All in all, a motley crew, and except for Jaffer, they all had an air of ruthless competence. They possessed a tautness, an invisible twitch under the skin that spoke of readiness and an aggressiveness stronger than a starving shark's. Some wolves loved the chase. Loved the taste of blood on the run. These guys definitely fell in the kill-to-run, run-to-kill category. Whatever the Kin might think of Cerberus, he wasn't a fool when it came to his boys. Even Flay. Snowball might be a betrayer and unlikely to follow in Einstein's footsteps, but he was tough. Resilient.

At the continuing silence, I moved over to shove Jaffer out of his chair. Fenrik was the obvious Alpha of this little group and Jaffer just as obviously low wolf on the totem pole. I wasn't about to take his place. The red wolf showed his teeth, oddly enough utterly human, but ducked and scuttled his way to one side. '"Since I'm not much on butt sniffing as an introduction, why don't we play a hand?" I scooped up the cards and gave them a casual shuffle. "I guarantee you'll get next month's dip-and-groom money off of me. I suck."

Fenrik's pale eyes dilated and he changed. One second a man, the next a wolf. There was only a blur before my eyes, so quick that if I'd blinked, I would've missed it. Boaz had been fast, a trait of the old breeding, but this guy… he was quicker. I felt like applauding, so what the hell. I did. Three short claps. "Goddamn," I said. "I didn't even have to buy a ticket for the magic show. Is there popcorn? Can I buy a T-shirt when it's over?"

Two massive paws rested on the crate and black lips peeled back silently. It was shaping up to be Boaz all over again, except this time I was without Promise at my back or Niko busting down the door. And those were not good things to be without, trust me. Reaching under my jacket, I pulled out my shiny new gun. Flay had given it back to me after Cerberus had agreed to take me under his motherly wing. A thing of beauty, it was, and only slightly smaller than an anti-aircraft gun. I'd learned my lesson with Boaz and his boys, and I wanted stopping power this time. With stainless steel, a black rubber grip, and a futuristic barrel over ten inches long, the .50 Magnum was most often being used in big-game hunting. If these guys didn't count as big game, then I didn't know what did. It weighed more than your average five-year-old kid and I plunked it down with force on the crate between Fenrik and me. "You're making me cranky, Lassie," I said amiably. "Timmy might put up with your shit, but I won't."

The silent snarl turned into a buzz-saw rumble that ripped the air to shreds. Apparently Lassie wasn't particularly appreciative of my shit either. Then an unlikely peacemaker stepped in. Red eyes annoyed, Flay moved up to the crate, took a handful of silver fur and another of my jacket collar, and then shook us both—much as Fenrik had shaken Jaffer. "Work for Cerberus." He gave us another shake. "All work for Cerberus." Letting go, he took my gun and shoved it back against my chest and then pushed Fenrik's furry ass back down on his chair. "Stupid. Cerberus eat both. Stupid." He folded his arms and shook his head with disgust. "Shitheads."

I stood corrected. There was an Alpha, but it wasn't Fenrik after all. It was Flay. Flay of the sloping forehead, garbled speech, and self-proclaimed low IQ. I didn't know what the hell I thought about that. I reholstered my gun and reconsidered the situation at hand. "What the hell. Getting eaten on my first day isn't really a sound career plan anyway. Truce, Lassie?"

A naked Fenrik materialized out of the mass of wolf and stared at me with narrowed eyes. He might be interested in me, but it didn't mean he liked me. Who knew? Maybe that interest was more oriented on how a half Auphe would taste as opposed to simply seeing one in living color. As for his not liking me, that I was used to. If the situation were reversed, I probably wouldn't like me either.

"Truce." Fenrik ground out the reluctant word and started to dress. "I don't question the judgment of Cerberus. Not even in this."

"That's big of you." Smart as well. Cerberus didn't strike me as the kind to tolerate dissent in his ranks. At the ruby gleam aimed my way, I sighed and shifted my shoulders. "How about lunch on the new guy? Pizza. Steak. You guys name it. I'm buying."