Had Nik wondered like me, or had Promise told him? I don’t think she had, and while I was doing this whole thinking fest, I went on to the next thought, which was: That was a mistake. She had really screwed up. Seamus, now this. The past was the past, but family was family—it could fuck up things in a heartbeat. I was living proof.

“I’m not looking for a step-niece, in case you were wondering,” I told him lightly as I dug a hand into my jeans pocket. With cell phone in one hand and card in the other, I muttered as I punched buttons, “Payback time, Samuel.” When he answered, I said brusquely, “Promise’s place. Bring a van.” I took another look around. “Forget that. Bring a truck.” I was sure their psychics would know where her place was. Flipping the phone shut, I crossed my arms and took my first good, detailed look at Cherish. She was dressed in a long-sleeved, high-necked, sleek black dress. It was slit to her thighs, the skirt separated into four pieces for easy movement. Beneath it she wore black leggings and black boots. Vampires . . . they could never wear jeans like a normal person.

“Cherish, what have you done now?” Promise demanded with a weary tone to the words. The bottom of her silk robe fluttered in the rush of air circling the apartment.

Not done . . . but done now.

She had Promise’s eyes, but while the color was the same, what was in them was far different. There was a swirl, wild and wicked. It reminded me of what I saw in Goodfellow. I’d seen a street performer doing origami once—folding brightly colored squares of paper into cranes, tigers, horses, dragons, you name it. That was the quality I saw in Cherish and Robin. They treated life the same way. They twisted and folded it until they got the result they wanted. Life, like the paper, didn’t have much to say about it. But the two of them enjoyed themselves, so normally I would’ve said what the hell? Live it up.

If not for the Auphe, Seamus, and a horde of flesh rotters. If that wasn’t a hat trick of shittiness, I didn’t know what was. Cherish’s trouble was one trouble too many.

“You’re always so quick to think badly of me, Madre.” Scarlet-stained sword still in hand, she kissed Promise’s cheek. Blood and daughterly affection; it was a weird mix. Goodfellow was probably getting turned on. I made sure not to look and see. “And it was so very bright and sparkly,” she smiled, “not even you could’ve resisted taking it.”

“Strangely enough, I think I could have.” Promise returned the kiss but it seemed strained. “But you have made your bed, Cherish, as you have so many times in the past. You must handle this alone. We’re in dire straits ourselves.”

“She’s right. Next to our shit,” I nudged a dead cadejo with my foot, “this is playtime at doggie day care.”

“The Auphe are coming for us,” Niko said impassively. “If you stay here, they’ll be after you as well. I don’t believe you or your mother would want that.”

She definitely hadn’t told him. Promise had messed up indeed. Knowing Niko, knowing how he felt about Promise—how he trusted her, he might have thought that long-ago-photographed little girl was dead. Not a matter of honesty—a matter of too much pain for her to talk about.

Cherish would’ve been a lot less trouble dead, and that was my honesty—because from the set of her chin and the desperate spark in her eyes, she wasn’t going anywhere. “The Auphe.” The olive skin grayed. “How did you get involved . . . never mind.” She shook her head, the sweep of hair coming to rest on her shoulders in a fall of black silk. “I can’t leave. I can’t do this alone. And Tíío Seamus told me to come to you if I needed help. That you had friends, strong ones. I’ll need all the friends and all the assistance I can get. Oshossi wants me, and he won’t stop. He will never stop. This is what he does.”

“Hunts,” Robin cleared up our confusion. He’d turned over a glass-sprinkled cushion and dropped onto the couch. “Never met him, but he’s some sort of immortal creature. Likes to hunt. Likes to fight. Usually sticks to South America. He’s a forest type. Nature and whatnot. Likes dogs too. Obviously. If he’s come all this way to this place of concrete and steel, he is wholly pissed.” He propped his feet on a dead cadejo-canine. “So you stole from him, eh? Thievery. Tsk.” He raised eyebrows at Nik and me with his next words, “Uncle Seamus, eh?”

Cherish gave a deceptively delicate shrug, recognizing a kindred spirit. “It’s a hobby. Everyone should have one.” It was said breezily, but the pallor remained. Between the Auphe and this Oshossi guy apparently wasn’t the best place to be, but it didn’t have her offering to leave. “And, yes, if it is any concern of yours, Uncle Seamus. Step-papa Seamus, whatever you wish to call him. Family takes care of family. But when I told him that what I took I had already sold and couldn’t retrieve it, he sent me here. He knew he and I couldn’t handle Oshossi alone.” Damn Seamus, jumping at the chance to make things harder for Niko. The more distractions, the easier he’d be to kill. Then again, he wanted Promise. He wouldn’t want to risk her. He might have genuinely thought the group of us had a better chance than just he and Cherish. And when Promise told him the case was off, I doubted she’d brought up that the reason was the Auphe . . . for my sake.

Cherish sighed, a self-deprecating downward curve to her lips. “No matter how much they glitter, the things I ‘borrow’ tend to bore me quickly. I did try to make up for it. I gave Oshossi the name of who I sold it to, but either he can’t find them or he’d rather have his revenge instead.”

“Or maybe,” I said, “you really pissed him off at, I don’t know, the worst possible time for everyone in this whole goddamn room. You think maybe that’s it?” I didn’t care if I sounded bitter—I was. Uncle Seamus. Step-daddy Seamus. A full-grown daughter out of nowhere. An entire family. What the hell had Promise done to my brother?

That had some color returning to her face as she said frostily, “And what did you do to piss off the Auphe, hijo de puta?”

“I missed the family reunion.” I bared my teeth in a humorless grin. “And, yeah, Mom was a whore. Thanks for the reminder.”

It was true. I existed solely because Sophia had taken gold to screw an Auphe. I existed because not only had Sophia whored herself out to anyone, but also to anything. Like Cherish herself had said, everyone needed a hobby. And despite what Niko had thought . . .

It looked like Promise’s hobby was lying.

“She didn’t know about your mother. She didn’t mean it, not that way. She’s one hundred and sixty-five, but in human terms that makes her barely eighteen.”

I didn’t care about Cherish’s age, and I barely heard Promise’s words.

Samuel and his colleagues had come and gone. They’d taken the cadejos with them as well as the rug that was ruined beyond repair. They hadn’t said a word other than a murmured “careful of the teeth” amongst themselves as they rolled the bodies in tarps. They were knowledgeable; Samuel hadn’t been wrong about that. He didn’t ask any questions when he arrived or when he left. He simply did the work, paying his debt.

If he thought he was done, he was mistaken. He may have helped to save Cal, but he had helped to betray him first. Seeing him made me remember things I’d sooner not. The sensation of my sword’s blade sliding into Cal’s abdomen. The absolute certainty that I was going to have to kill my brother to save his soul. That I had failed him. Knowing I chose to die with him hadn’t changed what had twisted my gut, had frozen my brain . . . the feeling of . . .

There were no words.

I, who had read so many of them in my life, had no words for it. The blade slipping through the resistance of his flesh. The blood. On me, Cal’s blood, warm and flowing. Dripping from my hands to the floor. Red with a quick patter like rain. Images and sensations; I had those. So many. But no words. Words were for defining, capturing. I didn’t want that moment defined. I only wanted it gone. Over a year later and I still just wanted it gone.