My coat flared on the edges of a hot afternoon wind. This close to the desert, up on the fringes of the valley the Luz River kept watered and kind-of-green, everything smelled of sand and heat. The whip tapped against my thigh and I kept my hands loose and easy. Touching a knife now would show nervousness. Weakness.

You never show a hellbreed any weakness. It's a cardinal law, not to be bent or broken like so many other laws.

The bouncer didn't stop me, though his was a face I hadn't seen before. He was a massive slab of muscle with a flat sheen to his eyes, and he didn't quite meet my gaze. His submachine gun, slung on a leather strap, was a flagrant violation.

Goddammit, Perry. You son of a bitch.

My heart stopped pounding by the time I palmed the doors open and saw the Monde's interior, vast and cavernous during the day, no shaft of sunlight piercing its gloom. Nightclubs always look saddest during the day, and even though the Monde pulsed with the glamour of Hell, it was still a broken sight at this particular hour, dappled bits of light sliding over the deserted dance floor, the tables all empty, and the electric lights on overhead. Two janitors—ancient, decrepit, broken things that might once have been Traders—shuffled aimlessly, pushing brooms.

The massive bar was off to the left, and as usual Riverson was there, his blind filmy eyes widening as he took me in. "Kismet." His tone was flat, and he reached behind himself for the bottle of vodka. "You're here."

Score one for you, blind man, stating the goddamn obvious. I kept the words behind my teeth.

Mikhail had brought me in here to meet Riverson, who for a human with no taint of Hell was extremely knowledgeable about Hell's citizens, not to mention still alive to be questioned—both incredible achievements. The blind man hadn't been blind back when Mikhail first met him, but by the time I saw him he was a scarecrow of a man with a shock of white hair and those filmed, useless orbs that seemed nevertheless to notice a good deal more than most of the sighted ever would.

And the first time I'd come here, Perry had shown up at the end of the bar, looking very interested. Mikhail had almost drawn on him, but Perry made an offer… and a few months later, I'd sat in a chair with Perry circling me, negotiating the bargain that made me able to do what I do so well.

Murder, chaos, and screaming, that is. Hey, when a girl's got talents…

I shoved the memories back down into their little black box, took the shot Riverson poured, tossed it back, and slammed the shot glass down on the bar. The sound was a rifle crack in the hush. "I'm early." My voice was flat, uninflected. "I'm here on business. Put it on the tab."

"You can wait up in his office. They're finishing the meeting—Kismet! For God's sake, don't!"

The old man actually sounded concerned. A meeting, eh? Wait in the office? I don't think so. Perry, your meeting's about to be adjourned.

And by making a statement here I could probably find out something useful. I bit back an iron-edged laugh and stalked through the open maw of the building, skirting the dance floor and aiming to the left of the stage. The painted-black door opened smoothly, and I found myself in a back hall lit with red neon tubes along the ceiling. The light tinted everything bloody, and I strode down the linoleum, my heels clicking even more sharply and the charms in my hair chiming sweet and soft.

Perry, you have been a very bad boy.

The scar prickled, a fiery loathsome tendril of pleasure twining up my arm. I'd had it uncovered for so long it almost felt normal.

Almost.

The door I wanted was at the end of the hall, and as I approached it I heard the mutter, like flies magnified by the space inside a stripped-out skull. It was Helletöng, the language of the damned, and my heart gave a smothered leap and settled back into its regular pace.

Do it quick, Jill. Just like ripping a Band-Aid off. Do it hard and quick.

The door—blank steel, no knob on my side—was maybe three yards away. I gathered myself and skipped forward two long strides, kicking it inward and adding a generous portion of etheric force pulled through the scar on my wrist turned hard and hurtful, a bruised swelling. The steel crumpled, smashing inward, and I rode the motion down as the door crashed into the floor.

Two of them, one on either side. I took the first with a quick upward strike, smashing him across the face with a hellbreed-strong fist braced by the handle of my whip. The gun was in my other hand, speaking for me, smashing the shell of the hellbreed on my left. The whip struck, its thundercrack lost under the noise of the gun, and I uncoiled in a flung-wide kick, both boots smashing hellbreed flesh, one on either side. They folded down, both of them stinking now that I'd shattered their shells and dosed them with silver, and the whip coiled itself as I landed, both feet striking the battered curve of the door again.

As entrances go, it wasn't bad.

There was a long table polished to a mirror-shine, and tasteful sconces along the wall with yet more red neon, dyeing the air with crimson. Candles hissed in branched iron candelabra, their warm glow somehow bleached.

At the end of the table, a pair of blue eyes met mine. Perry sat in a high-backed iron chair, the red velvet of its cushions contrasting with the pale linen of his suit. His face under the expensive sandy-blond haircut was bland and interested, but I thought I caught a steely glint far back in his pupils. His fingers were tented together, and he didn't look surprised to see me at all.

Then again, he never did.

Gathered on either side of the table were other hellbreed, none as bland or unsurprised as him. The damned are always beautiful, and these were no exception—black leather, exquisite silk, frayed lace, glittering liquid eyes and sculpted lips, four or five had leapt to their feet on seeing me. The table was full, except for the seat directly to Perry's left.

And there was another surprise, oh friends and neighbors. Most of the damned in the room were instantly recognizable. The movers and shakers of the entire hellbreed population of Santa Luz, the maggots every smaller hellbreed answered to in their network of feudal obligation. There was the tall, sloe-eyed female who owned the Kat Klub downtown; the broker who ran the influence net out in the financial district; the short tense male in the black cloth half-veil that did assassinations for one faction or another, according to who hired him first or paid him most.

A meeting, and the resident hunter wasn't invited. Why am I not surprised?

My boots grated against the door, I took another two steps and leapt, landing catlike at the foot of the table, the whip coiled neatly in my hand. The gun tracked onto the nearest 'breed—a slim dark male with a leather vest over his hard narrow chest. I suspected him behind a large chunk of the cocaine trade that had recently soaked the poorer quarters with a wave of overdoses from whatever the supplier had cut it with. The current bet over in Vice was twelve to eight in favor of simple Drano, but Forensics hadn't come up with a verdict yet.

Jesus, with a submachine gun and some heavy-duty sorcery I could make the world a much better place in about ten minutes.

The trouble was, there were always more. If I erased this batch others would move in, and I'd have to threaten them into behaving all over again. Talk about your futile efforts.

Still—My finger tightened on the trigger. "So many scumbags, and all in one room. Fish in a barrel." My lips peeled back from my teeth. "Feels just like Christmas."

The silence crackled, and leather made a slight sound in my right hand as my fingers bore down on the handle of the whip. The candleflames hissed. Jesus. I should have thought about this before I kicked the door in. Good one. Kismet. Get out of this alive.