I opened the door to find a box with a USPS mailing label. I bent to pick it up and stopped, my hands just above the cardboard. The scent was wrong. All wrong. Wrong! I stood and backed slowly away, easing the door closed. “Kid, call nine-one-one. Tell them we have a possible bomb on the front porch. And get your brother here. Now!”

•   •   •

The NOPD Bomb Squad, the FBI, the ATF, and a few other initial-agencies took over my house, my yard, and my life. They had insisted the entire street evacuate, but I had refused to go. No way was I going to leave my home with a bunch of cops in it. Not with all the toys in the hidden room. I hadn’t checked it lately, but I had a feeling that Eli had begun keeping bigger and better weapons in there, weapons that the ATF might have been unhappy for us civilians to have. Somebody had to guard the place. The Younger brothers were human and a bomb would kill them, so they had to go; I wasn’t and didn’t, not that the cops knew that. The token firefighter in boots and heavy gear looked over at me, measuring the level of what he thought was my stupidity. Okay. Maybe I couldn’t survive a bomb blast. I wasn’t leaving until I had to.

I sat, alone, at the back of the living room, Bruiser’s huge bouquet in my line of sight, watching the activity in the front part of the house, eating a stick of Eli’s beef jerky, which reeked of spices I usually didn’t ingest, and drinking iced tea. Fingering the business card given to me by the officer in charge. Wanting to rip it into small pieces, except I might need the contact info later on. I was mad, and, well, mad.

The firefighter glanced at me again, and I saluted him with the stick of jerky, ripped off another bite, smiling, or maybe snarling, from the way he reacted. I chewed and swallowed and ate another chomp.

The Kid had called me several times, explaining that the pizza delivery had been rerouted and was delicious, and updating me on law enforcement’s progress. Not that he was supposed to know. He had hacked their communication systems, which (according to him) had only basic, elementary firewalls and protection. He was in heaven; his brother was torn between the need for intel and the need to keep Alex out of jail; I was ticked off that someone had sent me a bomb. A bomb. Really? Couldn’t they do something inventive? Something creative? Like an attack by mutant blood-sucking mosquitoes, a rogue-vamp attack, or even a drone attack? One with a bomb in its fuselage. No. They had to send me a letter bomb. A package bomb. I was too busy for this crap.

My cell rang again. “Yeah?”

“A robotic bomb detection and defusing device is rolling down your street,” Alex said, his inner geek turned up to max. “Can you see it?”

“Not from here. They won’t let me near the front of my house.” But the padded fireman was nowhere in sight at the moment. “Hold on,” I whispered into the cell. I raced to the kitchen window and looked out. Streetlights meant I could see about fifty feet to either side in both directions. The street was lined with marked and unmarked cop vans, cop cars, fire trucks, and sundry emergency vehicles with flashing lights. There wasn’t a single POV—personally owned vehicle—anywhere. Placing my face to the window glass, I could see farther down the block where news vans were blocking the street both ways, and overhead I could hear the steady thump-thump-thump of a helicopter. From the far left, in the middle of the street, something moved.

The robot could have been designed by Caterpillar Inc. in miniature, a long, lean, low, bright orange body with tanklike track wheels. It had a single long arm mounted on the deck, with four tweezer-type fingers on the end, and a tall, slender black box mounted higher, housing a camera and the remote controls and a mini flashlight. The robot was maybe three feet long and a little more than a foot wide, and looked like something a kid would love to get for Christmas. “Cooool,” I whispered, drawing out the word.

“Ma’am. You said you’d stay—” I jolted, guilty, and whirled on the firefighter who had managed to get back in the living room without me seeing him, smelling him, or hearing him. He heaved a disgusted breath. “Never mind. You have to leave now.”

I said, “Are you leaving?”

He made this gesture that probably involved his whole body under the firefighting gear, and though I saw only his hands and shoulders, I could tell he was annoyed. “Yes, ma’am. I’m heading out that side door”—he pointed to my kitchen door—“with you, walking on your own feet, or tossed over my shoulder, however you want it.”

I narrowed my eyes at him, daring him to try, and then heard Eli over the cell. “Jane, you’re acting like a civilian. Get out and let them do their job.” Civilian was an insult from Eli. I frowned, closed the cell, and walked to the side door and out into the backyard. The padded firefighter followed, leaving the door open behind us as he went out the narrow side drive to the street. Open door . . . to help equalize the pressure should the bomb blow? I took a last look at my house. Replacing windows was getting expensive. I hoped that was all I would need to do before the night was over.

CHAPTER 10

HOT Spelled Out Across His Rump

No one was looking at the back of the house, so I half climbed, half jumped the brick fence to Katie’s. I could hear the sounds of hammers, electric skill saws, and other noisy equipment from nearby, and tracked the sounds to the house near Katie’s. Renovation had started in the old building, and the back attic window was cracked open. The smell of sawdust and old plaster filtered out into the night. Hoping that the new owners knew about Katie and wouldn’t later cry foul about living or having a business next to hers, I went on to the back door and waved at the security camera.

Katie’s Ladies was the oldest continuously operating whorehouse in New Orleans, catering to both humans and vamps. The owner was Leo’s heir, was scary powerful, and wasn’t totally sane—even as far as sane vampires went. Katie was also my former landlady, before I was given the deed to the house. And if I was honest, Katie didn’t like me much.

When Troll let me in, I joined the Youngers. The guys were at the big bar in the huge kitchen, watching raw footage from different vantage points, on several screens, as the robot approached the box on my front porch. I smelled food and tea and coffee and liquor and perfume. Way too much perfume.

“Civilian?” I demanded, as I took one of the tall stools and stuffed a nigiri sushi into my mouth.

Eli gave a one-tenths smile, more a twitch than an indication of amusement as Deon, Katie’s chef, placed a Coke in my hand. “Eat. You bein’ starved, Tartlet, in that house with all that military eatin’,” he said, in his lovely island accent. Eli’s smile widened at the nickname. I pretended to not see it and ate another sushi piece, a ball of rice with a strip of raw salmon on top. Deep inside, Beast chuffed happily at the raw meat. It wasn’t Mona Lisa’s pizza—the box was, not surprisingly, empty—but it was totally delicious in its own raw-meat way.