Williams was putting the phone down as Jesse knocked on the doorframe and entered. She gestured for him to take a seat. Jesse thought she looked as tired as he felt.

“Please tell me you have new information, Cruz. The press is starting a frenzy over this case. They’re calling it the new Black Dahlia, and you know how well that turned out for the department.”

“Yes, ma’am. And unfortunately, I don’t have any news. But I did have an idea.”

“Go ahead.”

“La Brea Park isn’t all that far from the airport. If the three of them were taken from LAX, it might explain why three such different people were all killed together. Like a random thing.”

“Uh-huh.” She seemed unconvinced.

“I thought I could take the pictures of the deceased over to LAX, show them to some baggage people, the guys who run the security cameras. If they were coming from somewhere, we could get ID that way.”

Williams thought it over and finally shrugged. “I think it’s a pretty big stretch, but at this point, we’re willing to consider anything. Go ahead. Just call me if you find anything, and get a report back to me before the end of the day, all right?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Jesse said.

He knew he’d actually have to do the wild-goose chase at the airport—these things had a way of coming back to haunt you if you didn’t follow through—but he could squeeze in a couple hours of his own investigation in the meantime. He drove to Scarlett’s, feeling a little nervous. At least it was broad daylight.

Chapter 8

Tuesday night was another rough one. When I finally made it into bed, I found myself trapped in a mental loop, thinking about the murder and Eli and my job. The freelance gigs I get are good—I occasionally attend important pack meetings where there might be extra tension, or chaperone vampires in the business world when they can’t avoid a daytime meeting, stuff like that. But I need the steady income of my crime scene job. If not for that, I had absolutely no idea how I’d make a living. I didn’t make it through a single semester of college, and I had no skills or non-supernatural job experience. I didn’t think McDonald’s would care if, one time, I hid three severed limbs, a pool of blood, and a dead hundred-year-old desert tortoise in twenty-five minutes. No, I needed to keep my job, whatever it took, if I wanted to keep eating.

When the alarm went off at eleven thirty, I woke up stiff and cranky, still wearing my clothes from the night before. I dragged myself out for a run, showered, and pulled on yesterday’s jeans and a dark-brown T-shirt. No need to dress up for the geeks. I impatiently tugged a brush through my long hair and pulled it up in a clip while it was still damp. I checked the mirror. Good enough.

Molly was still in the armchair in the living room when I came downstairs. She’d probably fallen asleep as a human and died when I’d gone for my run. When I got close enough, she yawned and stretched, then looked around in confusion. When she saw me, she smiled.

“You want coffee?” I asked. Molly likes to be awake during the day, if I can manage it. Going out in the sun completely delights her. Those kinds of perks are the reason why Dashiell has ordered his vampire minions to stay away from me. His protection is part of our deal, which is yet another reason why I don’t want to lose my job.

“Yep.” Molly swung her legs off the arm of the chair and followed me into the kitchen, careful to keep close to me. She sat down at the little breakfast counter, watching as I brewed the coffee. “So...I heard you’re in kind of a mess.”

“How did you hear about that?” I asked, though I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Molly just shrugged. “You know, the vampire rumor mill.” She hesitated for a second. “Do you want to talk about it?”

That surprised me, too. Most of the time, Molly prefers to act as if she and I are best gal pals in one of her romantic comedies. She’s always all perky and sort of surface. I wasn’t expecting a Do you want to talk about it? conversation.

In fact, maybe it wasn’t an idle question.

I pulled two mugs from the shelf above the sink and poured a dark stream of coffee into each one, stalling for time. Had Dashiell ordered her to ask me questions? I wasn’t stupid; I knew Molly reported to Dashiell about me. I just figured there wasn’t usually much to report, as long as I kept anything too personal from Molly. She had no idea that I had a brother, for example. If the impossible happened and I got a real boyfriend, someone I really loved, I’d keep that from her, too.

“Not really,” I said carefully. “I think it’s going to be okay.”

“Do you know—” she began, but then we both jumped as someone knocked hard on the door. “Whoa, jeez. I can’t get used to how humans sneak up on each other.”

That’s not really what knocking on a door means, but I didn’t bother saying so. “That must be Cruz,” I said, trying not to sound too relieved. “Where do you want me to drop you off?”

“Uh, my room is good.” I walked her up there and then skidded down the stairs, suddenly very excited to get out of the house.

Cruz and I were both quiet on the drive to Pico. He looked tired and worn-out, and I wondered how much sleep he’d gotten in the past couple of nights. I felt a sudden, very unwelcome pang of guilt. Because of my screwup with the park murders, I had almost set this guy up to be killed. Did that make him my responsibility? Should I be checking in on his emotional welfare? I considered how my mother would have answered that question, and then Olivia. Then I decided I didn’t care. Cruz had dug his own grave on this one. No pun intended.