She frowned, uncomfortable. “You have to understand what was at stake,” she began, “what the witches have worried about for centuries…”

Jesse held up his hand. “Runa, I just spent the last hour helping a vampire control the minds of my brother officers. It’s killing me, but I also know it was the right thing to do. I think I’m capable of some big-picture perspective.”

She was silent for a moment, and then she said very quietly, “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

Jesse was at a loss. He had loved this girl. And he was supposed to be a detective. How had he been so oblivious? How was it possible to love someone when you didn’t really know them at all? He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “I’m sorry too,” he said. “But you understand why I can’t see you anymore, right?”

Tears filled her eyes. She would be one of those women who cried beautifully, he saw. When she nodded, they leaked down onto her cheeks. She lifted her good arm to wipe them off with the back of her hand. “Yes.”

He stood up. “I should get going. I think Scarlett is missing, and we haven’t caught Olivia or Mallory yet.”

Runa frowned. “Scarlett is missing?” she asked.

“I’m not positive that it’s anything big. But she’s not answering her phone, and this isn’t really the night for her to do that.” He studied her face. “You don’t know where she is, do you?”

“No…wait. What is she driving?”

Jesse smiled ruefully. “She took my car. I suppose I could always report it as stolen, but—” He slapped his head, feeling impossibly stupid.

“What?”

“I’m such an idiot. I have LoJack.”

He made the calls, pacing a few feet away toward the waiting-room windows so he could get better reception. Runa looked up when he returned. She showed no signs of getting up from her waiting room chair, and he figured she must be sticking around for Kirsten.

“The car is at Hair of the Dog,” he said.

“That’s good, right?” Runa asked. “She probably had a cleanup job there or something. And Will will keep her safe.”

“Yeah, I guess.” But something felt wrong, he decided. He scrolled through his phone and found the right number. “I’m gonna call the bar.” He went back over to the seats by the windows.

It rang forever. When someone finally picked up, the line was shockingly quiet. Every other time he’d called there, he’d had to shout over loud music to be heard. “This is Will,” said a tired voice. Jesse identified himself and asked for Scarlett.

“Yeah,” Will said heavily. “She’s here. We had a…well, she can fill you in, I guess. I don’t have it in me to talk about it. Hang on, I’ll go have her pick up the line in the office.”

There was a long pause, and Jesse found himself listening to a horrible Muzak cover of “Tainted Love.” Then “I Want to Run to You.” Just before the final chorus, Will finally picked back up. “Detective?”

“Jesse,” he said automatically.

“Jesse. She’s um…she’s not here. I left her in the office, but she must have walked out the back door. Her wallet is gone, but she left her phone here.”

“She couldn’t have gotten far,” Jesse objected. “My car is still parked there, or it was five minutes ago.”

Will coughed. “I actually went outside and checked. If your car is a blue sedan, then yeah, it’s here. But Eli’s truck is missing. His keys are gone too.” Will paused, and finally added, “I…um…think she’s gone rogue.”

Chapter 27

I drove south, blasting the heater in Eli’s truck. I was shivering in my borrowed T-shirt and boxers, but there just wasn’t time to stop at Molly’s for a change of clothes and the White Whale, not if Mallory was really going to perform her spell at midnight. I was going to have to face Olivia just as I was, bloody boots and all.

She had given me directions to the San Mateo Clinic in Redondo Beach, which was a small, modern outpatient facility that had closed down in the mid-2000s. The once-prestigious clinic had grown famous for a perfect storm of controversy: within eighteen months, a corrupt chief of staff had set up an elaborate insurance scam and escaped the country, a huge sexual harassment lawsuit had been filed against a cardiologist on behalf of the support staff, and a little girl had died in a freak accident when she’d been climbing too quickly down a set of fire stairs. The clinic might have survived any one of those incidents, but not all three at once. The building’s owners got tangled up in legal repercussions, and even years later San Mateo stood vacant while the court battles raged on. It wasn’t much to look at: a squat, lonely brick building with a parking lot in back and faded No Trespassing signs to deter vandals and homeless people. Or, now that I thought about it, perhaps the deterrent was that anyone who wandered in would be eaten by vampires. I had to admit, it was an excellent choice for an evil lair.

I pulled Eli’s truck around the back of the clinic building, as instructed, and saw no signs of life: no lit windows, no cars in the lot, no sound from the building’s heating or air-conditioning systems. Cautiously, I followed the sidewalk to the clinic’s enormous loading dock and climbed up the short ramp that led to a human-sized door beside it. I knocked twice.

After only a second, I felt a vampire enter my radius from the other side of the door. Olivia had been waiting for me. Even though I’d walked into the situation of my own free will, I still felt cornered when the door swung open and she stepped forward. “Scar-bear!” Olivia cried gaily. “You made it!”