“You’re early,” he said, setting the box down. “I thought you said you’d swing by later.”
“Plans changed,” I said. “Wanted to see how this place is holding up.”
He glanced around, pride slipping through his guarded stare.
“Mostly repaired,” he said. “Door and window got replaced yesterday. Got the last busted shelves swapped this morning. Seraphine says all we need now is stock and customers.”
“And no more demons crashing the party,” I muttered.
His eyes flicked to me. He heard that. He always heard the things I did not mean to say out loud.
I stepped closer to the counter.
“Listen up, kid,” I said. “Tonight, Halloween, there’s a party at Cherry Smoke. You know the place.”
“RBMC territory,” he said at once. “Yeah. Neutral ground. Ajax owns it, right.”
“Right,” I said. “It sits on the edge of the Quarter. Easy to get in, easy to get out. That’s where a lot of our people are heading. That’s where Grace is heading.”
He raised a brow.
“You want me there?” he asked.
“I want you vigilant,” I said. “You’ll meet us first here out front when it gets dark. Then we walk over together. You keep your eyes open in that crowd. If you see anyone from the Scorpions, you let me know. If you see Croak, you find me fast.”
Josh’s mouth tightened at the mention of those names. He looked down at his hands for a second, then back up.
“I haven’t heard anything from them yet,” he said. “No bikes near here. No assholes asking about you or Grace. But they’re planning something. I can feel it. The streets are too quiet.”
He was right. There was a strange calm over the city. The wrong kind of calm. The kind that one had to guard themselves on.
“They’re not done,” I said. “They think this city’s open season. They think we’re still licking our wounds. They see this mess, and they think that means we’re weak.”
“You’re not,” he said.
“No,” I agreed. “We’re not. But we don’t underestimate them either. So, I need you to show up tonight at Cherry Smoke. You keep Grace in your periphery at all times. If something feels off, you tug my sleeve. You don’t play hero. You get me.”
He held my stare, then nodded once.“Got it.”
I left him there, stacking boxes and humming to some track that played through his headphones, and stepped back out into the street. The sky had started to turn, light thinning, shadows pulling longer between buildings. Halloween always wound thiscity up. The Quarter would fill once the sun dropped. Costumes. Masks. Drunks. It was a good night for demons.
By the time the evening rolled in, I was back outside theMidnight Wytchwith a beer in my hand and a cigarette I did not bother to light. The neon signs flicked on up and down the block. Music thumped from somewhere on the corner. The street began to fill with bodies, painted faces, cheap capes, fake blood, and plastic fangs. Anne Rice was definitely a favorite this time of year.
Hoax leaned against the wall beside me; one boot braced behind him. He looked amused by everything and nothing all at once.
“How’s it going with Maleficent?” he asked, taking a pull from his bottle.
“Do me a favor,” I said, not looking at him. “Don’t call her that.”
He laughed. “You two finally did the deed, huh?”
“We finally did something,” I muttered.
“It was bound to happen,” he said. “Chemistry like that is bound to explode.”
“Why don’t you go find your own chemistry and stop messing with mine,” I said.
“Oh, I intend to,” he shot back. “And mine shuts down all the charts.”
