I don’t know if it’s the speeding van that makes the crowd around the Burning Moon scream and scatter, or the armed thugs wearing party masks leaping out of it as soon as the thing shrieks to a halt. (My guess? It’s a blend of both, but that’s my partially biased opinion). Victoria is out first, snow eagle in hand and cat-themed masked on her face. Astrid comes next. Morgan grabs Juniper’s shoulder and hauls her out of the van. I grab the Sorcerer’s head and make sure she ducks before stumbling out the rear, stopping her from smacking her dome against the top of the van.

  It’s Juniper’s show from here on out, because our job is to scare off the security as she falls to the pavement, grabs a piece of chalk from her pocket, fumbles, catches it, then frantically starts scribbling onto the warm stone. A gunshot barks. A bullet ricochets off the curb, biting into the stones and spitting small bits of rubble against my face. Vicky takes a pot shot, gunning him in the gut and leaving him sprawling in a pool of quickly spreading red. I blink hard. Catch my breath. Have the gun in my left hand, my right on the hilt of the sword. Mouth is dry. Head is ringing. People are screaming and running. The security are yelling at one another, ducking behind cars, grabbing VIPs. Then I hear gunshots—bangbangbang—go off like, well, gunshots, chewing the tarmac in front of Morgan and I. Glance over my shoulder. Thank the Gods. She’s finished drawing her runes or portal, fuck, I don’t know, I’m not a Sorcerer, am I? She flicks open her Grimoire, murmurs off a line, shuts her eyes, then slits her palm open.

  As soon as her blood hits the chalk, foul-smelling smoke rises. “Bear witness,” she whispers. “Freeze.”

  And just like she’s said, everything stops.

  And suddenly, everything is almost pitch-black a moment later.

  “Lights!” Vicky yells, cutting on the flashlight we’ve all got on our shoulders. One after the other, tiny white beams illuminate the gloomy shadows. As soon as mine turns on, I swear and take a step back, because there’s a bullet frozen mid flight, violent turbulence still behind it, just an inch from my nose. Any closer and I’d be dead.

  Again, by the way, and in the span of a few days.

  “I owe you one,” I say to Ju, finding my voice.

  She gives me a thumbs up as she rests her hands on her knees. She lifts up her party animal mask, something cute with whiskers and blush, then vomits to her left. “I’m good,” she moans, swaying a little. “I think I just need a nap and some ice cream.” She vomits again. I glance at Vicky, but she’s already moving to the Moon.

  “Got her,” May says, climbing out of the van and rushing to her side. “She’ll be fine. Not her first rodeo. Y’all have got two minutes before things start speeding up. The barrier will stay up as long as missy here is awake.”

  Juniper mutters incoherently, eyes glazed over. The magic around her is…purple, but several shades lighter than the one outside my place. Weird. Sorcerer Pledges tend to gather their magic from their Grimoires, not from themselves, and right now, that book is a spitting cesspit of foul-smelling magic beside her. I never told Vicky, but this isn’t my first nose, either. Got snagged by a Beast-Man when I was a kid. Some rowdy little bastard that wanted a taste and found out what a shard of glass can do to his throat. Mom’s first and last gift to me was my sense of smell, and right now, Juniper is sitting in a pool of magic so sour, bitter, and turbulent, I almost feel like puking.

  But she’ll be fine with May there, and the others are shouting for me to get my ass moving.

  I follow them into the nightclub, jogging past frozen-in-place cops that, upon closer inspection, turn out to be Beast-Men, not just normal guys. Something I take mind of as I splash through the puddle of blood and enter the swinging double doors. Inside the nightclub is a hellscape of booze, panic, spilled alcohol and lingering smoke. More Shimmer sits in the air, sparking away and caught in hesitant strobe lights. Everything else is still working. The lights are just slower. The music is weirdly upbeat and high tempo. Gun in my hand, though, and that’s not our problem right now. Up the stairs, following Morgan. We brush shoulders with statues of people. The further up we get, the less of them seem to have heard the gunshots. Past private rooms now. So high up I pause and glance over the balcony to look down at the dance floor and the poles, the stage and its flourishing decorations, the bar and its wall of multicolored drinks. I shake my head and keep going, moving around people until I stop again and listen.

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  Really, really listen, just like how I’ve been taught to do. You listen to your gut and force your brain to make sense of it, that’s what my oldest sister always says. Bounty hunting is as much instinct as it is using your head. I’ve got a feeling rampaging through my body right now and my brain is freaking out trying to make sense of what’s giving me a cold spike of adrenaline right to the heart, sending cold beads of sweat dripping down my spine.

  My brother used to call me Pup when I was younger, just because it almost seemed like I was a hound more often than not. When my older siblings would take wine from the cellar and drink in the attic, they’d tell me to sit at my door and bang on the wall the moment my ears, my skin, or my eyes felt something weird, which usually turned out to be mom stomping up the stairs, yelling at the five of us for breaking into her vault again without permission.

  It grew into this thing I could kind of just do. Like a sixth sense. It’s saved me plenty.

  And right now, it’s losing its mind as I stare at the lower floors. Nobody is moving. Barely any sound. And yet I can’t move my head without my neck prickling and my scalp tingling, screaming at me to keep searching.

  Morgan glances over her shoulder, followed by Astrid and Vicky further down the hallway.

  It’s just a short elevator ride to the top office, then we’ve got our man.

  But something’s not right. Call it experience, call it intuition.

  My gut just isn’t sitting still in my body.

  “Kace,” Morgan hisses, stopping. “Fuck’s the problem?”

  Vicky yanks up her sleeve and swears. “‘bout a minute left, girls. Let’s get our asses moving.”

  I slowly step backward, tilting my head, waiting, barely breathing. I smell the air, through the haze of smoke and liquor, sweat and alcohol, there’s something more than just the bodies surrounding us. Something big.

  Something watching us.

  It vanishes as quickly as it makes my blood chill, gone in an instance. I shake my head and look around, using a nose that isn’t mine and eyes I paid out of pocket for to see or smell anything at all, but there’s nothing to look at. Nothing at all except drunken men and women, the occasional Monster and the even more rare Beast-Men amongst the thick crowds. Note it. Remember it. Keep moving. So I do, and that forces everyone else to keep going, even if Vicky gives me a look that means far too much for the briefest second we meet eyes. Then it’s into the large golden elevator, just when the hallway filled with people begin sluggishly moving, the music grows louder and the strobe lights spin around faster and faster, getting disorientating. By the time the two Tiger-Men realize we’ve just hijacked our way into the elevator they were shoving people away from, I’ve already put a round in each of their heads. They drop. A woman who’s just gotten bathed in blood screams, still slow, still warped, languid and weird.

  But Vicky punches the button for the top floor as we bundle into the elevator,, our shoes smearing blood all over the shiny golden floor. It shudders, then jerks, moving upward, playing a ditsy little song on its speakers.

  My heart is still racing. The deafening silence in the elevator is killing me.

  Vicky shoots out the camera in here, hailing sparks from the light fixture she’s just busted, too. Then she grabs me shoulder and leans closer, face mask close to the side of my head. “Mind telling me why you cut short?”

  I bat off her hand and roll my shoulders. “Got a feeling. Left a second later.”

  “Don’t start chickening out now, Salem,” Morgan says. “Too late for that.”

  “I fuckin’ know,” I mutter, chewing my tongue. Nervous habit. “Get off my ass. It was a gut feeling.”

  “It’s not time to start trusting your gut,” Astrid mutters, resting her hand on the hilt of her sword as we all watch the numbers tick higher and higher on the panel beside me. “If you actually see anything, you tell us.”

  “Fuck, man, I get it!” I snap. Silence in the elevator. I flick the safety on and off the gun.

  Finally, the elevator stops. My heart is in my mouth. Safety off.

  Doors slide open.

  Go.

  They were ready, waiting for us on the other side.

  And the man facing me doesn’t hesitate to pull the trigger.