“Okay,” she said, nodding again. “You want some tea?”
“You got anything stronger?”
A smile twitched at the corner of her mouth, and Imogen rolled her eyes. “Some things never change.”
I followed her into the tiny open kitchen, and she bentdown to rummage under the sink. She retrieved a dusty bottle of gin, which she splashed into mismatched teacups.
I took the cup she offered me and downed the gin in one gulp, shuddering as the alcohol hit my throat, then set the cup back down. Imogen raised her eyebrows but filled my cup again, and I staggered into the living room and sank down onto the couch.
My whole body sagged against the plush cushions, and I let out an audible sigh. Somewhere underneath an end table choked with yellowing vines, Goose hissed.
“Fuck you, too,” I muttered, taking another sip of my gin.
Maybe it was a hunter thing, but cats had always hated me.
“So,” said Imogen, sinking down onto a crocheted beanbag and tucking her feet beneath her. “What’s new?”
I snorted at her attempt at a politely conversational tone. The ImogenIknew was always straight to the point and as mean as a snake when she felt like it. She must have been curious as hell as to why I was there. Not that I could blame her.
“Well . . .” I drew a finger along the rim of my teacup, allowing the pad of my thumb to snag on a crack in the porcelain. “I left Silas.Triedto leave the Quarter, but . . .”
Imogen’s eyebrows shot up. “What happened?”
“With Silas?” I looked down at the cup clutched in my hands and shook my head. “I should have left him a long time ago.”
“No shit.”
I loosed a heavy sigh. “I went to one of our black-market dealers to try to hunt down a relic to help me escape this godsforsaken place. Tonight was supposed to be thenight I left. But when I showed up at the dealer’s shop, I was attacked by a horde of demons.”
Imogen’s mouth fell open, and her eyes went wide. “Demons? In the Quarter?” She shook her head. “But that’s impossible. There hasn’t been a demon sighting in the Quarter inyears.”
“Yeah. Tell that to my hair.” I fingered the singed locks, cringing as I imagined what I must look like.
Imogen’s smooth caramel skin had paled. “H-how many?”
“Three.” I ticked them off on my fingers. “There was a fire demon . . . a demon that could make copies of itself, and one that could . . . take over a person’s mind. Possess them. I don’t know.” My chest tightened at the memory of that horrible demon’s claws scraping against my mind — the sheer helplessness I’d felt as those voices filled my head.
“Demons,” she repeated, looking sick. “How are you evenhereright now?”
I opened my mouth and then closed it again. “Turns out a witchwood blade really can kill a demon,” I said. “And I might have had some help.”
I found myself unloading the whole story on my friend. I told her all about my stupid plan with the apokropos stone — how Julian had hinted that the buyer would be interested in my dagger. I told her all about my fight with the demons, Kaden showing up, and how the other demons had fled.
“How do you think they got in?” Imogen asked once I finished my story. “Any tears in the veil between realms are supposed to be warded.”
I shrugged. “Maybe there’s a new one. A tear that no one knows about.”
“Maybe.” We fell into thoughtful silence, though I couldfeel her watching me over the rim of her teacup. “You really left Silas, huh?”
I nodded. I still hadn’t told herwhyI couldn’t go back. Imogen wasn’t stupid, though. Silas was infamous in the Quarter, and she knew where his money came from. But even after five years of doing Silas’s dirty work, I was ashamed to tell my one and only friend the horrible things I’d done.
It didn’t matter that killing was a hunter’s nature. It didn’t matter that I captured vampires who would have ended up killing innocents — or that the vampires were already dead. Draining their blood, harvesting their venom, and then discarding their desiccated bodies made me just as much of a monster.
“The hellfire destroyed the blood bags I was supposed to sell for Silas,” I told her. “I can’t go back without them.”
“Do youwantto go back?” Imogen asked, not bothering to keep the harsh edge out of her tone.
“No.” My voice broke on the word, and Imogen leaned back on the beanbag. Her brows creased in sympathy, but I didn’t deserve her pity.
