"Likewise," I said. Dmitri moved closer to me, and I backed up until I was against the sink.

"I missed you, Luna. Every day since I left. There wasn't an hour that you weren't in my thoughts."

I looked away from him, fixing my eyes on a crack in the tile wall rather than even try to answer.

"Luna?" he said again.

"We ended, Dmitri," I said finally. I stepped forward so he'd either have to back up or do a Super Bowlstyle chest bump with me. "I'm eternally grateful to you for getting me out of that place, but there's no us us anymore, and frankly it would be miles less stressful if we could just agree on that and move on." anymore, and frankly it would be miles less stressful if we could just agree on that and move on."

He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Do you ever think that no more us us was a mistake?" he asked softly. was a mistake?" he asked softly.

"Never," I said, too quickly to be anything but a lie. Of course I wondered if I'd backed out too soon. Of course I wondered if things ever could have been lasting between us.

But when I thought about it, the answer was always no no. Dmitri and I didn't work long-term. It was a flash, a melting point of lust, and that was all we'd ever really had.

"You're a bad liar," Dmitri said, moving again, rubbing his hands up and down my arms. After days in the Belikov brothel, close contact with another were was about on par with kissing one of Dr. Kronen's rotted corpses.

"How's the daemon?" I said, knowing that the question would snap him back. He grunted and dropped his hands.

"Do you really want to know?"

"Since we're all hot for the personal questions, yes. I do." I crossed my arms.

Dmitri pulled back the arm of his shirt and I hissed. Whatever I'd expected to see, it wasn't that.

Bitten by a were possessed by a daemon, Dmitri had been infected with daemon blood, and the corruption had slowly overtaken his own monster, turning him into a man who had violent blackouts, fits of anger that terrified me more than I'd ever let on. It weakened him, too, made him a prisoner of the daemon as his own pack magick was leached away.

Now the curved black scar, which had looked like a crescent brand, was red and swollen at the edges; the veins that trailed out through Dmitri's pale skin blackened as they crossed it.

"Hex me," I whispered, reaching out for his arm in spite of myself. I took a second look at Dmitri. He had deep rings under his eyes and he'd lost weight-a lot of weight. Where there had been a solid hunk of were was skinny, bones showing at the shoulders and low in his ribs. His hair was greasy and his scent was coppery with sickness.

"Dmitri," I said. "What's happening to you?"

"Don't I wish I knew." He laughed humorlessly, pulling his arm out of my grasp and rolling his shirtsleeve down. "Now, come on downstairs and meet the rest of my pack. I need to tell them what happened."

"A member of your pack sent you into the compound in the first place?" I said as I followed him down a narrow flight of stairs. It was a house, faded and rotted at the edges, but still homey. A parade of severe black-and-white pictures of someone's ancestors glared reprovingly at me as we descended.

"Sure did," Dmitri grunted. He was uncomfortable now, reverting to that Me-Tarzan monosyllabic thing he did when something grazed too close to one of his trigger points. The daemon bite was changing him, more than I'd thought possible.

I was definitely revisiting that. But not now. "Your pack member must be pretty damn persuasive if he talked you into going in there."

Dmitri dropped his eyes. "She. Yes. It was an emergency."

The plot thickens. "She have a name?"

He grunted. "You'll meet her." And that was all I got out of him as we walked through the warrenlike rooms to the kitchen. It was huge, from a time when you needed space for ten servants to be milling around, a wood-fired cooking stove hulking in one corner and a wide farm sink in the other.

Weres were thick there, standing at the ancient refrigerator or sitting at a battered harvest table playing cards. All conversation died away as soon as they caught my scent.

"Everyone," Dmitri said in English, "this is Luna."

I tensed, anticipating the wrath that was going to come my way any second. Dmitri's pack, the Redbacks, and I aren't exactly on great terms. He gave up his pack leader status to be with me, and I'd had a few run-ins with the pack elders who oversaw all Redbacks, all over the world. They hadn't been inviting me out for drinks when it was all over.

Kirov, the driver, stood up from the table and came over to me. "A pleasure, miss. Always happy to rescue a lady in distress." His accent was much heavier than Dmitri's, and his smile seemed genuine. When I shook his massive rough-palmed hand, he nearly pulped my fingers.

"Thanks for your help, again," I said. "I'm so happy to be out of there you don't even know." Maybe this particular pack house didn't know me from Eve. Maybe I had gotten lucky.

"So you are the one who Dmitri gave up everything for," a female voice said. "You're the one who made him leave Nocturne City."

Should have known. I was never that lucky.

"Margarita, don't do this," Dmitri said. "I don't hold it against Luna. You know that."

I sized up Margarita as she wound toward us through the other weres. She was shorter than me, but not by much, with stunning auburn hair that was too bright not to be natural. Blue eyes and flawless skin. She looked more like an Irish princess than a Ukrainian were, but what did I know?

She also had a fantastic body, slender and curved, and she came over and took Dmitri by her fantastic, delicate hand. "Care to explain to me why you are here, Miss Wilder?"

"Well, let's see," I said, mimicking her conciliatory bullshit tone. "There was the kidnapping from my hometown, and it all goes sort of vague, but I'm pretty sure it ends with me being grievously injured in a fight to the death and Dmitri saving me, like the white knight he aspires to be. That work for you, sugar tits?"

Kirov muffled a snort. Dmitri just sighed. "Luna, this is who I was telling you about. Margarita, I found her in that horrible place. You can't expect me to not help her."

Margarita rolled her eyes. "Did you have to bring her here? here? " "

"The Belikovs will have their weevils scouring Kiev for her. It was the safest place I could think of."

Margarita grunted, as if this were an inadequate answer at best, but I ignored her. Dmitri turned to his buddy. "Kirov, do you think you could fix a girl up with something to eat? It's been a while."

He nodded, leading me over to the grumbling Soviet-era icebox. "Take your pick. We have sandwiches, sausage rolls, whatever you want. Any friend of Dmitri's, you know."

"You seem to be taking this awfully well," I said, grabbing three sausage rolls and a diet soda out of the bowels of the fridge. "Me being that packless bitch who made Dmitri into a walking daemon contagion and all."

Kirov swiveled his head toward where Dmitri and Margarita were talking with their heads bent together like lovers. For all I knew, they were. That would explain the attitude she was copping. "Dmitri is my very good friend," Kirov said quietly.

I tore the package on the first sausage roll and consumed it in two bites. "Oh, yeah? Good enough that you're treating me nice?"

"Dmitri was my pack mate before he took his sister to the United States," said Kirov. "He has saved my life more than once and I trust him. Besides ... you don't seem like the brazen hussy the pack elders made you out to be." His eyes flicked over me. "I figure Dmitri knew what he was doing getting involved."

"Gee," I said around the second roll, "thanks for that."

"Anytime," Kirov said. I popped the tab on the soda and washed my food down. I had no idea how it really tasted-I was so hungry, it could have been wallpaper paste on a cracker and I would have munched it with good cheer.

Dmitri and Margarita broke apart, he looking angry and she glaring at him and then pointing at me, saying something sharp. This would be the Either that hussy goes or I do Either that hussy goes or I do speech. I'd gotten it from a few girlfriends of men I was seeing, over the years. I wasn't always the perfect angel you see before you. Shocking, I know. speech. I'd gotten it from a few girlfriends of men I was seeing, over the years. I wasn't always the perfect angel you see before you. Shocking, I know.

Ducking his head, Dmitri came over to me. "Luna, Margarita has something she'd like to speak to you about."

"Fine," I said, crumpling the can in my fist and launching it at the trash. As the calories and caffeine hit my system, I was beginning to feel a little bit more like myself. "Hit me with your best shot, Ivana."

Margarita heaved a sigh. "Not here. In private. Come to our room."

Our room. This just got better and better. Not that I cared who Dmitri was sleeping with, but I sure as hell cared about having my face rubbed in it. After that little speech in the bathroom, he had a lot of gods-damned nerve. room. This just got better and better. Not that I cared who Dmitri was sleeping with, but I sure as hell cared about having my face rubbed in it. After that little speech in the bathroom, he had a lot of gods-damned nerve.

"Lead the way," I said. I grabbed a pack of chips from the counter and another soda, and followed Margarita. The kitchen had back stairs that led into the servants' quarters, and the small, neat room at the top was furnished with a large iron bed and photos of Margarita and a girl of about ten, with a serious expression and hair that hung in front of her face.

Dmitri sat in the armchair in the corner by the window and lit a cigarette. "Tell her, Margarita."

She knotted her hands together and looked at him for help. I spread my arms. "Tell me what? That you're getting married? That she's really a man? That you're both leaving the pack to become circus performers? If so, mazel tov and all of my blessings to you. Now, if you don't mind, I need to use your phone and call my embassy."

Margarita dipped her head, avoiding my eyes, and I realized that she was trying to be submissive, to show respect to me.

Well. That was new. "Spit it out," I said.

"I know that you want to go home, and I'm sure Dmitri will help you get to the embassy and get on a plane, but first I need to tell you why he was at that horrible place."

"Please," I said. "It's not like I'm on a schedule or anything. Not like I want to get out of your craphole country and go home. No offense. I'm sure the springtime is lovely."

"He was looking for someone," she said. She went to the bedside table and snatched up the photograph, holding it out to me. "He went looking for Masha, because I asked him to."

I took the photo and looked closer at the little girl. "She's young, even for these people," I said.

"The picture is old," said Margarita. "She's fourteen now. We don't know why the Belikovs took her, or where she is ... That place..." She let out a small sob. "That place was the last."

Dmitri got up and put his hands on her shoulders. "Just because she's not there doesn't mean we won't find her," he murmured.

I met Dmitri's eyes. "Why are you looking for this particular little girl? Lots of others I saw in there could have used a helping hand."

Margarita bit her lip. "Masha is..." She sniffed and tried again. "Masha is our daughter."

CHAPTER 17.

There are three kinds of silences-comfortable, uncomfortable, and incredulous. This was the third kind.

"Our daughter?" I said. "Yours and daughter?" I said. "Yours and Dmitri's Dmitri's?"

"Luna," he said. "I know I should have told you..."

I held up a hand and cut him off. "You know what-save it, because at this point I don't even care."

All that time, the entire year we were together as lovers, as partners, and he had a kid I didn't know about. And a Margarita, too ...

"Are you married?" I asked. She shook her head.

"No. I was very young, and Dmitri was about to be sent away to prison, so I raised Masha by myself for the first few years. And when he got out, he wanted to take us with him, but I said no, I needed to stay here, near the Kiev pack where we'd be safe..." She degenerated into sobs again.

"Masha has been missing for two weeks," Dmitri said. "Margarita asked me to come here and help her." He rubbed a hand over his forehead. "I'm hitting wall after wall, Luna. I know how good you are at investigation. I know how stubborn you can be. I need your help."

"We." Margarita sniffled. "We need your help."

"Isn't that just touching?" I spat. "I might shed a single tear." Spinning on my heel, I stormed back down the stairs, through the kitchen, and out the door, sitting myself on the crumbling back stoop of the crumbling old house.

I ripped open the bag of chips and consumed them, feeling rotten to my core as I did so. Masha Sandovsky hadn't done a thing to me.

But Dmitri had. He'd lied, and not about something small and forgivable like the number of ex-girlfriends he had or if my ass looked fat in those pants. He'd lied about having a child child, an entire life that was just a big blacked-out spot on the version of his past that he'd fed me.

And that I had swallowed, hook and line. I sighed and ground the heels of my hands against my eyes. When was I going to stop being a total idiot for the guy?

The back door creaked and Dmitri came out. I could tell it was him by his scent-that clove and him him smell that I thought I'd hallucinated back in the hotel. smell that I thought I'd hallucinated back in the hotel.

"I guess you're pretty pissed at me, huh, darlin'?" he said, sitting down next to me.

"Don't even go there with the darlin' darlin' crap right now, okay?" I said. crap right now, okay?" I said.

"Okay," he agreed. I let out a growl.

"Thank you."

"You know," he sighed. "Margarita and I have been over for a long time. It wasn't even supposed to be all that serious to begin with. Masha, though ... she's my kid. I gotta take care of her."

I finally looked at him. "Like you took care of her when you bolted to America and left her here in the ass-end of Eastern Europe with only her mom? Like that?"

Dmitri flinched, his newly hollow eyes wounded. "No. I screwed up there. Money doesn't make up for me not being around, so now I have to make it right." He reached out to put his hand on my shoulder, thought better of it, put his hand back at his side. "I never said I was perfect, but I am trying."

I looked out into the alley, at the blowing garbage and the taillights of cars passing on the street. Night was starting to fall and the air was cold, kissing my exposed skin. "Where did Masha go missing from?" I said.

"School," Dmitri said. He shrugged when I cocked my eyebrow. "What? Just because she's born were doesn't mean she has to miss school."

"And the small chance of her phasing and tearing the other kid to shreds when she loses at tetherball doesn't worry you?"

"Masha's not like that," he said. "She's a good girl. She takes after her mother."

I tried not to flinch at the implication that Margarita was the good woman and I was the ... what? The necessary evil? "I need to call Will and let him know I'm all right," I said. "And my department, and the FBI. Get them working on this case from the U.S. end. After that, I'll see what I can do."

Dmitri exhaled. "Thank you, Luna. You don't know what this means."

"Don't thank me yet," I said, standing up and brushing off my butt. "You want my help, then I help you my way. You don't get to second-guess me or argue with me or do that pouty thing that you do when you don't get your way. And the less I have to see of your baby mama, the happier I'll be. Got it?"

He sighed. "Margarita isn't the bad one here, Luna. That would be the bastards who kidnapped my daughter."

I shook my head. "Just show me where I can call Will, please. And accept that I don't want to talk about yours and Margarita's endless love, all right?"

Dmitri sighed and leaned inside. "Kirov, get the car." To me, he said, "We have to drive to the nightclub on the corner. They have a pay phone that can make international calls."

When we were in the car, Kirov looked at me from the driver's seat. "Who are we calling?"