For the first time, I found myself unwilling to rock the boat. I wasn't sure how I felt about that.

The OK Corral was hopping when I pulled up, far from the lackluster crowd of the morning. Smokers crowded the sidewalk, and a few prostitutes wound sinuously through the civilians like brassy sharks on the prowl in a school of bright tropical fish. I caught the smell of a few weres in the crowd, a few blood witches that stood out among the humans like bright copper pennies.

I parked in the side lot, under good light, and locked the car. Not that anyone would be keen to steal a pea-green '71 Nova, but you never know what sort of freaks are out there.

Will was waiting for me in front of the club, twirling the keys to his vintage Mustang around his finger.

"You trusted the valet?" I said by way of greeting. "In this neighborhood?"

"I live dangerously, doll," he said, sliding his arm around my waist. "Damn, look at you. I could get used to this."

"You'll get used to nothing," I said with a grin, pulling his hand up from my rear end. "We're here to work."

"Nuts," Will said, giving me a quick kiss. "Come on, then. Let's find this numbskull and get down to the real business of the night."

"That would be?" I said, as we pushed through the swinging doors to the honking of Garth Brooks. Nine P.M. and they were already playing Friends in Low Places Friends in Low Places. That should have been a warning right there.

"That's for me to know, and you to find out, doll." Will grinned at me lasciviously.

No one carded us, ironically. Will could look practically any age he chose with a change of wardrobe and hair-the perks of being immortal-and I was hanging off him like a sorority sister three shots to the wind.

A different bartender was working, a muscular girl with spiked black hair and a riot of tattoos, full sleeves up either arm. Will steered me toward her and I fell against the bar with a giggle. "Hey, Joanie. You seen Johnny Boy tonight?"

The bartender cocked her eyebrow. "Joanie?"

"Joanie as in Jett? 'Cuz of the hair? And then..."

Will cut me off. "Is Johnny Boy here?"

"Yeah," said the bartender. "Over there fixated on the tits, like he always is."

I reached over the bar and patted her arm. "You're cute. Hang loose, Joanie."

Will guided me away before the poor bartender could slug me. "You're unbelievable," he murmured in my ear. "Truly."

"Hey, you gotta sell it," I muttered. "I'm just doing my part."

Johnny Boy wasn't hard to spot once we left the bar and plunged into the cluster of horny frat boys and drunken cowboys surrounding the dancers' platforms. He was the only one sitting back, calmly smoking a thin cigar and swirling a glass of vodka while a brunette in a black bustier and little else gyrated on his lap.

I waded through the crowd and tapped her on the shoulder. "Mind if I cut in?"

She turned around and bared her teeth at me. "Get lost, skank."

Oh, irony. I grabbed her by the laces of her bustier and jerked her off Johnny Boy's lap, taking her place, my thighs straddling his, rubbing against the cheap polyester of his suit.

He glared up at me through the haze of cigar smoke. "I know you?"

"Not yet," I cooed, running a finger down his cheek. "I heard a girl could get a good fake ID off of Johnny Boy. I've got cash. I'll pay."

Johnny Boy snorted, looking me over. "Lady, you need a fake license about as much as my grandmother's Pomeranian does."

Will shook his head. "Of all the things you could have said, my man ... that one wasn't the right choice."

JB cut Will a look that would have taken his nose off, Chinatown Chinatown style. "She want to get carded? Make her feel young again?" He started to stand up. "I don't have time for your style. "She want to get carded? Make her feel young again?" He started to stand up. "I don't have time for your Desperate Housewives Desperate Housewives bullshit." bullshit."

I shoved him back, rocking his chair against the table, spilling his drink. "Sit your ass down, tough guy."

He took a second look at me, his expression shifting from boredom to rage inside of a bass beat of the tinny Carrie Underwood number that had replaced Garth. "What is this?" JB demanded.

"This is a dead teenage girl," I said. I had the photo tucked into my top, and I shoved it in JB's face with no small amount of relish.

He didn't react, except to twitch his lips in disgust. "I've never seen her. I'm very busy." Up again, and I shoved him back again. He gave me a smile that was the same smile a tiger gives a side of beef right before it pounces.

"I take it you're a cop. If so, you obviously don't know me." He reached out one hand and ran it down the bare thigh between my skirt and my stocking. "I'd change that if you're up for it, miss cop. What are you? Vice? Those are my favorite. They know how to moan and squeal-part of the job, when they're chasing johns."

Will stepped in. "That's far enough, John Boy."

JB slid his hand from my thigh to my ass and squeezed, hard. "This your piece? You should keep her on a leash."

I needed to get control back, and the fastest way to do that is usually with violence. I balled up my fist and punched JB in the eye, pulling the jab so I didn't break his orbital bone. I'm a lot stronger than a human, and you have to be careful about those things.

JB let out a yelp and I switched out my fist for my .38, pressing it between his eyes. If anyone in the crowd noticed or cared, they hinted not one whit. Beer and country music will do that to a person.

"I hate repeating myself, Johnny," I said. "Did you sell Lily Dubois her fake license?"

He drew his lips back in a snarl that rivaled my own. "Fuck you, bitch. I don't answer to the police."

"Okay," I said, putting the hammer up on the .38. "Then let's find out who you do answer to." I felt inside his suit jacket, the silk lining tickling my fingers. The ID business was good. JB's wallet was a soft leather that felt alive under my fingers. I tossed it to Will and stepped back. "I'll be in touch, John. You may want to find a new watering hole, too." I jerked my thumb at a college student wearing a Nocturne University Theta Theta shirt, doubled over and vomiting Jagermeister-colored bile into the sawdust. "This one is about to be violated for about ten different health codes. That, and the music sucks."

I waggled a hand at JB as Will and I walked away. "Don't get too comfortable. I'll be seeing you again."

"You can count on it!" JB stood up, his face red. "I'm not finished with you, bitch! You don't get to mess with me like this, in my place of business!"

I looked at Will, who rolled his eyes. "Well, at least he admits it," I said.

"What do you think all of those threats were about?" Will asked. "There's a lot of brave sons of bitches running around the city lately. Meyer, this jackass..."

I stopped at my car, leaning against the hood and rifling through the wallet. "Let's see what he thinks he has over somebody who's authorized to carry a gun and shoot mouthy people with it."

The wallet was devoid of everything except a balance-carrying credit card, one of the types that were just glorified gift cards and could be refilled with cash. Speaking of cash, there was a fat pack of it, five hundred-dollar bills fresh from the ATM.

"And here we have a bona-fide California state driver's license," I said, pulling it out of plastic. "John Black." I looked at the squinty-eyed photo of Johnny Boy.

"The only way that gets faker is if you replace 'Black' with 'Smith,'" said Will.

"He'd have to give an address," I said. "Two-seven-two-seven Winchester, apartment eighteen."

"I'm game for driving over there if you are," Will said. "I can even wake a judge up if you want to make it legal."

"Do it," I said. I pulled out my cell and dialed Dellarocco. "Hey, it's Lieutenant Wilder. If I drop something by, can I get an AFIS report by morning?"

Dellarocco masterfully hid a yawn before he spoke. "Sure. What's a few hours of REM sleep?"

"I touched it," I said, slipping the wallet into a evidence baggie from my glove compartment. "My exclusionary prints are on file from the Holly Street shooting about five years back. The prints you want are from a guy calling himself John Black."

"Good enough," said Dellarocco. "Although would it kill you pavement-pounders to wear gloves?"

"Sorry," I said. "Carrie Underwood makes me very distracted."

"What?"

"Trust me, Dellarocco, you're better off not knowing."

Will shut his own phone. "Judge Hannity is calling in a warrant to the SCS. We're good to go."

"You and your federal connections," I said, hopping in the car. "Very sexy."

Will stroked the same spot on my thigh that JB had touched, no perverse intent behind it, but as if he was reassuring himself I was still there. "I try my best, doll."

I reached over and patted his knee as we drove toward the ID lab. "So far, so good."

CHAPTER 6.

The apartment building on Winchester Drive was a brick turn-of-the-century firetrap, common to the old part of the city. There was no doorman, no elevator, and no one to care what went on in the dank, half-lit halls.

I climbed up two flights to 18, trying the door. It was locked, with a shiny new deadbolt that was top of the line. I snarled under my breath. "I can't pick this."

"We can wake the super up," Will said. "Assuming this place has one..."

I braced myself against the jamb and gave the door a kick. The deadbolt ripped clean out of the frame and the door rocketed back into the apartment, hinges and all.

"...Or we could do that," Will finished. I shrugged.

"Didn't mean to kick it quite so hard." I'd have to watch that-even with fifteen years of being a were, sometimes I miscalculated.

Will slipped on a pair of gloves and hit the lights, while I cleared the front room, the small kitchen and the bedroom. No one home. JB was probably still frothing at the mouth back at the club.

"Neat in here," Will said. "For a single guy."

I gestured at the front room, which managed to hold a leather sofa and a plasma-screen home-theater system, small though it was. "Does this look like the apartment of some club rat to you?"

Will shook his head. "It looks like he's got some money stashed and doesn't want to broadcast it with his address."

"Okay, John Black," I said, stealing a pair of gloves from Will. "What have you got to hide?"

I searched the kitchen, which held a lot of booze but no food beyond a suspicious container of Thai takeout, and the bathroom. John was fond of his products, as any metrosexual mobster would be. "He's got to be in with an outfit," I told Will as I rifled through the papers on the small desk, next to a high-end laptop. "Otherwise this apartment would be stripped clean the first time he stepped out to grab a bag of groceries."

I ran my hands along the underside of the bed frame, trying to ignore the crimson satin sheets. Single guys have the worst taste.

"Looking for a gun?" Will said.

"Finding one." I pulled at the small-frame pistol duct-taped to the frame, finding a small Ruger automatic in my hand. Will whistled.

"That's some serious hardware. Pricey, too."

"Think he's got a permit for this?" I said, getting on my knees and peering under the bed. A shoebox greeted me, also taped.

"I dunno. You think that I could click my heels and take us all to Oz?" Will said. I drew the shoebox out and tore the lid off.

"Good point." The box was full of Polaroids and afew creased documents, bills of lading from a shipping company. The photographs were of girls, many of them grinning against the backdrop of a club or a bar, a few posed against a blank white-painted brick wall with vacant expressions on their faces and glazed eyes.

"Not sexy," Will said. "What does he do, document his conquests?"

I unfolded the bills and looked at the contents-electronics, souvenirs, party supplies. The destinations were all cities in the Ukraine, the shipping company listing an import/export house as the receiver. I chewed on my lip. "I don't think these are conquests, Will. I think these are business partners."

Will looked over my shoulder. "Prostitutes?"

"Looks that way," I said. All of the girls were like Lily, older than their years, perfectly blonde, perfectly tempting to any man with a taste for younger flesh.

"Let's bag this and get it out of here," I said softly. "I don't want to look at it anymore."

Had Lily been lured to her death with the promise of a party she'd never experienced before? Had John Black been the one to do it? And who were the other girls?

Will and I bagged the evidence and sealed it, and I locked it in the trunk of the Nova for Pete to examine tomorrow. For now, I just wanted to go home and curl up in my own bed.

"Want me to stay?" Will said when we pulled up at my apartment. "I can. It's closer to my work, anyway."

"Yeah," I said. I was tired, suddenly, all of my limbs heavy. Lily Dubois's face wouldn't leave me alone. "Come up."

Will waited while I locked the door behind us and then pulled me to him, pressing his lips over mine.

I put my arms around his neck as his hands traveled under my skirt, over the tops of my stockings and tugged at my thong. "Moving a little fast, aren't we?" I asked against his mouth.

"I had to watch that waste of oxygen touch you," Will said. "I'm not waiting."

Leading him backward to the bed, I agreed, with my hands on his fly and my lips on his neck. I wanted someone to be next to me who wasn't predatory, who I could be honest with.

Will slid down the sheets, pulling my underwear with him, until his head was between my thighs, running his hands up the skin and stocking. I gasped when I felt his mouth against me and arched my stomach, inviting his attention.

Sliding his hands under my ass and lifting me, Will worked until lights started to swim in front of my eyes, which with him usually wasn't very long.

"Ready?" he asked me, raising his eyes and dipping his hand into my nightstand for a condom. I nodded, pulling him up and wrapping my legs around his waist.