“Mmmm.” I rested my head on his shoulder and yawned.

“Especially a pissed-off trickster?” he continued.

“Especially,” I agreed wearily with another heavy yawn and a desire to eat the nearest buffet in its entirety. No sharing. I’d carb loaded at breakfast for all the changing I knew I’d do, all the energy I’d need. Now I was drained, had a fifteen-mile walk ahead of me, and couldn’t decide whether I’d rather sleep for days or eat for hours. Too bad I couldn’t do both at the same time.

By the time we made it back to Rachel, population less than a hundred, I gave up on the idea of “borrowing” a car and heading back to Vegas. We stopped at the Little A’Le’Inn. With Area 51 being so close, aliens were the only tourist attraction and business that kept this tiny town going. The inn’s restaurant didn’t have the buffet I’d been wanting to devour from beginning to end. I settled for five burgers, five sides of fries, and three milkshakes. I’d have to start watching it from now on. I couldn’t just melt the fat away anymore or turn it into more hair or height. I sighed and enjoyed my final burger to every last bite.

“So, your sanctuary—you called it the Hearth?” Griffin fiddled with his tuna on toast. He didn’t seem too enthralled with it. He was more into sushi or the expensive restaurants.

“The Hearth.” I nodded, and dipped a fry in ketchup. “I was for Haven myself and Sanctuary is far too clichéd, but we had a committee and voted. You never heard so much bitching over a name. And some of the members kept trying to eat the other—” I stopped at the look in Griffin’s eyes. It wasn’t panic. It wasn’t fear. It was the resignation of “Here comes yet one more nightmare in the world.” He didn’t need that, knowing the whole of what lived in the shadows of this world. He was dealing with enough.

“All different kinds of tricksters, you know?” I changed smoothly. “We don’t always get along.” I finished my fry hastily.

“So it’s just angels, demons, and what did you call your kind? Païens?”

“Drink your juice. It’s good for you,” I ordered. “Yes, angels, demons, and the païens.” As we tricksters tended to call all the supernatural creatures that inhabited the world. But Zeke and Griffin didn’t need to peek that far under the covers into the dark. Demons were enough, especially with them coping with their new lives. Humans with wings, telepathy, and empathy . . . the Light had left them all three. Whether they would live as long as the other peris did . . . thousands and thousands of years, I didn’t know. If not . . . a gray-haired Zeke in a rocking chair with a marmalade cat in his lap, shooting at the annoying neighborhood kids with a BB gun might be amusing. I almost choked at the mental picture.

“Will you be leaving now? Will you be taking off and leaving us like you always said you would?” Zeke demanded, grabbing Griffin’s sandwich when his partner didn’t make any progress on it. He gave me a similar look, as if he wanted to grab on to me the same way and keep me there.

I always had said it to the boys, warned them, although I hadn’t known exactly what would happen to them when this was over. I’d hoped I could save them. The Light had done more than hope. The Light and my guys had saved themselves.

I was a traveler. Travel came with the job. Very few of us settled down in one spot long. I’d avenged Kimano. I doubted Hell’s lapdog, Trinity, had told the other Houses about Griffin and Zeke letting me hunt with them. I doubted he’d told any other House anything at all in those last days. I thought they’d be safe. They could stay here with a new Eden House or have my bar or come with me if they wanted. Or . . .

Or I could stick around awhile. It was only four or five years. I still had my bar, still had my business on the side; I could still even do my trickster work. I didn’t have to change form to do that. It made things much easier if I’d been able to, definitely, but I could do it.

“Who knows?” I sucked up the last of the strawberry shake. “I might stay around . . . if you stop shooting up my bar. What’s the difference between ten years and fourteen or fifteen? I can see it. Kicking demon ass with you guys for a while longer.” It was hard to take brothers for granted when you’d already lost one. I was born to travel, but I was born into a family too, and then I’d chosen one of my own. I’d gotten used to them. Stay in one place long enough and that’ll happen. Mama would be so disappointed in me, but, you know what? Mama could kiss . . . Get over it, I changed hastily in my mind. What I’d done to Solomon, Mama could do to me and call it a spanking for a dirty mouth. “Maybe I will stick around and hunt demons with you guys. It’s good exercise.”

Zeke took in the five empty plates. “You’re going to need it if you keep shoveling it down like a starved hippo.”

I didn’t stab him with my fork, but it was a close call. “I have to crash. Let’s get one of the motel rooms, because I have about five minutes before I go comatose for at least a day.”

It was a lovely hotel room. I fell face-first on the nearest bed. Actually it could’ve been the grotto at Hef’s mansion for all I knew. I didn’t know if there were pictures of flying saucers on the wall or soap shaped like an alien’s head or a shag carpet that devoured small pets. Nothing registered but sleep and the vaguely distant grumbling of Zeke and Griffin standing beside the other twin bed, all that was available.

“I’m tired of being the big spoon.”

“You’re taller than I am. It just works that way.”

It went on from there I was sure, but I was long gone, so buried under a blanket of sleep that an entire horde of demons couldn’t have woken me up. But what felt like a week later later, the squabbling that put demonic cursing into perspective did.

“You could’ve slept in the bathtub.”

“You could have too, partner. Might have earned you some more halo points. You can’t throw omelets at the cook. Hot melted cheese is like napalm. The guy will probably need skin grafts.” Griffin’s hand was on my shoulder shaking lightly.

“He spit in it.” I imagined Zeke’s eyes narrowing. Telepathy had always given Zeke more reasons to be cranky than he usually had—as if he needed more. “I ‘heard’ it. Because he thought I was rude.”

“You are rude.”

“So? He was an ugly son of a bitch who cheats on his wife and I didn’t spit on him.”

“No. You just scarred him for life with a molten-hot dairy product.”

All of which made perfect sense and that could only mean I needed more food and a shower. I sat up and saw nothing but black, bronze, and russet tangles. Swearing, I swept back the mop of hair and asked Griffin, “How long has it been?”

“About twenty hours. And we’ve got to be out in another two. Big alien convention in town. Thirty whole people. They’re booked solid.” He handed me a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. “No spitting on this one, I swear.”

“Good to know.” I took a big bite of greasy diner scrambled eggs, greasier bacon, and loved every second of it.

“Is Leo coming back?”

I looked up at Zeke and took pity on his foodless state. Handing him my toast, I answered, “I don’t know. Loki . . . Leo’s not as much of a wanderer as I am. He’s a trickster not by race but by choice, by calling, and he’s been at odds with his family for a long time. Now that it sounds like he made up with them when he went back to catch the dog, he might want to stay with them awhile.”

“The dog?” Griffin said grimly. “He left us in that clusterfuck to go home and catch a dog?”

“Well, Fenris is a little more than just a dog.” I took another bite of eggs. “He might not be able to swallow the sun like Norse legend says, but he could wipe out a few hundred—maybe thousand—people if he made it to civilization. And he only likes Leo, so, there you go.” I wiped my hands on the napkins Griffin had brought. “Anyway, I don’t know if Leo will want to go back for some family time or not. It’s up to him. He’s been with me ten years straight now. He might need a break.”