Juliet, who hadn’t seemed this excited since Jack first proposed, began to bounce on her feet. “Next weekend! I guess Beatrice and Dashiell had show tickets and a suite reserved, and everything is paid for, but now they can’t go.” The words were tumbling out of her so fast, it would have been funny if my world hadn’t just caved in. “And Beatrice knew I never had a bachelorette party, so she hatched this whole plan to send us there at the last minute! All the bridesmaids are invited! Is it okay?” she asked Jack, suddenly anxious. “Can you be with the kids?”

“Of course.” Jack was smiling at her.

Abruptly, my shock was replaced with serious rage. How fucking dare he? How could Dashiell set up this situation behind my back? How could he pull Juliet, a completely innocent human, into it?

Oh, right, because he needed to manipulate me into going on the trip. This was just like him, to use family against me.

Juliet turned to me. “Oh, and they especially invited you, because I guess Dashiell wants you to do a little work while you’re there? Something about meeting with cleaning companies . . . Scarlett? Are you okay?”

I was still standing behind the kitchen table, frozen in place. My palm hurt from the little house figure that was clenched in one of my fists. “Scarbo?” Jack asked, concern in his voice. He took one step toward me. “You look pale . . .”

Shadow had gotten up from her place under the table and moved soundlessly over to me, putting her head under my hand. She had to duck to do it.

“I . . . I . . .” I swallowed hard, forcing myself to take a deep breath. Anger would not be an appropriate response in this company, I reminded myself. You have to say something.

Ordinarily I’d make an excuse about needing to work, but Juliet already knew Dashiell had given me the time off. And everyone knew I wasn’t exactly in the dating game these days. Besides, I couldn’t just duck out of the trip. I needed to make sure Juliet didn’t go at all. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?” I managed to say. “I thought you said you were too old for penis necklaces and screen-printed tank tops.”

Juliet deflated, just a little bit, and I felt like an ass. My brother glared at me, rather rightfully. I was going to murder Dashiell. “I’m sorry,” I said before she could reply. “I’m just . . . um . . . Vegas isn’t my favorite.”

Jack’s face softened. He took a step back to his wife, putting an arm around her shoulders. “We went to Las Vegas for my twenty-first birthday, right before our parents died,” he told her. “It was our last family trip.”

“Oh,” Juliet said, understanding flooding her face. “Oh. Scarlett!”

I winced. “That’s not . . . that isn’t the only reason,” I said lamely. But Juliet had already darted forward and thrown her arms around me. I awkwardly patted her back. I am not a hugger.

It was true that the family trip to Vegas had been rough, though it took me years to figure out why. Vegas is a vampire town, and every time we left our hotel rooms, vampires were stumbling in and out of my radius. Only I didn’t know what I was yet, so I didn’t know how to process the endless weird sensations and the strange looks I kept getting from people I didn’t know. Most of them were hateful, although a few looked at me the way I suspect pedophiles look at kids. Like I was something to be used up.

And they didn’t just stare. Every time Jack and my dad went to the bathroom or the blackjack table, I was propositioned for what I thought at the time was sex. As a body-shy seventeen-year-old, it was a nightmare.

Juliet took a step back so she could touch my face with her cool, dry palms. “Listen,” she said, sympathy in her voice. “Vegas has changed so much in the last eight years; you probably won’t even recognize it. And we’re not doing the penis necklace, matching tank tops, club thing,” she added sternly. “I was very clear about that. We’ll take in a show—Beatrice got more tickets so we can all go—do some shopping, maybe hit the spa.” Her eyes were sparkling. “The three big S’s of female bonding, right? It’ll be so much fun. Beatrice and Bethany have got it all planned.”

“Bethany?” I said faintly. Ugh, talk about making matters worse.

Bethany Sibowski was Juliet’s older stepsister, a chiropractor in Reseda. I wouldn’t say she was my nemesis—I didn’t see her often enough, and really, there were a lot of other people who hated me more. There just wasn’t room for human Bethany on my nemesis short list. But she was an uptight, severe woman who probably organized the contents of her change purse.

Even I had to admit that Bethany had made an excellent matron of honor for Juliet, given her obsession with details. But she thought I was a useless slacker who naturally sucked at all the important things in life: organization, bridal shower games, personal grooming, and returning phone calls in a timely manner. She wasn’t exactly wrong about any of that, but still. If Bethany was planning the weekend, I would bet a year’s salary that there was a printed itinerary in my near future. Probably in goddamned calligraphy.

But of course, Bethany was far from my biggest problem. I couldn’t put Juliet and a bunch of innocent humans in the middle of a possible vampire skirmish. I had to nip this in the bud before my sister-in-law got any more excited. And I needed to have a conversation with Dashiell about using humans as cannon fodder. Especially my humans.

I mumbled something about needing to sleep on it, and made some excuses. I don’t think I even said goodbye to Riley and Logan before I bolted for the van with Shadow trotting after me. It wasn’t until I saw my shaking hands on the steering wheel that I realized I was furious.

I drove to Pasadena in a blind rage—though since this was LA, anger-driving probably put me in the majority. I parked on the fancy Spanish-tiled driveway and stormed up the sculpted path toward the front door. Shadow had sensed my obvious tension and made no effort to go explore Dashiell’s yard. Instead, she was in full-on silent predator mode, stalking along beside me with the hunt in her eyes.

As soon as the vampire lackey opened the door, I marched past him toward Dashiell’s office. The lackey let us go by without so much as a comment, which probably meant that Dashiell had warned him I was coming—which in turn meant he had known exactly how I would feel about this, and he’d done it anyway.

Just when I thought I couldn’t get any angrier.

I slammed Dashiell’s office door open, hard enough to make it hit the wall. Shadow surged in ahead of me to check the room for threats.

There was a pretty frickin’ big threat sitting behind the desk. Dashiell gazed at me calmly. A thin, fashionably dressed brunette woman stood next to him, looking slightly flustered. Beatrice, Dashiell’s vampire wife. She’d probably been sitting in his lap before I stormed in.

“Good evening, Scarlett,” Dashiell said mildly. There was a slight edge to his voice as he added, “Please, do come in.”

Not finding any strangers, or any immediate source of danger, Shadow returned to my side, clearly a little confused, but ready to back my play. “You win, boss,” I spat. “I’ll go to Vegas and be your little spy. Now call it off.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Call what off?”

I ground my teeth. “The bachelorette weekend.” I pointed to the cell phone sitting on the desk. “Call Juliet and cancel.”

Beatrice made a little clucking noise, and Dashiell gave me a disapproving frown. “Scarlett. Do you know how hard Beatrice worked to plan a full bachelorette weekend so quickly?”

“I don’t care!” My voice came out shrill.

Beatrice gave me a look that I’d seen on my mother’s face: I sounded petulant. No one would take me seriously until I calmed down. I threw myself into the chair, glaring at them as I took a couple of deep breaths. “I’ll go see your stupid fucking show,” I said in the calmest tone I could manage. “Hell, I’ll go tonight, right now, if you want. But leave my family out of this.”

“I’m afraid it’s not that simple,” Dashiell said smoothly. “The situation has changed.”

“How?”

Beatrice stepped back to perch on a table behind the desk, while Dashiell picked up his cell phone and pressed the screen. “I took your advice,” he said, his eyes on the phone. “I sent one of my vampires to see the opening performance on Friday night.”