“Yeah?” I asked, not willing to throw back the shower curtain to see him. Knowing that if he wanted me dead, he could have already fired. I had no place to run anyway. But mostly not wanting to be naked in front of Derek. I took the weapon in a two-hand grip and spread my feet, balanced and ready. “Tell me something only we know. So that I’ll know it’s you talking through your mouth and not some foreign vamp who’s made you his.”

“You wore a party dress the first time I saw you take down a fanghead. You told me you had a magic charm to track down suckheads, but we both know you was lying.”

I chuckled.

“Also,” Eli said, “he’s got me, with a gun about three inches from his spine.”

Not again, I thought, but feeling relieved. “You boys have got to learn to play together.”

“Too close, Ranger boy. I’d take you—”

“And you’d sit in a chair the rest of your life. So go ahead. Make my—”

“Go away!” I yelled. I turned the water back on and set the gun aside. They could play Ranger versus SEAL on their own time. I still had things to think through. And one of those was, why was I always the only female in the ladies’ room? Was I so terrifying and creepy that all the other female security personnel who used this locker room made themselves scarce when I was here? It was kinda weird.

•   •   •

Once I was dressed, I read my new texts and sent several, one to tell the Kid I was headed into the security conference room. He’d know what to do. The guys were waiting outside the locker room door when I emerged, holding up opposite walls. Eli had an abrasion on his cheek that hadn’t been there the last time I saw him, and Derek was nursing a bloody lip. “Idiots.” I shook my head and asked Eli to run an errand for me, fast. He nodded and took off. I asked, “Your men?”

Derek’s face turned down, the lines beside his mouth making him look far older. “Red Dragon and Antifreeze are down for rehab. Trash Can and Acapulco are both dead.”

He didn’t want sympathy. I didn’t know what he wanted, but sympathy wasn’t it. I kept my eyes emotionless, but let my mouth turn down in acknowledgment of his loss. “I’d like to go to the services,” I said. “Anything I can do for the families, please let me know.”

He nodded once, a severe, clipped gesture, and I lifted a finger pointing to the conference room. Derek followed me down the hall into security, and I felt him behind me, more so than heard him. He moved as silently as a hunting big-cat.

If he had been rolled, then I could be a target, though I could tell by his body scent that he wasn’t fighting anything; nor was he overly, abnormally calm. He smelled like himself after exercise, and he also smelled angry, but it was normal, human “It isn’t fair” kind of angry, combined with a little “I need to hit something” angry. He stepped up beside me, our shoulders brushing. But his scent changed as we walked, a hint of adrenaline, an increase of testosterone. It smelled like a dominance thing, the scent telling me that the person he wanted to hit was me.

I could take him if he attacked. Most likely, I could. Probably. Maybe. Most days. Maybe not right now with my belly feeling like . . . “You shot me,” I said, casually.

From the corner of my eye, I saw the satisfaction flit onto his face, as he said, “Yeah. Sorry about that.” But he didn’t sound sorry. His voice went harder, colder. “Leo instructed me not to call in the cops for our DBs. He says it’s too dangerous for us to let any more humans in here.”

I suddenly understood all the mixed signals he was giving off. I moved to the side of the hallway and stopped again, turning to him. I put a hand on his arm, feeling the rigid, corded muscles there. His black eyes glittered in his dark-skinned face, but he stared into the distance. “I’m sorry about your men,” I said. “I’m so very sorry.”

“Vodka Sunrise was injured, but had enough life to be turned. He’ll be an insane suckhead for ten years, but he’ll be alive, if you call that living.” Sunrise had lost a tooth in Leo’s service not so long ago. He was good people. All Derek’s men were good people. I could smell Derek’s conflict, his anger, his grief, and I tightened my fingers on his arm, letting a bit of Beast into my grip. It had to hurt, but he didn’t meet my eyes. I understood that too. I wasn’t human. I was one of the monsters. And I hadn’t reacted with anger when one of the monsters had said no human law enforcement involvement. I was getting in deep. Too deep? How deep did I have to get to be happy that Sunrise had been turned instead of dying? “We’ll honor their sacrifice. Your men and me. And right now, I honor their sacrifice.”

I closed my mouth with a soft snap. I didn’t have time for this, but I also didn’t not have time for it. I shoved my conflict down deep inside and shook his arm until he looked at me. “In the ways of The People, the War Woman was responsible for restitution and revenge after battle. I am War Woman.” His eyes widened slightly and his scent changed, though I couldn’t tell what the pheromones meant, except more confusion. “I promise you the right to choose how our enemy will die. If you choose, then for each man true-dead, I will cause our enemy to scream until he can’t scream anymore. I will let him heal. And I’ll make him scream again for the next man. For the men turned, I’ll bring them a cup of his still-warm blood to drink. If you choose this, the death of the one we hunt will not be clean or easy.”

Derek’s head went up, his mouth hard. “You’re asking me to let you torture a man.”

“No. I’m asking what you want done.”

“Clean death,” he spat. “I’m not a monster.”

I smiled, and knew it was bitter. “No. You aren’t. And for that I’m thankful.”

He blinked several times, then said, “You don’t want to . . . do what you said.”

“I really, really don’t. But for you, to honor your men, to remember your men, I would have.” I let a small smile soften my face. “The last time I counted coup—to use a word not of The People—I was five years old and my grandmother put the knife into my hand.” Derek’s scent changed again, this time taking on a clearly identified horror in the chemical mixture. “Humans, ordinary humans, can be far worse than the monsters. To torture a man when you’re a child, when your mother and grandmother stand beside you and guide in the methodology and the mechanics, it changes you. It changed me, changed who I became; who I am now. But I’m willing to go back to that time if you need me to.”