Through a slight fog of hysteria, she remembers those weird dudes from Billy’s talking about the vampire community. She was pretty sure that was some kind of BDSM role-play thing. But what if—

August snaps her laptop shut.

Jesus Christ. What is she thinking? That Jane is some thousand-year-old succubus who’s really into punk music but can’t keep her references straight? That she spends her nights haunting the tunnels, eating rats and getting horned up over O-positive and using her supernatural charm to maneuver SPF 75 out of strangers’ Duane Reade bags? She’s Jane. She’s just Jane.

Really, sincerely, from the very bottom of August’s heart: What the fuck?

Somewhere beneath it all, a voice that sounds like August’s mom says she needs a primary source. An interview. Someone who can tell her exactly what she’s dealing with.

She thinks about Jerry, or even Billy, the owner of the restaurant. They must have known Jane. Jerry could tell her how long he’s been cooking the Su Special. If she shows them the picture, they might remember whether they ever caught her hissing at the jugs of minced garlic in the walk-in. But August’s job is hanging by a thin enough thread without barging into the kitchen demanding to know if any former employees displayed signs of bloodlust.

No, there’s someone else to talk to first.

5

 

Classifieds

 

* * *

 

PERSONALS

 

BUTCH ON THE Q TRAIN—Are you the short-haired Asian woman, 20-30, who takes the Q from Manhattan to Brooklyn on Thursday afternoons? Do you wear a black leather jacket? Do you like to be spoiled? This wealthy older businesswoman can provide you with a life of sensuality and luxury. PO Box 2348, Queens, NY 11101. 10/18/1983

Niko’s described the bar where he works enough times for August to have it filed away under Pertinent Brooklyn Locations: beneath a bookstore and down a flight of creaky metal stairs that threaten to drop her into the murky bowels of the city. She’s got a coffee in hand for a bribe, and thankfully the girl checking IDs doesn’t say anything about it.

She can’t believe she’s working a case. And she really can’t believe she’s about to do the thing her mom swore she’d die before doing again: consulting a psychic.

Slinky’s is exactly the type of place where she would expect Niko to work. The whole room is washed in a bloody red glow, multicolored string lights strung up over a bar that looks sticky even from here. Most of the floor is taken up with round tea tables surrounded by curved and overstuffed booths, battered purple leather patched in every fabric pattern from starry galaxy to picnic gingham. The finishing touch is the ceiling, lined with hundreds of pairs of underoos and boxers and frilly panties, the odd bra or piece of lingerie dangling from a rafter.

Niko’s behind the bar in a denim vest, both arms of tattoos on full display. He grins around a chicken wing when he sees August.

“August!” He finishes his chicken wing and casually slides the bones into the pocket of his vest. August decides not to ask. “This is awesome! Hi!”

She sidles up to a sparkly bar stool, wavering between a dozen openings—It was a two-for-one special. The barista accidentally gave me a double order. Are vampires real?—before giving up and plunking the coffee down.

“I got you a coffee,” August says. “I know how night shifts are.”

He blinks owlishly through glasses, round and tinted yellow. “A gift from August? What god have I pleased?”

“I’m not that withholding.”

He smiles enigmatically. “Of course not.”

“You like lavender, right?” August says. “They have a lavender honey latte at Bean & Burn and—I don’t know, I thought of you. I can, um, toss it if you hate it.”

“No, no!” Niko says. He picks up the cup and sniffs it. “Although we are going to discuss your bougie choice of coffee shop later. There is a perfectly good combination jerk chicken and donut joint across the street that does cups for fifty cents.”

“Okay,” August pushes on. “Can I ask you a question?”

“If it’s about the underwear on the ceiling,” Niko says, turning away and reaching for a couple of bottles, “it started when one guy left his underwear in the bathroom and now people just keep bringing them and the owner thinks it’s hilarious.”

August looks up at a pair of briefs—cartoon teeth on the crotch and UNLEASH THE BEAST across the back—and back to Niko. He’s lined up three bottles on his workstation and is muddling a handful of herbs and berries.

“Not what I was going to ask, but good to know.”

“Ah,” Niko says with a wink, and August realizes he already knew. Stupid psychics. She’s still not even sure she believes he knows anything, but she doesn’t have any other option but to trust him.

“So, um…” she goes on. “Your line of work … you know about, like, uh. Supernatural stuff?”

The enigmatic smile is back. “Yes?”

“Like…” August resolves not to do anything with her facial expression. “Creatures?”

“Oh, I’m loving this already,” Niko says readily. “What kind of creatures?”

“You know what?” she says, hopping down from her stool. “This is insane. Forget it.”

“August,” he says, and it’s not teasing or apologetic or even like he’s trying to get her to stay. It’s the way he always says August’s name, soft and sympathetic, like he knows something about her that she doesn’t. She settles back down and buries her face in the sleeves of her sweater.

“Okay, fine,” she says. “So, like. You know the girl I told y’all about? The one I asked out?”

Niko doesn’t say anything. When she looks up, he keeps measuring out liquors.

“Her name’s Jane. She takes the same train as me. The Q, every single morning and afternoon. At first I thought, like, wow, okay, crazy coincidence, but tons of people probably have the same commutes, and … I definitely went out of my way to catch the same train as her, which I realize sounds a lot like stalking, but I promise I wasn’t weird about it—anyway, today at work, I found this.”

She slides the photo across the bar, and Niko nudges his sunglasses up onto his forehead to examine it.

“That’s her,” August says, pointing. “I’m a thousand percent sure it’s her. She has the same tattoos.” She looks up at him. “Niko, this photo is from opening day at Billy’s. Summer ’76. She hasn’t aged in forty-five years. I think she’s—”

The rattle of Niko’s cocktail shaker cuts through her sentence, drowning her out, and he wiggles his eyebrows until his glasses fall back down to his nose.

August is going to kick his ass one day.

She has to wait thirty whole seconds for him to pop the top off the shaker and pour the drink into a glass so she can finish. “I think she’s not … human.”

Niko slides the drink over. “Blackberry mint mule. On the house. What do you think she is?”

She’s going to have to say this out loud, isn’t she? Bella Swan, eat your horny little Mormon heart out.