“How did you not have money? Your parents are Cadogan House.”

“Not a lot of part-time jobs for teenagers who could only work at night. I did chores in the House, but that money only went so far.”

His smile was dubious. “Because you had a staff to pay?”

“Because she has a coffee habit,” Lulu said, and pulled a paper menu from the holder at the edge of the table, handed one to me. Only a few items were on the menu, and all of them had at least one indecipherable ingredient. There were four kinds of artisanal water.

“You still picky?” Connor asked.

With a vampire metabolism, I’d wanted nothing but blood, grilled cheeses, and chocolate chip cookies growing up. Thankfully, I’d grown out of that stage.

“I usually eat what’s available,” I said, giving him a thin smile. “No one likes a hangry vampire.”

Natalia came back, put glasses of water—artisanal status undetermined—in front of us on the table. Then she looked at Connor expectantly. Because he’s the shifter, I wondered, or the only one she trusts to order from their very particular menu?

“Three burgers,” Connor said. “Set us up.”

“Of course.” She nodded, then turned and walked back to the kitchen.

“Are you under the impression we can’t order for ourselves?” Lulu asked testily.

“Shifter place, shifter rules. If I order, they think I’m in charge. Makes it easier for everyone.”

“Because you’re you?” I wondered. “Or because I’m a vampire?” The incident at Little Red had made it clear that antivamp prejudices still ran through the Pack.

He watched me for a moment, as if carefully considering his answer. “Both,” he finally said. “And the burgers are good.”

Lulu crossed her arms. “We’ll see.”

“He’s a wolf,” I pointed out. “Probably knows good meat from bad.”

“One of my many skills. And now that we’re out of danger, please explain to me why you two decided to start a war by storming a literal fairy castle in the middle of the night.”

“The pin belonged to one of the fairies,” I said. “The one I found near the Cadogan House patio.”

Connor’s brows lifted. “How do you know?”

“She took video of the reception,” Lulu said. “We reviewed the evidence and reached a conclusion based on the same.”

“Thank you, CSI.” His tone was dry as dust.

Lulu saluted. “And bee-tee-dubs, your girlfriend is a firecracker. That panther routine?” She mimicked wiping sweat from her brow. “Impressive.”

“She’s not my girlfriend. We aren’t together anymore.”

“Oh, well, damn,” Lulu said. “I will cease harassing you on that topic, and congratulate your good decision making.”

Connor rolled his eyes, shifted his gaze to me. “So, the pin belonged to a fairy. Was the fairy at the party?”

“I don’t know. If he was, I didn’t see him.” We’d have to talk to Kelley—or maybe Theo—about that. See if the Cadogan surveillance video revealed anything else.

“Why did they let us go?” I asked, working that over.

“Because they’re smart?” Lulu said. “They realized they don’t want the wrath of Cadogan House and the Pack raining down upon them.”

Maybe, I thought. They had backed down after Connor had arrived. But that look in Ruadan’s eyes, that interest, made me wonder if we’d been allowed to leave because he had something else planned. I had no idea what that might be, but I had a sinking feeling—after that talk about power—it had something to do with me.

Didn’t matter. I’d handle it, just like I’d handled the fight.

Natalia returned, put plates of food in front of us. A waiter behind her added glasses of beer.

“Diakuju,” Connor said, and she nodded, left to check on the other patrons. Her expression changed completely when she reached them. She smiled, which softened her features, put a hand on their shoulders, chatted with them quietly. It took me a minute to realize why, to recognize the magic that lingered in the air.

I looked at Connor. “Are we the only non-shifters in the restaurant?”

He pulled pickles, onions, tomatoes, lettuce off his burger, piled them on the side of his plate. They barely had time to settle before Lulu grabbed them, piled them onto hers.

“Yes,” he said, then took a bite. “And the salad is unnecessary.”

“Textures,” Lulu said, then sawed at the entire pile to cut it in half, then in quarters. Then she picked up a wedge, bit off the pointed end.

“You still do that.”

She looked at Connor, chewed. “I don’t like putting my face into food. I’d rather bring the food to my face.”

“You’re an odd duck, Bell.”

“At least I’m not literally a duck, Keene.”

“You’re well aware what I am, Bell.”

“True,” she said, winging up her eyebrows.

I hadn’t yet tasted the food, so I grabbed a fry from Connor’s plate, chewed.

He stopped chewing midbite. “What the hell, Sullivan?”

Lulu smiled, shook her head. “You think I’m a weird eater? She prefers to eat other people’s food. Freaking fry thief.”

“Fries from someone else’s plate always taste better,” I said, finishing off the one I’d stolen. “You can have some of mine.”

“That is empirically false,” Connor said. “And I don’t want your fries. I want my own fries.”

I shrugged, reached unapologetically for a fry from Lulu’s plate. She slapped my hand away. “Bad vampire. Eat your own food.”

“Fine.” I gathered up the burger, took a bite. “Not bad,” I said, and took another. “I’m surprised this place doesn’t make the Chicago top-ten list.”

“It does,” Connor said. “Just not the human list. Riley eats four of these at a time.” His smile fell away with the memory.

“Maybe the Ombudsman would let you bring him one?”

“I doubt it,” he said sourly. “Dearborn’s a dick. If he wasn’t, Riley wouldn’t be in prison right now.”

“It’s because he looks big and dangerous,” Lulu said. “He has plenty of muscle and power to back that up. But he has an enormous heart.”

“So why did you break up with him?” Connor asked.

Her gaze lifted. “He didn’t tell you?”

Connor shook his head. “I know it wasn’t what he wanted, but he didn’t talk about it. Riley’s easygoing, but he’s not one for talking about his emotions.”

She looked up at the ceiling, as if wishing for strength to get to it. “We were getting serious. And it was getting harder for me to, I guess, avoid his magic.”

“To avoid it?” Connor asked.

“I made a conscious decision not to do magic. Dating a shifter is like . . . being ensconced in it. A lot.” She looked at me. “More than just vampire magic, because with vampires, the magic is mostly driven by emotions. You get nervous or excited or really hungry, and you throw off a little magic. But with shifters, it’s all the time. It’s in the air.”

“And the ground,” Connor said. “It’s part of our connection to the natural world—or the result of it.”

Lulu swirled the beer in the glass, watching the liquid spin. “It was becoming more difficult to be around him and still say no to using my magic. I loved him,” she said. “It just wasn’t right for me.”

“I’m sorry, Lulu,” Connor said, and I saw only compassion in his eyes. Maybe for Lulu, maybe for his friend, maybe for a relationship broken because love hadn’t been enough.

“It’s all right,” she said with a smile she was obviously fighting to keep in place. “It was hard. It sucked. And we both lived through it.”

She looked up at Connor, at me. “Get him out of this. Whether we work together or not, he’s being used, and that’s not fair.”

“Working on it,” I said, and put my hand over hers, squeezed. But when I went to pull away, she didn’t let go.

“I love you,” she said to me. “And I tolerate you,” she said to Connor. “But I’m going to bow out of any further fairy-related adventures.”