“Carol already on the floor?” I hooked open my locker, pulling out my uniform top before hauling my shirt off over my head.

“She called in sick,” said Candy.

I paused in the process of unfastening my jeans. As far as I knew, Carol was unmarried, and lived alone. “Did she actually call in, or did she just not show up?”

Candy shrugged to show her total lack of concern for such nonfinancial niceties. Swearing under my breath, I went back to getting changed. Dave didn’t like the waitresses to appear in the club out of uniform (he said it sent a mixed message; I was pretty sure he just hated not being able to see our tits), and I needed to go into the club if I wanted to find Ryan. He took his duties as bouncer and protector of us girls seriously. I was hoping that would extend to pulling Carol’s emergency contact information and heading over to check on her. Just in case. If she was really sick, she’d probably appreciate some chicken soup and maybe some pinkie mice for her hair. If she wasn’t…

I already felt lousy for going to work while Dominic—a man from the Covenant, for God’s sake—retrieved Piyusha’s body from its resting place beneath the city streets. If Carol had been taken because I didn’t think to warn her about the goddamn snake cult, I was never going to forgive myself.

Twisting my hair roughly into a tangled bun, I secured it with a hair pick that could double as a stiletto and went stomping toward the front of the club. Time to dispatch the tanuki.

Ryan was exactly where I expected him to be this early in the evening: standing by the register chatting with Angel, who was wiping down the bar and trying to hear him over the thumping bass of the current dancer’s personal soundtrack. She saw me coming before Ryan did. Tucking the rag into her pocket, she straightened up and looked at me anxiously. Once I was in earshot, she asked, “Well, Very? What’s the news?”

“Verity!” Ryan smiled, displaying outsized canines. They were at half-mast; he was in good control of his therianthropy, which was a good thing if I was about to send him looking for Carol. “I wasn’t sure you were going to come in tonight. Candy was saying you’d been out to visit the Nest today.”

I paused to eye his expression. He looked sincere—no surprise there, Ryan always looked sincere—and like he had no idea that a dragon princess wouldn’t just decide to have a Price girl over on a social call. Pushing my misgivings aside, I said, “It’s been one hell of a week, and it’s not getting any better. In the locker room, Candy said Carol was out sick tonight. Do you know if she actually called in to say she wouldn’t be coming?”

“She didn’t,” said Angel. “Dave was pissed when she didn’t show, especially since we’d all been figuring you’d be out. Candy already gouged him for a promise of overtime.”

“That’s what I was afraid of.” I turned to Ryan. “You need to go to Carol’s apartment. You need to leave right now, and you need to go as fast as you can.”

“What’s going on?”

“You know how cryptid girls have been disappearing? Well, there’s a snake cult under the city, and I’m pretty sure they’re sacrificing them to a dragon in order to try waking it up. Not that it cares, since, well, dragons, not all that into the eating of sentient creatures and are you two even listening to me or are you too busy staring like I just grew a second head?” I touched my shoulder automatically. No extra head greeted me. After the week I’d been having, that was something of a relief.

“Dragons are extinct, Verity,” said Ryan.

“And humans don’t fraternize with cryptids, but there’s Angel, and here I am, and somewhere under this city there are a bunch of assholes feeding cryptid girls to a sleeping dragon because they think it’s the way to achieve ultimate cosmic power. Or something like that. I don’t know—I haven’t found the snake cult yet and, when I do, they can explain themselves to me during the pauses.”

“The pauses?” asked Ryan. His canines were starting to get more pronounced. That was good. That meant that he was taking me seriously.

“I can’t beat their heads against the wall constantly, now can I? So will you go, or do I have to start beating your head against the wall?”

“I’ll drive,” said Angel. I shot her a startled look. She met it without batting an eye. “Carol’s my friend, too, and if she’s in trouble, Ryan shouldn’t be dealing with it alone.”

“Won’t Dave get pissed?”

“If we disappear together, he’ll figure Ryan’s instincts finally got the best of him, and he’ll call it our lunch hour.” Angel pulled the dishrag out of her pocket and dropped it on the bar. “Give me five minutes to get changed and I’ll pick you up in front of the club.”

“Got it,” said Ryan. He watched Angel go before looking back to me. “Very, I really hope you’re wrong about this.”

“Trust me,” I said grimly. “So do I.”

Twenty minutes passed without word from Ryan and Angel. I worked five tables, avoided being kicked in the head by an overenthusiastic pole-dancer, and picked up about half my usual tips. Worry made it difficult to focus on flirting enough to get paid for it without crossing the line into coming off like I offered cocktails off a “special” menu. (Technically, Dave’s had a special menu. It just involved slime, blood, and other unmentionable fluids, rather than cheap sex in the employee break room.)

I was making my fifth round with the cleanup tray when my phone started ringing. I promptly dug it out of my apron pocket, shifting the tray to my dominant hand as I wedged the phone between my ear and shoulder. “Hello?”

“Verity?” Ryan’s voice was low and gravelly, and further distorted by the static of a bad connection. “Are you there?”

“Ryan!” I began beating a rapid retreat toward the bar, ignoring the people who were trying to flag me down. One of them flipped me off when I blew past his table without slowing. I made a mental note to fuck up his drink order at least once before the end of my shift. “Where are you? Is Carol okay?”

“She’s shaken, but she’s not really hurt. You were right about the snake cult coming to get her.”

I sagged against the bar, dropping my tray atop it with a loud clatter. Angel’s temporary replacement shot me a sour look. I showed him the gesture our beloved patron had so recently shown to me. “They came? But she’s okay?”