“The fun just never ends.” Crumbling concrete held a spider-map of veins right in front of my nose. I kept climbing. “He’s bagged.”

“Good deal.” Tension under the light bantering tone—he hadn’t wanted to stay topside, but I’d needed him up there watching the manhole in case the Trader doubled back.

Or at least, that’s what I’d told him. He didn’t make any fuss over it, but his tone warned me that he was an unhappy Were, and we were probably going to have a talk about it soon.

There were other things to talk about, too. Big fun.

I reached the top, skipping a rung or two that didn’t look sanguine about holding me, and Saul put a hand out. I grabbed and hung on, and he pulled me easily out of the darkness. He magnanimously didn’t mention how bad I must have smelled. “You okay?”

My boots found solid ground. It was a dead-end street down near Barazada Park, the spire of Santa Esperanza lifting into the heat haze. Blessed sunlight poured hot and heavy over me, just like syrup. In the distance the barrio weltered.

“Fine.” I paused for a moment. “Not really.”

He reeled me in. Closed his arms around my shoulders and we stood for a moment, me staring at his chest where the small vial of blessed water hung on a silver chain. No blue swirled in the vial’s depths.

He pulled me even closer, slid an arm around my waist, and I could finally lay my head down on his chest. We stood like that, his heartbeat a comforting thunder in my ear, for a long time. The rumble of his purr—a cat Were’s response to a mate’s distress—went straight through me, turning my bones into jelly. It didn’t stop the way I was quivering, though, body amped up into redline and adrenaline dumping through the bloodstream.

When the shakes finally went down I let out a long breath, and immediately felt bad about smearing gunk on him. He didn’t seem to mind much—he never did—but I felt bad all the same.