Maybe the one Father MacKenzie labeled all females with back in grade school: Whore of Babylon. He did have a way with words, did Brimstone MacKenzie. Must have been the auld sod in him.

Then there’s my personal favorite: Jill Kismet, Kickass Bitch. If I was to get a business card, that would probably be it. Not very high-class, is it?

In my line of work, high-class can cripple you.

I walked into the Monde Nuit like I owned the place. No spike heels, the combat boots were steel-toed and silver-buckled. The black leather trenchcoat flapped around my ankles.

Yeah, in my line of work, sometimes you have to look the part—like, all the time. Nobody takes you seriously if you show up in sweats.

So it was a skin-tight black T-shirt and leather pants, the chunk of carved ruby at my throat glimmering with its own brand of power, Mikhail’s silver ring on my left third finger and the scar on my right wrist prickle-throbbing with heat in time with the music spilling through concrete and slamming me in the ribs. With my hair loose and my eyes wide open, maybe I even looked like I belonged, here where the black-leather crowd gathered. Bright eyes, hips like seashells, fishscale chains around slim supple waists—all glittering jewelry, silken hair, and cherry lips.

The damned are beautiful, really. Or here in the Monde they always are. Ugly ’breed don’t come in here, or even ugly Traders. The bouncers at the door take care of that.

If it wasn’t for my bargain, I probably would never have seen the inside of the place shaking and throbbing with hellbreed. Even the hunter who trained me had only come here as a last resort, and never at night.

I might have come here only to burn the place down.

Nobody paid any attention to me. I stalked right up to the bar. Riverson was on duty, slinging drinks, his blind eyes filmed with gray. His head rose as I approached, and his nostrils flared. He could sense me, of course. Riverson didn’t miss much; it was why he was still alive. And I burn in the ether like a star, especially with the scar on my wrist prickling, the sensation tearing up my arm, reacting to all the dark hellbreed energy throttling the air.