The one with gray streaks in his hair stood up. “I am.”

“Then you can stay, but he”—Bones paused to give a short jerk of his head at the other, skinny vampire—“can leave.”

“Wait!” Scratch’s voice lowered and he moved closer to Bones. “That thing you’re here to talk to me about? He might have some information on it.”

Bones glanced at me. I lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. “May as well hear what our unexpected guest has to say,” I commented.

“I’m Ed,” the vampire spoke up, with a nervous look over Bones’s shoulder at me. “Scratch didn’t tell me he was meeting you guys here.”

From Ed’s expression, I guessed that between my crimson hair, the large red diamond on my finger, Bones’s English accent, and the tingling aura of power he emanated, Ed had figured out who we were.

“That’s because he didn’t know,” Bones answered coolly. His emotions, accessible to me ever since the day Bones changed me, were now locked down behind the impenetrable wall he used in public. Still, anyone could pick up on the edge to his voice as he went on.

“I take it introductions aren’t necessary?”

Scratch’s gaze slid to me and then skipped away. “No,” he muttered. “You’re Bones, and that’s the Reaper.”

Bones’s expression didn’t soften, but I smiled in my best “I’m not going to kill you” way.

“Call me Cat, and why don’t we find some shade where we can talk?”

The sun’s rays weren’t lethal to vampires as mythology claimed, but we were easily sunburned. Expending some of our supernatural energy just to heal from the strong summer rays was pointless. A French restaurant with outdoor seating was nearby, so the four of us found a table under an umbrella and sat down as if we were old friends catching up.

“You said your Master was killed a few years ago, and she left no one to look after the members of her line,” Bones stated to Scratch, after the waitress took our drink orders. “A group of you banded together to watch out for one another. When did you first notice something odd was going on?”