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As the black-on-black sign for ZeroSum came into view, she knew they were going to stop in front of it, and her heart dropped into her lower gut.

Strangely, she had the same reaction she’d had to seeing Stephan in the morgue: This can’t be right. This can’t be happening. This is not how things are supposed to be.

The Bentley didn’t pull up in front of the club, though, and for a moment hope flared.

But of course. They went into the alley on the far side, stopping at a private entrance.

“He owns this club,” she said in a dead voice. “Doesn’t he.”

Trez didn’t touch the question, but he didn’t have to. As he came around and opened the door for her, she sat frozen stiff in the back of the Bentley, staring at the brick building. Absently, she noted that there was grime dripping down its flank from the roof, and crud splashed up on it from the ground. Tarnished. Dirty.

She thought of standing at the foot of the Commodore and staring upward at all the sparkling-clean glass and chrome. That was the facade he had chosen to show her.

This one with the filth was what he had been forced to show her.

“He’s waiting for you,” Trez said gently.

The side door of the club opened wide, another Moorish male appearing. Behind him, everything was dim, but she heard the thumping bass.

Did she really need to see this, she wondered.

Well, she needed to tell Rehv off, that was for sure, assuming this train wreck was going in the direction it appeared to be. And then it dawned on her: If all this was true, she had a bigger problem. She’d had sex…with a symphath.

She’d let a symphath feed from her.

Ehlena shook her head. “I don’t need this. Take me h—”

A female appeared, one who was built tough and hard as a male, and not just on the outside. Her eyes were icy cold and utterly calculating.

She came over and leaned into the car. “Nothing is going to hurt you inside here. I swear it.”

Whatever—the hurt was already happening, Ehlena thought. She was getting chest pains like you would with a heart attack.

“He’s waiting,” the female said.

What got Ehlena out of the car was her backbone, and not just because it straightened her from a sitting position. The thing was, she didn’t run. In all her life, she hadn’t run from the hard stuff, and she was not starting now.

She walked in through the door and knew for sure that she was somewhere she wouldn’t ever choose to be. Everything was dark, and the music banged into her ears like fists, and the smell of too much hot skin made her want to plug her nose.

The female led the way, and the Moors flanked Ehlena, their huge bodies carving a path through a human jungle she had no wish to be a part of. Waitresses dressed in tight black uniforms carried around endless variations on alcohol, and half-nude women rubbed up against men in suits, and every person Ehlena passed had eyes that were looking somewhere else, as if whatever they’d ordered or whoever was in front of them couldn’t satisfy them.

She was led over to a reinforced black door, and after Trez spoke into his wristwatch, the thing opened and he stood to the side—as if he expected her to walk right in, like it was just someone’s living room.

Yeah…not.

Staring into the darkness beyond, she saw nothing but a black ceiling and black walls and a shiny black floor.

But then Rehvenge stepped into her line of sight. He was exactly as she knew him to be, a big male dressed in a sable duster who had mohawked hair and amethyst eyes and a red cane.

He was, however, a total stranger.

Rehvenge stared at the female he loved and saw on her pale, strained face exactly what he had sought to put there.

Revulsion.

“Will you come in?” he said, needing to finish the job.

Ehlena glanced over at Xhex. “You’re security, right?” Xhex frowned, but nodded. “Then you’re coming in with me. I don’t want to be alone with him.”

As her words hit, Rehv might as well have been sliced through the throat, but he showed no reaction as Xhex came forward and Ehlena followed.

The door shut and the music was buffered away and the silence was as