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“She comes in an agreeable package,” he said to Bill, and I supposed that was meant to be a compliment, a pat on the back, for Bill.

Bill inclined his head.

Vampires didn’t waste time saying a lot of things humans would under similar circumstances. A human executive would ask Bill how Eric, his boss, was doing; would threaten Bill a little in case I didn’t perform; would maybe introduce Bill and me to at least the more important people in the room. Not Stan Davis, head vampire. He lifted his hand, and a young Hispanic vampire with bristly black hair left the room and returned with a human girl in tow. When she saw me, she gave a screech and lunged, trying to break free of the grip the vampire had on her upper arm.

“Help me,” she shrieked. “You have to help me!”

I knew right away that she was stupid. After all, what could I do against a roomful of vampires? Her appeal was ridiculous. I told myself that several times, very fast, so I could go through with what I had to do.

I caught her eyes, and held up my finger to tell her to be silent. Once she’d looked at me, locked on to me, she obeyed. I don’t have the hypnotic eyes of a vamp, but I don’t look the least bit threatening. I look exactly like the girl you’d see in a low-paying job any place in any town in the South: blond and bosomy and tan and young. Possibly, I don’t look very bright. But I think it’s more that people (and vampires) assume that if you’re pretty and blond and have a low-paying job, you are ipso facto dumb.

I turned to Stan Davis, very grateful that Bill was right behind me. “Mr. Davis, you understand that I need more privacy when I question this girl. And I have to know what you need from her.”

The girl began to sob. It was slow and heartrending, and almost unbelievably irritating under the circumstances.

Davis’s pale eyes fastened on mine. He was not trying to glamour me, or subdue me; he was just examining me. “I understood your escort knew the terms of my agreement with his leader,” Stan Davis said. All right, I got the point. I was beneath contempt since I was a human. My talking to Stan was like a chicken talking to the buyer from KFC. But still, I had to know our goal. “I’m aware you met Area 5’s conditions,” I said, keeping my voice as steady as I could, “and I’m going to do my best. But without a goal, I can’t get started.”

“We need to know where our brother is,” he said, after a pause.

I tried not to look as astonished as I felt.

As I’ve said, some vampires, like Bill, live by themselves. Others feel more secure in a cluster, called a nest. They call each other brother and sister when they’ve been in the same nest for a while, and some nests lasted decades. (One in New Orleans has lasted two centuries.) I knew from Bill’s briefing before we left Louisiana that the Dallas vampires lived in an especially large nest.

I’m no brain surgeon, but even I realized that for a vampire as powerful as Stan to be missing one of his nest brothers was not only very unusual, it was humiliating.

Vampires like to be humiliated about as much as people do.

“Explain the circumstances, please,” I said in my most neutral voice.

“My brother Farrell has not returned to his nest for five nights,” Stan Davis said.

I knew they would have checked Farrell’s favorite hunting grounds, have asked every other vampire in the Dallas nest to find out if Farrell had been seen. Nevertheless, I opened my mouth to ask, as humans are compelled to do. But Bill touched my shoulder, and I glanced behind me to see a tiny headshake. My questions would be taken as a serious insult.

“This girl?” I asked instead. She was still quiet, but she was shivering and shaking. The Hispanic vampire seemed to be the only thing holding her up.

“Works in the club where he was last seen. It’s one we own, The Bat’s Wing.” Bars were favorite enterprises for vampires, naturally, because their heaviest traffic came at night. Somehow, fanged all-night dry cleaners didn’t have the same allure that a vampirestudded bar did.

In the past two years, vampire bars had become the