A Perfect Blood

between her teeth. I was pretty sure she’d sated her hunger yesterday, but the crime scene had probably put her on edge.
    Jenks landed on the top of her monitor, and I turned my back on them to rinse out my rag. “Rachel taking an active part in this run,” the pixy said. “Going in angry.”
    “It’s how the woman rolls,” she said, and I tried to ignore the ribbing as I wiped the counter down. “She shouldn’t be going in at all, but she is. We’ll adapt.”
    “Yeah, the angrier she gets, the more the bad guys suffer,” Jenks said, his pride obvious. “And they are going to suffer this time, baby!”
    I frowned, unable to meet Wayde’s disapproving eyes as I tucked Jenks’s toad-lily flowers in a cupboard to dry. I wasn’t proud of that part of my personality—especially since I didn’t have much magic anymore to back up what came out of my mouth. “I’m not angry,” I said, shutting the cupboard with a thump.
    “Yes, you are.”
    “I am not angry!” I shouted.
    Bis made a small noise from the fridge, and Ivy looked up from her computer. Her eyes going to Jenks, she clicked her security back on, stood, and stretched. “Excuse me,” she said, and left. Bis followed, clinging to the ceiling like a chagrined bat, Belle in a crook of his tail.
    “Jenks!” Ivy shouted from the hall.
    “What?” he shouted, hands on his hips. “She says she’s not angry!”
    Damn it, I hadn’t meant to push Ivy’s buttons. “Look,” I said as I brought my attention up to find Wayde waiting. “You haven’t really given this much thought, have you?” I said softly. “What’s really going on here.”
    “Now you’re in for it,” Jenks said, hovering backward, enjoying this.
    Wayde’s posture shifted, and somewhat uneasy, he said, “I saw the man at the park. You need to back off and let someone else do this.”
    More tired than angry, I shook my head. Weres were not known for looking at the big picture, focused more on the here and now. They made great bodyguards and crime scene techs, but not so much so when it came to extrapolating. “HAPA is trying to make a source of demon blood so they can have their own magic. What do you think will happen if they’re successful and humans can do demon magic at will? With a cost they don’t believe in and a risk they can’t see?”
    Wayde made a “so what” face at me, but I could see him thinking, and when he seemed to sober, I backed off, satisfied.
    “Who is going to control them if they’re successful?” I said, tossing the rag into the soapy water to make it splash. “Who’s going to keep them from wiping us out species by species? Not me. We aren’t prepared for a new demographic of magic-using humans who are sadistic, power hungry, don’t like Inderlanders, and see genocide as an acceptable form of communication.” My head hurt, and I put a damp hand to it, smelling the fresh scent of soap. “At least demons have some sense of fair play.”
    I couldn’t believe the words coming out of my mouth, but it was true. Their morals might not match ours, but demons did have them. Demons had them . . . These humans did not. What is wrong with this picture?
    “Demons enslave people,” Wayde said. He was taking bowls out of an adjacent cupboard, but hungry was the last thing I was.
    “Not as many as you think. And they don’t snatch innocents, only people who have made themselves available.” My head hurt, and I opened my charm cupboard for a pain amulet. “I need to call Trent.”
    Jenks flew over from Ivy’s monitor, and his sparkles seemed to make my headache worse. “Why? You think he might side with you?”
    My headache eased as my fingers touched the amulet, and I shut the cabinet, Jenks darting out of the way with time to spare. “Yes, I do, actually,” I said calmly as I tucked the amulet underneath my shirt. Trent played in the genetic pool like a lifeguard. He might be able to shed a little light on the situation, maybe give me an idea as to how close HAPA might be. Besides, I wanted to know if he was missing any equipment and if he had an antimemory charm.
    Wayde shoved a bowl of chili at me, his eyes down and his back hunched. “Here,” he said as I fumbled to take it. “If you’re going to fight bad guys, you might want to eat.”
    I looked down at the bowl, then up at him, reading his distress. He wasn’t happy about me working this run—hell, I wasn’t happy about working this run—but he’d help me now instead