Secrets in the Shadows by Jenna Black

heaved a sigh. “You see that policeman over there? The one writing out a ticket? Well, that’s my car.” With the clock ticking, she’d finally decided an illegal parking spot would have to do, and she’d parked smack dab in front of a fire hydrant.
    Drake actually smiled at that. “I’d change his mind for you, but I’d have to let go of Jules and I don’t think that’s a good idea right now.”
    She glanced at Jules and his slack jaw and shivered. “You going to keep him like that indefinitely?”
    “Tempting,” he muttered under his breath. “No,” he said aloud. “Just till we get back to the hotel. Let’s skip the car. We don’t want to be talking to cops right now.”
    With the highly illegal concealed weapon on her person, and a PI license that would be revoked in a heartbeat if she was caught with it, Hannah had to agree, so the three of them strolled right on past her car. It wasn’t that far to the hotel anyway.
    “So,” Drake said, “I was expecting to find Jules alone. What are you doing here?”
    “Carolyn was afraid Jules was going to do something stupid like this, so she sent me to look after him. You know, make sure he didn’t accidentally fry in his hotel room, stuff like that. What’s your story?”
    “Eli sent me to haul Jules back to Philly.”
    Hannah bit her lip, remembering Jules’s assertion that Eli would kill him if he ever went back to Philly. Was he right? Or had that just been a bad case of paranoia?
    They walked in silence the rest of the way to the hotel. By the time they stepped into the elevator, she noticed Drake’s bruises were completely gone.

Chapter 7
    People looked at Ian strangely as he staggered and stumbled down the street toward the house, his hands, under Camille’s command, cutting off most of his air. Gabriel met him halfway, grabbing his upper arm in a brutally hard grip and dragging him along.
    Ian cursed his moron of a fledgling, and he cursed the interfering mortal who’d stopped him from getting his satisfaction. Despite the distraction of Camille’s forceful summons, he’d taken a long, hard look at the mortal. He would recognize her if he saw her again, and he would make her suffer for what she’d done.
    And Jules! Who’d ever guess the bastard was stupid enough to have come down here alone? No, he was supposed to bring a nice, big squad of Guardians with him, and they were supposed to find the house that, on paper, Ian still owned. And they were supposed to kill the bitch who lived there! Leave it to Jules to fuck everything up so thoroughly.
    Gabriel ushered him into the living room, then gave him a shove that left him lying face down at Camille’s feet. At least she finally let up on making him choke himself. He lay still, sucking in air, grateful to be alive, not sure how long that would last, seething with fury that his plan had failed.
    “I thought you were supposed to be hunting me up a juicy morsel for dinner,” Camille said. “Yes, I specifically remember asking you to do that for me. And yet, it seems that you had other priorities.”
    The bitch was too lazy to do her own hunting half the time. And, unlike Ian, she was picky. Male or female, her meals had to be pretty or she’d throw a fit.
    Camille hadn’t given him permission to get up, so Ian remained prone at her feet. “I was hunting for you,” he lied. “I’d found one I thought you would like and was bringing her back when Jules found me.”
    “Jules found you?” she said, her voice dripping with incredulity. “Sit up so I can see your eyes.”
    He sat up and obediently met her eyes. She thought her ability to read his eyes was infallible, but she was wrong. Years of trial and error had taught him how to mask his thoughts with reasonable success. He did his best now to project sincerity even as he frantically planned his next steps. He might convince her for the time being, but that was unlikely to last.
    Camille sat back, looking disappointed that she had