The dented footlocker in the rear of Marcus’s Jeep contained a plethora of useful roadside items–a flashlight and batteries, first aid kit, road flares, and bottled water. In the compartment beneath it, Tybalt found the more useful items–binoculars, two Bowie knives, a pair of Glocks, and four clips of ammunition. He helped himself to the binoculars, one of the knives, and a Glock as backup for his own weapon, which was down to only six bullets.

Tybalt put Intimidation Tactics 101 to good use at the Vinyl Store. The clerk behind the dingy counter had at least a dozen needle marks hidden beneath his long-sleeved, flannel shirt, and it only took one painful twist of his wrist and a single threat of police involvement before the boy showed them the basement door. He also babbled half a dozen confessions, ranging from selling his blood to the Halfies after he’d shot up with heroin–which apparently gave the Halfies quite a high–to stealing a walker from his ancient next door neighbor. The walker made no sense, but Tybalt had learned long ago to not bother questioning the motivations of a junkie.

No red-blooded male, however suspicious or selfish, can resist the helpless smile of a beautiful woman–or so Astrid told him when she insisted that she knock on Castle’s apartment door and beguile her way inside. And she had a point, though Tybalt loathed to admit it. She wasn’t the awkward teenager he’d loved. He saw the changes in the way she walked, her shoulders back and steps firm. Her voice was clear and demanding, instead of timid and asking. Her eyes worried him the most, rimmed with a suspicion she directed at everyone, himself included.

Closing his eyes for a moment, Tybalt pinched the bridge of his nose. It was all he could do to curb his rising temper. He had half a mind to knock Marcus down and beat him until the entire story poured out in a single chunk, rather than in frustrating drips and drabs. Tybalt had worked so hard to ferret away his anger and hide his pain at losing the only relationships in his life that had mattered–until he found the Triads and new friendships that helped him thrive, that is. But Marcus had chipped into his careful control in only a few minutes.

No matter the care he took in his approach to the empty lot beneath the freeway overpass, Tybalt Monahan knew his arrival would be detected. He moved forward on soundless feet, keeping his breathing low and controlled, even though his stomach had twisted into a cold knot of trepidation. Three a.m. meetings in the dark underbelly of Mercy’s Lot were not unusual for him as a Triad Hunter, and Tybalt had been trained relentlessly in self-defense and attack techniques. He could handle himself against anything, human or otherwise, that chose to pop out of the shadows.