Consciousness returned with the slow brightening of the rising sun.

First, I was aware that I lay in a large, warm, deliciously comfortable bed; second, that I was not alone in it. An arm encircled my waist, and a pair of long legs tangled with mine.

Half asleep, I smiled and allowed myself to bask in the unexpected comfort of Jamie's embrace.

He rarely showed such physical affection. Typically—when our schedules aligned and when we were both in the mood—he'd down a few beers, fuck me silly (or, less often, let me fuck him), then roll away from me and pass out. I couldn't remember waking up in bed with him before.

It was nice. Strange of him to do so now, seeing as he was dead, but nice.

The thought drifted through my mind like a scrap of burning paper on a mischievous breeze. Then it came to settle like a hot ember on bare skin and, abruptly, I was wide awake.

Rolling over, I found myself staring into a pair of yellow, catlike eyes.

"Good morning, sunshine," Ro said, and grinned.

With a yelp, I scrambled away from him, got tangled in the sheets, and fell off the side of the bed.

He leaned over and frowned down at me, his long hair falling forward in a dark cascade.

"Is that not the proper morning salutation among humans?" he asked.

I scowled. "Among serial killers, maybe. I thought you said you'd stay in cat form."

After convincing me to sleep in my dead father's bed (having applied his miraculous cleaning skills once again) Ro had retaken his feline shape, assuring me he'd be perfectly comfortable curled up on the cushion of an upholstered chair.

"I got cold," he said easily. "There was plenty of room to share."

"Says you," I grumbled, getting to my feet.

Ro sat cross-legged on the bed, leaning his elbows on his knees and resting his chin in his hands. He wore nothing but a pair of black underwear. Slipping the leash of my self-control, my eyes roamed his lean, toned form, from his trim torso to his muscled shoulders and gracefully long limbs.

Catching myself, I turned swiftly away, struck through with a sharp pang of guilt.

A moment ago, I'd thought he was Jamie. Now I recalled, in full and grisly detail, that Jamie was dead, and that it was my fault.

If I'd just played Mr. Walters's game, he wouldn't have fired me. If he hadn't fired me, I wouldn't have come home early and interrupted Jamie's fun with Mr. Knots. If I hadn't interrupted him, I wouldn't have stormed out of our apartment and run away. And if I hadn't run away, I'd have been there when whoever—or whatever—had shown up to kill me, and...

"He'd still be dead," Ro said, surprising me.

"What?"

"You're blaming yourself for your not-cheating not-boyfriend's death, aren't you? I can see it on your face. You're surprisingly easy to read."

I frowned. "But—"

"But nothing. If you'd been there, the only difference is that you'd be dead, too. So, you see, what seemed like a lot of bad luck was actually good luck in the end. For you, obviously. Not for the other fellow. But that's fate for you. Your alarm doesn't go off, and you miss an important appointment; little do you know, you also miss getting turned to road paté by the bus that would have run you over if you'd been on time. That's why the wise take such turns in stride—don't get upset over the little things."

"I don't think getting fired and cheated on are 'little things,'" I said.

He lifted his brows. "Compared to being eaten by a demonic hyena?"

Maybe he had a point, but it didn't do anything to assuage my guilt. I turned my attention back to the matter of waking up next to him.

"If you wanted a bed, why didn't you make up the spare room, too?" I asked, retrieving my clothes from a neat pile on a chair. I didn't remember folding them.

He shrugged. "Why bother? This bed is big enough for two."

"Do daemons even need to sleep?"

"Not exactly as humans do, but yes. Rest restores our energies in much the same way."

"Did you sleep with my father?"

The words escaped me before I could stop myself, and my face heated with embarrassment as I realized it might be taken two ways.

Ro made a sound of disgust that answered both. "As if I would."

Suddenly curious, I asked, "Why did you hate him so much?"

Something in Ro's expression closed off, like curtains dropped behind his eyes, leaving them with a blank, empty look.

"Lots of reasons," he murmured. Then he blinked, and his expression cleared. "None of which are relevant right now. Come on. Let's get dressed. We've a long day ahead of us."

"We... do?"

He unfolded himself from his seated position and got to his feet, stretching lazily, and giving me a clear view of the whole, leanly muscled length of him. The unavoidable comparison to my own scrawniness didn't help my self-confidence at all.

"We do," he said. "I wouldn't know where to begin teaching you, so I'm bringing you to someone who will. A witch I trust."

"Do I have a say in the matter?" I asked, hearing a note of petulance in my tone.

He grinned carnivorously. "Sure. What do you say, Ellie?"

I opened my mouth, thought for a moment, and shut it again.

He sauntered towards me with a dangerous smirk on his lips. I took a step back, trying not to look at his still mostly naked body, and suddenly very aware that he was quite a bit taller and larger than me—at least in this form. He stopped with his chest nearly touching mine, my bundled clothes held up like a shield between us.

"That's what I thought," he said. "Let's get something straight, shall we? You're my witch—for now—and it's my aim to keep you safe. You got lucky last night, discovering your gift like you did. Don't count on it happening again. You'll be dead in a day without me. So until you know which end of the wand is up, so to speak, you do what I say, immediately, and without question. Understand?"

I nodded, taken aback and feeling a bit like a mouse cornered by a cat.

"Good." He smiled, tucking his fingers beneath my chin and forcing me to look up at him. "You're my ticket off this wretched sphere. I'd hate to lose you," he said.

Then, abruptly, he turned away and began to dress himself.

Confused, and still conscious of his eyes on me, I took my clothes and retreated to the bathroom. Thankfully, they really were my clothes, too, and not my dad's old things. I'd brought a few outfits over to have on hand at the weekends, when I'd been spending all my time here, cleaning up the place.

I pulled on the pair of mint-green skinny jeans, the long-sleeved t-shirt, and the soft, lavender-colored sweater that hung halfway to my knees, and studied myself critically in the mirror. The face that stared back at me was pale and a little pinched, with lingering traces of emotional shock. Understandable for the morning after the worst day of my life, I thought.

I brushed my teeth and washed my face, and splashed some water through my unevenly cut hair. I'd asked for something 'kind of androgynous' the last time I'd been to the salon, and the stylist had given me a pixie cut. She said it brought out my cheekbones and made me look like a model or something. I thought she was full of it.

The only thing I modeled was failure.

I wouldn't fail Ro, though, I decided, meeting my drab, gray-green eyes in the mirror. Whether he was a figment of a broken mind, or—as I'd barely convinced myself—part of a whole new reality, I'd set us both free of my father's legacy.

With this resolution, I donned my rainbow socks and rejoined him in the outer room.

Dressed once more in his impeccable black clothes, he looked me up and down, one slender brow arching high.

Not caring for popular opinion, I didn't pay any attention to what section of the department store I shopped in—men's or women's, I just bought what I liked—but his raw scrutiny rubbed the last of my thin patience clean off.

"What are you looking at?" I snapped, dropping to sit on the end of the bed as I pulled my black canvas high-tops on and laced them.

He blinked slowly. "You, obviously."

I scoffed. "Well, look at something else. There's nothing to see, anyway."

"Who told you that?" he asked, his tone strangely soft and curious.

"Um, mirrors?"

"Mirrors lie. Deceptive bastards."

I looked up in surprise. "What?"

Rather than answer, he jerked his head towards the door, making his long hair swish. I wondered how he kept it so perfect all the time. Probably a daemon thing.

"Breakfast," he said. "Then we meet Janelle."

"Who's Janelle?"

"Your new teacher, if you're lucky," he said. "A scrubbed memory, if you're not. Your worst nightmare, probably, either way."

Not at all reassured, but remembering my pledge to myself, I pinched my lips shut and followed him from the room.