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“As if a piece of fucking paper changes what’s rightfully mine.” Garrett snarled. “I’m owed this, and I think you forget that this room is full of my people, not yours. They aren’t going to just let you take it from me.”

“It was never yours!” Elsie shouted, turning a couple of heads. “You snake!”

“Hey, that’s not cool, Els,” Ren said, stepping up to me to back me up and get in Garrett’s face. “Snakes are intelligent predators. Garrett is just an entitled prick who doesn’t deserve to share the same last name as Cherie, much less a part of her legacy.”

“Besides,” I cut in, shaking the paper in front of the vampire’s nose with a grin. “That’s exactly what this piece of paper does, dumbass. I’m going to need you and your guests to vacate the premises immediately.”

“We aren’t going anywhere,” Garrett snapped, making a bid to grab the page from me. His mistake was coming at me with human speed, allowing me to pull back just in time, leveling him with a flat glare.

“I mean it, get the fuck out.”

“Or what?”

“Or…” I glanced at Ren, floundering a little to come up with an adequate threat that I could make against a vampire.

Being a human at that moment was actually a fucking crock of shit.

Ren nodded toward Garrett encouragingly, her jaw set.

“Or what, juice box?” he asked again.

My eyes moved back to him, stepping up angrily and backing him slightly into the wall—the red lever just beside him catching my attention.

“Or I’ll fucking make you.”

Garrett moved so fast none of us had time to react, grabbing me by the front of my shirt so roughly my feet nearly left the floor as he slammed my back into the wall.

“I’m getting real fuckin’ tired of your attitude,” he snarled. “Is that any way to talk to a man on his birthday?”

Ren reacted immediately, a hand going around Garrett’s neck and squeezing, with Elsie’s sparkly baby pink nail polish catching the lights as she tried to pry his hand away from me.

“Let go!” she insisted.

Like anything they did didn’t matter at all, Garrett bore down on me.

Panic flared to life in my belly, the memory of that vampire in the alleyway now fresh in my mind—but instead of succumbingto the fear that should have made my stomach drop and fingers shake, I was just… angry.

Angry at Garrett for feeling so entitled to the life Cherie built for us that he’d tried to steal it out from under our noses.

Angry that he was faster and stronger than me only because he’d made the change.

And, fuck it, I was angry he was stressing out my coven.

My hand found the wall blindly, sliding along its smooth expanse as I missed my target.

“Get out,” I snapped one last time as my hand found its mark on the second try, fingers curling around the cool metal and pulling down.

An alarm blared to life instantly, shrieking over the pounding of the music in a teeth-jittering wail. Ren’s fist found the side of Garrett’s face, his hand slackening around my shirt as he staggered to the side to be bumped and shoved by his party guests as they began to run for the exit, spurred on by a cascade of frigid water coming from the sprinklers overhead.

Elsie squealed, putting her arms up to try and shield her face and hair as bodies collided with our little group, rounding us to head upstairs.

Garrett recovered, making a move toward Ren that was impeded by Dana’s firm grip on his shoulder, shoving him hard toward the way the crowd was going—the door.

“I think you were told it’s time to get the fuck out,” she snapped.

“Yeah,” Elsie said, her bubbly little voice unusually harsh. “The owner kicked you out, Garrett. Don’t come back.”

“You’ve never been welcome here,” Ren added. “That won’t change now.”