In the middle of the night, Anita gets a call from Richard's younger brother, Daniel. Richard is in jail for rape, Anita can't believe it. She hires an expensive lawyer for him and starts packing. Jean-Claude makes his only appearance in the book before Anita leaves. It seems Mr. Dark-Handsome-Sexy-Vampire is afraid Anita will make-up with Richard if she goes to Tennessee to help him and will therefore leave him. Anita actually has to comfort Jean-Claude.
Anita using her great diplomatic skills manages to piss off the Master Vampire of the area Richard is in even before she leaves. Colin, the Master Vampire, doesn't want Anita there because when two people in a triumvirate are together they can do a lot of damage even if they don't have the third there. Colin's afraid they will try to take over his territory. Anita tells him she's coming anyway. This upsets Jean-Claude that she endangered all three of them because of her temper. He assembles an entourage of body guards for her to take. This entourage includes: Asher, Damian, Nathaniel, Zane, Cherry, and Jason. They take his private jet to Tennessee and then the fun really begins.
In broad daylight after Anita talks to Richard and his lawyer she can Jason get attacked by a bunch of local hicks. The police department is looking the other way, so a werewolf sent to watch over Richard, Shang-Da, kind of helps them out. The three of them beat the hicks, they aren't about to win any popularity contests with the locals.
It also comes to Anita's attention, thru a variety of sources, that Richard has been sleeping around. Can she say anything about it? No. Does it bother her? Hell, YES!
We find out the real reason Richard is in jail is because of his research on trolls is getting support. Which would be fine, if the land the trolls were living on weren't wanted by the local cops for some reason. So, after they threaten Richard and he doesn't leave, they have a girl he used to date cry wolf (pun intended) to get him put away in the slammer and out of their way. Of course they weren't counting on Anita coming down to rescue him. Not to mention that there is a blue moon coming (2 full moons in the same month), so of course Anita gets to wade through some pack politics as well.
Pretty soon the Feds show up as well because of a dead body in the woods. It looks like someone is sacrificing people to demons to gain power. It pretty much is infered that a dirty businessman, Franklin Niley, and a sorceror, Linus Beck, are behind the sacrifice. They are also the people paying off the cops to give the trolls a bad rep, so they can seize the land the trolls live on.
Also, in here I believe I mentioned earlier is pack business. Since, Richard is a visiting pack leader he has to observe certain protocol with the local pack. However, that is made hard considering his family is in town and he doesn't want them to find out. The only person in his family who seems to know that Richard is a werewolf is Daniel. Anyway, Anita gets dragged into this pack stuff because she's still Richard's lupa. One good thing that comes out of it is she meets Marianne, a type of magical consultant the local pack has. Marianne acts as a mentor to Anita, trying to help her control Raina's muin (spirit) who likes to possess Anita at the worst times. One such time Raina takes over so completely she makes Anita pretty much the sex object of the pack. I can't really explain it but it is basically a plot device that Ms. Hamilton invented so Anita could make love to Richard.
A little more is revealed about Jean-Claude in this book as well. Through Damian, who is now animated by Anita's power by some weird form of necromacy, we learn that Jean-Claude is an incubus. It means he can feed off of not only sex, but sexual energy like lust. Now, I'm sorry to insult anyone who was caught off guard by this revelation but I didn't find it that surprising. Throughout all of the books Jean-Claude has always been depicted as this sexual being who looks like he stepped out of a wet dream, the only thing LKH did was put a name to what he does and is. Anyway, that's just MHO.
I'm sorry if I've confused more than explained this book, just know that it is a very interesting and entertaining book as well as very complicated. I can't wait till the next one!
Get your own Free Home Page