Lately I’d been working less—only three days a week, and just one of those shifts kept me until closing time at two. When Kar Yee and I first opened Tambuku two years back, I’d bartended six nights a week, usually working twelve-hour days. Then I met Lon. The drive from Tambuku to my house in Morella was fifteen minutes; the drive from Tambuku to Lon’s house in La Sirena was half an hour, or longer, depending on traffic.

I hadn’t slept at my own house in weeks—not since the demon Lord Chora disabled my house wards. But walking into the Butler home at three in the morning wasn’t working for any of us; Lon was a walking zombie on photo shoots and I sometimes went days without seeing Jupe, since I was sleeping when he was getting ready for school and already at work when he came home.

Lon never complained or asked me to change my schedule. But Jupe was vocal enough for the both of them, griping that his fourteen-year-old self was turning into a “latchkey kid.” I’m not sure where he heard that phrase, but it made me feel guilty enough to change my work schedule. After all, I was half-owner, and the bar was successful. We could afford another bartender. Kar Yee wasn’t working more than three shifts a week after recently promoting our lead server Amanda to assistant manager. Amanda liked closing and Kar Yee was starting to trust her with the Holy Bank Deposit, miracle of miracles. Everyone was happy.

One of those happy people marched down Tambuku’s cement steps into our basement entrance. With an aqua-blue halo and a fuck-off stare that could make Dirty Harry flinch, Kar Yee was my best friend and co-owner of Tambuku.

The Chinese expat nodded at a couple of regulars who were playing the vintage Tahiti Tropicana pinball machine that Jupe had found online. The boy had a major crush on Kar Yee and went to extravagant lengths to hatch excuses to talk to her. His latest ploy was scouring eBay and other sites for Tiki-themed junk. The Tahiti Tropicana was from the seventies and showcased two half-undressed island babes; one flipper stuck whenever you tried to hit one of the chipped silver balls. The old machine was an eyesore, but Kar Yee loved the damn thing: it averaged twenty dollars of quarters every day.

Kar Yee plopped down on a spinning stool and propped her elbows on the bamboo bar top. “It’s dead already?”

“Been dead for an hour.” Which is exactly how long ago I’d shut off the canned music. Only so many times you can hear “Mele Kalikimaka,” the so-called Hawaiian Christmas song, before wanting to stab sharp objects into your ear. “However, we did have an office party earlier that dropped several hundred.”

She twisted one of the two pointy locks of hair that extended past the severe line of her bob. “I’ll start on the receipts in a minute.”

I eyed two guys who walked into the bar. Their faces were covered in stage makeup: one was painted to look like a reindeer with a red nose and the other was either supposed to be an elf . . . or a robot wearing an elf hat. Either way, his ears stuck out comically beneath it. I couldn’t tell if they’d been at some lame holiday party or if they’d been part of a stage production of The Nutcracker Suite, but I could tell from the slight build of their bodies that they had a fifty-fifty chance of being legal.

And if they thought they were going to pass off fake IDs, they could think again.

“Where’s Doctor Feelgood?” Kar Yee asked.

Her nickname for Bob, a thirty-something Hawaiian shirt–wearing Earthbound who’d spent most of his nights at Tambuku since the first day we opened. Bob’s father was a popular Earthbound doctor here in Morella before he passed away, and Bob inherited a milder version of the man’s healing knack.

“He was in here a second ago,” I said, then gestured toward the arched hallway at the back of the bar, where our TV hung under a net of twinkling white lights. “Maybe in the restroom.”

“I pulled a muscle,” Kar Yee complained, rubbing her shoulder.

“Oh, I’m sure he’ll be more than happy to put his hands on you.”

Kar Yee’s kohl-rimmed eyes narrowed. “Bob needs a girlfriend. Hell, I need somebody, too. Looks like you’re the only lucky one for a change. By the way, I know a secret you don’t know.”

I stared at her. “What secret?”

“Just a little something,” she said enigmatically, with a teasing lilt to her voice. “A surprise. My future boyfriend told me.”

“Oh, that reminds me . . .” I leaned down beneath the bar and rummaged around for a small package. “Someone asked me to give this to you.”

Kar Yee reluctantly accepted the gift. It was bundled in Cthulhu print wrapping paper, complete with green tentacles—and way too much tape. Her face relaxed when she read the sloppy, hand-printed label. “A present from Jupe?”

“He says you can’t open it before Christmas.”

She shook it near her ear and grinned. “What is it?”

“Not telling, but it’s pretty sweet.”

“I have to know. Don’t tell him I opened it early.” She tore into the wrapping and pulled out a small wooden box. Inside sat a small figurine carved from wood: a beautiful but strange female with long robes and a gold and silver mask painted over her face. “It’s a traditional Chinese opera character,” she said in small voice. “My mother loves the opera.”

“Jupe said gold and silver would be someone supernatural. A demon.”

She turned it in her hands, seeing the green disk that had been placed over the crown of the figure’s head. “It represents me.” As she grinned, two deep dimples appeared in her cheeks.