“Am I the only one on this ship who’s treating this trip as time away from the office?” She did up the last button on her blouse and let her hands drop.
“Who said my work wasn’t to do with our current venture?”
“And here I thought you just wanted to get out of going to the gym with us.” She bared her teeth in an almost friendly smile.
“You saw through me that easily?” He laughed. “If you find yourself abandoned again, you should look for Mrs. Smith. She would enjoy having someone new to complain to.”
“Not the Tourneurs?”
He looked thoughtful. “A strange couple. I have never known carrion birds to approach before the slaughter. Then again…”
“So long as thatSteveykeeps out of my way.”
He looked at her in surprise. “That will not be a problem, I think.”
“Why? You think he’s going to keep his head down?”
“I think he is dead.”
She stopped. White-hot shock seared through her. “What?”
“Was that too abrupt? My apologies. We are all dancing around the facts. I forgot my part.” His smile hardened, and something flashed behind his eyes. “I wonder—”
He stopped, his gaze going cloudy. Was he speaking to someone else? Or listening? It was as though someone had interrupted him partway through talking.
Francine concentrated. She couldn’t sense anyone else nearby, unless—there.The hint of a psychic buzz at the edge of her awareness. A telepathic whisper she wasn’t meant to hear.
Whoever was talking to Nikolaidis didn’t want to be seen. Were they using one of Julian’s scales?
Anger boiled through her.
“And here we are,” Nikolaidis announced.
She blinked. They were outside her suite. When had that happened?
*What was that about?*Julian asked as she shut the suite door behind herself. He looked damp, as though he’d taken the opportunity to shower while she was out.
She hoped he’d eaten, too. They both needed his dragon back in shape, as fast as possible.
She began to reply telepathically, then thoughtthe hell with it.Nikolaidis was right about everyone dancing around the facts; they all knew why they were here, didn’t they? They knew the goal, and they knew the risks.
“I think someone’s started killing the other guests already.”
13
Julian
His mate was correct.
He flinched.Francinewas correct. He needed to stop thinking of the statuesque woman sitting at the table in front of him as his mate. Not even in the privacy of his own head.
But that didn’t change the fact that she was right.
There was one fewer place setting at the dining table that night.
Eloise, at the head of the table. Francine to her right, with Mrs. Smith and the secretive Mr. Nikolaidis next to her. On the opposite side of the table, the French couple sat either side of the boar shifter’s friend.
He looked as though he knew he was trapped.
