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I side-eyed the jukebox, now playing a different tune in the background. Zee would never admit it, but Reynard’s gift might have been one of the best things to happen to the hotel.

I chinked my morning whiskey against Zee’s fancy, rainbow-colored cocktail. “To new beginnings.”

He grinned. “I can get behind that.”

It felt good, drinking with a friend in our own hotel—a business venture we’d brought to life, together.

Take that, Noreen Greene, and your Lost Cause news article.

I should have known it wouldn’t last.

CHAPTER 6

The day passed without incident. Reynard was absent, probably busy running his tech empire, which begged the same question—why was he staying at our hotel, when he surely had a luxury bed at home to crawl into after a long, hard day’s work? Did he have a partner to snuggle with? He didn’t seem the snuggling sort. Kids? Did vampires have kids, or did they infect each other with vampirism? Pets, then? I needed to check the Wilson’s Guide again, and focus.

A few minor problems kept me busy. Several tasks I’d asked Claymore to do hadn’t been done, including setting the gremlin traps in the attic. While up there—among the shadows, stacks of storage boxes, and cobwebs—I took a few minutes to stop at Zee’s perch, and peer out the window over San Francisco bay. I could see why he liked it up there, the view was stunning with the iconic Golden Gate Bridge in the distance.

Returning to the main hotel, I searched for Claymore. As a shy gargoyle, he usually lurked in the basement during the day, preferring to emerge at night to patrol the grounds. But he wasn’t there, and when I asked a few of the staff, nobody had seen him since the previous day. As a six-foot-tall, muscle-bound gargoyle, he was generally hard to miss.

As the evening drew in, I found Zee in the bar, hammering and clanging, putting together what appeared to be a stage he’d found somewhere. He mentioned he’d printed Noreen’s article, and left me to read it as he went back to fixing the stage boards in place.

Noreen’s article dismissed the SOS Hotel as a folly that was doomed to fail, despite the plucky, naïve human manager—me. Zee had been mentioned in passing as the ex-porn star, but most of the page had been dedicated to why Lord Victor Reynard would invest in such an obvious lost cause. Noreen asked the question as to whether he was taking on charity cases to clean the stains from his past.

What stains could those be? Vampires generally got a bad rep, since Hollywood had made them out to be vicious, blood-hungry zombies, or romantic emo teenagers. The truth, I figured, was probably nothing like those stereotypes.

Noreen went on to describe the vampire nobility ranks, baron being pretty low on the food chain, which was probably why he chose to go by Lord. But just as the details were getting juicy, the ink had faded on Zee’s printer, and the rest of the article had faded away.

“I’ll tell you all you want to know, you merely have to ask.”

Reynard’s smooth, articulate voice was made for radio, and announced his arrival by stroking some inner, hungry part of me, long before he sat in the opposite seat at my table. Mercy, he seemed to get more handsome every time I laid eyes on him. How did he keep his hair so smooth and straight? Maybe it was L’Oréal? Since he was definitely worth it.

“Hit the Road Jack” came on the jukebox, and a glance revealed Zee there, tail twitching, pretending he hadn’t noticed Reynard’s return.

“Do you like my gift, Adam?” He didn’t look over at the jukebox, also preferring to ignore the existence of the angry demon, and instead settled his silvery-eyed gaze on me. When Reynard looked at you, he made it seem as though nothing else existed. Just him and me, in this singular moment. And I was trapped, fixed in place, while that penetrating gaze rummaged around in my soul.

I cleared my throat, breaking eye contact. “It’s . . . very nice. Thank you.”

“But?”

There were so many buts. I didn’t want to appear rude, but . . . “If you’re going to stay here, you must accept that Zee is joint owner in this hotel, and while you clearly don’t like demons, this is half his house too.” My heart began to pound under the weight of his scrutinizing gaze. “And while we’re laying some ground rules, of course your gift is graciously accepted, providing there are no hidden motives behind your gifting it. Are there?”

His lips gradually lifted in a smile. “It’s as though you do not trust me, Adam.”

“It’s nothing personal. I don’t trust anyone.” Except Zee.

“And why is that?”

“Well, it’s just . . .” I teased a SOS Hotel cardboard drinks coaster between my fingers, keeping my eyes downcast so he couldn’t read them. “That’s just the way I am.”

“Intriguing.”

Was I? I thought I was the least intriguing thing in the hotel. I tried to be. But the way Reynard was looking at me, through me, trying to figure me out, suggested I needed to work a little harder at being average.

There was nothing to figure out.

I was just Adam.

“Is that a . . . pole?” Reynard asked.