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“You can go alone, but forgive me . . . which one of us has more experience in the court of business?”

He made everything sound so reasonable. Zee would say no. I could hear him now, emphatically urging me not to accept Reynard’s help. “What’s the catch?”

“No catch. As I said before, I have an interest in the hotel succeeding, and to that end, I want to help where I can.”

He just said all of that with a perfectly straight face, and stood there, looking perfect and impeccable in his dark suit and buffed shoes. Nobody was that perfect. What was he hiding? “Tell me why you’re staying here. Who are you hiding from?”

He breathed in and sighed through his nose. “Very well. My family have certain . . . expectations.” He picked at an invisible speck of dust on his sleeve. “Expectations I’ve tried to avoid, but blood ties are not easily severed.”

This had to be a vampire nobility thing. But that was fine. I didn’t need to know any more, just that he had a genuine reason for helping. And I couldn’t deny, he’d definitely be of help when facing off against Gideon Cain—billionaire to billionaire.

“Do you think he’ll meet with me?” I asked.

“Not if he’s involved in all this. But he will meet with me.” A sneaky smile crept onto Reynard’s thin lips. “He doesn’t have to know you’re coming along.”

Did I really think Gideon Cain was capable of murder just to see my hotel fail? At the very least, we could meet with him and see what his intentions were, if he had any.

Reynard nodded. “I’ll have my people set up a meeting.”

It sounded as though this was happening, but I really needed to run it by Zee before he got the wrong idea about me working with Reynard.

He should have been back by now . . .

CHAPTER 8

“Can we swing by Runo real quick?” I asked, climbing into the back of Reynard’s luxury black sedan the next morning. Reynard was already seated inside, his long, lean body poured over the leather like a professional photoshoot for Business Man Monthly.

When I closed the door, the traffic noise vanished, as though I’d stepped into a vacuum-sealed room.

“Runo?” he asked.

“It won’t take long.” Zee still hadn’t returned. The last time I’d seen him, he hadn’t been all that upset, other than believing he’d enthralled me. But it had been too long now. We had a business to run. He couldn’t keep running off whenever we had any little setback.

“Take us to Runo,” Reynard ordered the driver.

“Alright, sir,” his driver acknowledged, peeling the car out into traffic.

Did Reynard know what Runo was infamous for? Perhaps it was best I didn’t mention it until we were there, since he didn’t get along with demons. It wasn’t as though he had to leave the car. Just a few minutes visit, that was all . . .

The car rumbled through early morning San Francisco, blacked-out windows hiding us from prying eyes. The thick silence suggested the car was warded, but against what, I couldn’t be sure. Perhaps it was to hide the screams of Reynard’s victims? I discreetly kept an eye on him in the corner of my vision.

Outside the hotel, I was potentially vulnerable to Reynard’s vampiric abilities, although it was up for debate whether his charms would work on me—same as Zee’s allure hadn’t worked, despite what he believed. But Reynard had other abilities, and outside the reach of Madame Matase’s wards, he was free to wield them.

We drove by a roadsign for Runo. Someone had slapped red paint over it that read: Demontown.

“Imaginative,” Reynard remarked.

“Any particular location?” the driver asked.

“Uh, yes, Razorsedge?” I said. The driver glanced in the rear view mirror, eyes widening. “Do you know it?”

“Yeah.” He didn’t add anything more. Which said a lot.

“What is Razorsedge?” Reynard asked, picking up on the man’s strange tone. His curious gaze slid to me.

“A club where Zee worked. He uh . . . I haven’t seen him for a while and he might be there. It won’t take long.”

“Is his absence unusual?” Reynard asked, as the car pulled to a stop outside the club.