“Young woman.” His voice stopped her cold as he turned and looked at her face-to-face. “You’ve been through a disturbing experience. I’ll make allowances for that. But don’t think for a moment that you are my equal simply because you bear your father’s name. I’m the Council’s President and you are its youngest member, and you haven’t earned the right to address me by my given name, let alone speak to me in that manner.”
She was now seriously pissed, but he held up his hand. “If you intend to make an enemy of me so early in your career, you’re not just rude, you’re ignorant.”
Sailor closed her mouth, anger and embarrassment fighting it out inside her.
“Word of this must not get out,” he continued, “or you will cause a great deal of damage. Keep your mouth shut. You should stay out of sight, as well. Your eyes will attract attention.”
“Shouldn’t you be worried I’ll transmit the disease to the Elven?”
His eyes narrowed. “Naturally,” he said, and looked at his watch. “I’ll call for a Council meeting within twenty-four hours, and you’ll hear from me in the next twelve. Until then, stay home. I’ll send my own physician to your house tomorrow to examine you. Where are you parked?”
“I don’t need an escort, thank you.”
“Then I’ll return to the concert, where my absence will have been noted. You’ll have been recognized, as well. That’s how rumors begin. It was an unfortunate move on your part, coming here. That’s why it’s imperative you go home now. I’ll have to do some damage control.”
“I’m sure you’re quite capable of it. Sir,” she added, with as much sarcasm as she could fit into one syllable. She walked away before he could respond, pleased to have the last word.
Go home? Ha. She had things to do, and going home was far down on the list.
Declan knocked on the door of the first of the two guesthouses he came to, interrupting what he imagined to be the early stages of foreplay between Rhiannon Gryffald, the Canyon vampire Keeper, and Brodie McKay, her Elven lover. He was on good terms with both, so he spent a minute in friendly conversation before saying to Rhiannon, “Where’s your cousin?”
“Which one?” she asked, innocence written all over her lovely face.
“Sailor.”
“Oh.” She smiled. “Work, I expect. She waits tables at the House of Illusion. The late shift.”
She went to work? In her condition? Declan hid his reaction and asked, “Did you see her tonight?”
Rhiannon hesitated for a fraction of a second. “We don’t run into each other as much as you’d think.”
Declan saw Brodie raise an eyebrow, which told Declan a several things: Rhiannon knew about the attack on Sailor, but she wasn’t about to tell him, because she hadn’t even told her fiancé. And her fiancé, who happened to be a cop, would no doubt ask her why she’d just lied to a friend and fellow Keeper as soon as Declan was out the door.
And if Rhiannon was able to keep secrets from an Elven who would be looking her right in the eye, she was very talented indeed. Telepathy through eye contact was an Elven specialty, right up there with a strong sexual appetite. Declan wondered how his friends would reconcile the two tonight.
“Thanks,” he said. “Have a nice evening.”
The House of Illusion sat atop a hill on Hollywood Boulevard, east of Laurel Canyon. It was fully illuminated in all its medieval glory, turrets and battlements beckoning tourists and natives, skeptics and believers, devotees and the merely curious.
Declan had a soft spot in his heart for the place, having first seen it as an eighteen-year-old on his first night in L.A. He’d since outgrown its brooding kitschiness, but the tapestries, silvery mirrors and brocade sofas gave him a feeling of history, of Olde England, even—were he sentimental—of homesickness. Many of the furnishings had come from the British Isles, from castles fallen on hard times. The stained glass and stone fireplaces retained bits of history and, in some cases, magic.
The bar was an ornately carved mahogany affair, and Dennis, the gnome tending it, dressed for the period in a striped shirt and high-waisted trousers with suspenders. Declan would never require a uniform for his own waitstaff, and the guy had his sympathy.
Declan took a seat at a barstool, ordered a club soda and said, “Do you know a waitress named Sailor Gryffald?”
Dennis said, “Sailor? Sure. She’s due in—” He glanced at the clock behind the bar. “Seven minutes ago.”
Sailor had made the trip up the long winding drive to the House of Illusion more times than she could count. As a child she’d come with her parents, eyes wide, heart pounding, both terrified and mesmerized by the gargoyles, the heavy wooden doors, the moat that snaked around the castle. These days she didn’t drive over the ornate drawbridge that was the public entrance but around the back to employee parking.
Her waitress training had required her to memorize the history of the place, some of which overlapped with her family history. Ivan Schwartz, its founder, was the magician who went by the stage name of Merlin and was now their family ghost-in-residence. His star was rising in the 1920s, when he built not only the House of Illusion, but the House of the Rising Sun estate, his personal kingdom. He was a social creature, keeping friends in residence, foremost among them Rhys Gryffald, Sailor’s grandfather, for whom he’d designed Gwydion’s Cave. But whereas Rising Sun was welcoming even in its current state of semi-decay, the House of Illusion was modeled after the haunted Carisbrooke Castle on the Isle of Wight. It was meant to evoke chills, and it generally succeeded.
Tonight, though, her chills were from another source. Whatever Alessande had given her was fast leaving her system, taking with it energy, heat and mental clarity. The temperature had dropped twenty degrees since sunset, and Sailor couldn’t stop shivering, although the wound on her chest was now hot to the touch. She’d covered it with a gauze pad and buttoned her black velvet waitress dress up to her throat to hide it. It hurt, but pain she could handle. This weakness was another story.
Tough it out, she told herself, as she tied on her apron and reported to her manager, Kristoff, to be assigned a station. He was staring at his table chart and barely acknowledged her. “You’re late. You’ve got station two, but Lauren’s busy with a bachelorette party, so take the four-top for her and the deuce next to it.” Then he looked up. “What on earth?” he said, and she instantly looked away. “What’s going on with your eyes?”
“Yes, sorry, Kristoff, had trouble with my contacts tonight.”
He frowned. “Are your pupils completely dilated? Are you on something?”
“No, just colored lenses. My cousin talked me into them.”
“Black? Black contact lenses?”
They weren’t black, they were green, but in combination with the scarlet of her irises they resulted in a shade of mud. She’d borrowed them from Barrie, and while Barrie’s prescription was mild, it was enough to make Sailor nauseous.
“Dark brown, actually. Yes, okay, not my best look.”
“It’s a terrible look. Customers will think you’re a drug addict.”
She wanted to tell him she didn’t much care, as long as they tipped her, but flippancy didn’t go over well with Kristoff. “Sorry,” she said. “You really don’t want me working blind. I’d be walking into walls.”
He shook his head. “We’re wasting time. Get to work.”
She breathed deeply, trying to adjust to the noise, pace and stress of the restaurant, an atmosphere she ordinarily found bracing. Tonight, though, it felt like an assault. She looked at her watch. Twenty minutes until the second dinner seating, which preceded the midnight magic