“About the . . . you.” I waved a hand at his exposed middle and the arrow, clearly advertising what was beneath his pants—the part of his anatomy he believed to be his best feature. “We don’t want people getting the wrong idea about what we’re offering here.”
He sighed with his whole body, lifting and drooping his wings. “You know, people will pay by the hour for this.” He swept his hands down himself, adding a cocked hip and scandalous smile.
“No.”
“Fine.” He gave himself an all-over shiver, vanishing the wings and horns, and wrapping himself instead in a purple and black tailcoat over a ruffled shirt, and tight leggings that vanished into his boots. He could have worn a trash bag and he’d still have upstaged me. Standing next to Zodiac was like standing next to a neon sign. Which was fine. I was just an average joe in an average suit. Nothing to see here, move along.
I leaned back and arched an eye at his forked tail, looping and knotting on the floor behind him. “All of it.”
“Oh, come on.” He whipped his tail up and skimmed its smooth, warm touch along my jaw, and I’d have lied if I said his caress didn’t skitter tiny little darts of lust down my spine. I wasn’t entirely immune to his charms—I had urges, like everyone else—but he also wasn’t trying to seduce me. For him, flirting was as natural as breathing. “You’re killing me here, Kitten.”
I was actually killing him. He thrived on attention, literally fed on it. Or, more precisely, fed on the desire of others. Too long alone, or if he was forgotten, he’d die. Asking him to tone down all of him was like asking the sun not to shine. “It’s just for this morning.”
His tail withdrew, then tucked itself up the back of his tailcoat. Crossing his arms, he glared at the door between us and the outside world. “You owe me, Adam,” he said. And now he’d lost his smile, his tone held a thin thread of warning. Zodiac was all smiles and innuendo—until he wasn’t. Beneath the sassy one-liners, the jaunty walk, and his endless energy, lurked a demon far more dangerous than he pretended to be.
“I know.” But he owed me too. So we were even. Mostly.
“Ready?”
“Hell, yes.” His grin flashed back onto his face.
“Let’s do this.” I shoved open the doors, and stepped onto the wrap-around front porch. Brilliant, wintery sunshine had me blinking away, so it took a few extra seconds to focus on the angry protestors brandishing placards and banners, telling the Lost Ones to Go Home in many creative ways.
“Ugh, humans,” Zodiac sneered, careful to keep his lips from moving so nobody could read his disgust.
“I’m human,” I muttered.
“Yes, but you’re not like them.” He flicked his glossy, sharp purple nails at the crowd. “Look at them. Animals.”
The local police had set up a cordon, clearly having anticipated trouble. Some of the crowd held up their phones, taking photos. A religious contingent chanted about sin and prophecies. A small cadre of well-dressed men and women to one side were clearly from the press.
I’d always been careful not to show my face to cameras. And here I was, standing in the spotlight. At least everyone was looking at Zodiac. Even when he pretended to be like them, he clearly wasn’t. Too handsome, too striking, too extra, to be anything but demon. The religious contingent waved their crucifixes at him, as though to hold back the sin. Half the human population still believed their God had torn a hole in the veil in 2024 and let the Lost Ones in to punish all sinners. When in reality, it had been proven to be too much hydrofluorocarbon in the atmosphere, weakening the veil. Like the hole in the ozone, only instead of the human population getting a harmful dose of radiation, it got an influx of other beings from another realm. But hydrofluorocarbons were far too reasonable and scientific. So now, in 2028, four years since the veil had torn, sinners got the blame.
“Adam Vex?” a woman called, waving her arm. Her mop of tightly curled white hair gleamed like ice in winter sunshine. “Noreen Greene from the San Francisco Post. Do you have a few minutes to tell us about this fabulous hotel of yours?”
“Go on, then,” Zodiac urged. “Do your thing.”
“Or would Mr. Zodiac like to—”
“No! I’ve got it—it’s fine.” I hurried down the steps to the cordon. If Zodiac talked to a journalist, we’d have all his tricks lining up outside his room.
Noreen began by asking some warm-up questions, asking why I’d created a sanctuary for the Lost Ones. She seemed nice, but we’d barely begun to chat when the crowd parted for a sleek black sedan.
“Hello?” Zodiac said, sidling up beside me. “Who do we have here?”
The driver hopped out, popped open an umbrella—which was odd, considering there wasn’t a cloud in the pale blue sky—and opened the car’s rear door.
The man who climbed out wore a suit too, but his was stitched with gorgeous red filigree on the lapels. Glossy black shoes, perfectly tailored black pants with the creases as sharp as razor blades, and then the rest of him emerged as he straightened under the umbrella. Long dark hair fell like a waterfall of silk over proud shoulders and framed a lean, striking face. Dark lashes accented cool, mercury eyes.
“Fuck,” Zodiac said, breathlessly. “Forget getting paid, I’d pay him to spank me.”
“Don’t print that,” I told Noreen. She side-eyed me, and was definitely going to print it.
“Do you know who that is?” she asked, in a tone that suggested she did know. I had no idea, but our new arrival was looking up the hotel steps as though trying to decide if his beautiful shoes might catch poor if he ventured up them. The crowd had fallen quiet too, waiting for his assessment.
“No,” I told Noreen, feeling like Zodiac and I were the only ones here who didn’t know who the handsome stranger was.
“Victor Reynard.”
