Sex, Lies, and Vampires

Her smile turned rueful. "You have done much to help me in the past without demanding payment, Adrian. I am happy I will be able to pay off my debt to you, although I must warn you, I do not have much cash. My clientele demands only the best, and just last week I had to fly in an entirely new group of sylphs after the last girls decided to form a union and start their own house." She snorted disgustedly. "After all I did for them, that was how they repaid me!"

Adrian frowned. "I'm sorry about your labor problems, Gigli, but—"

"Ungrateful, selfish sylphs," Gigli stormed. "You would think they'd have felt some loyalty to me, but no, they stayed long enough to learn what it takes to entertain a poltergeist, then poof! Off they went to start a rival house."

"Poltergeists?" I asked, my eyebrows shooting upward as I looked at Adrian.

"They took their costumes, too. Do you have any idea how expensive it is to clothe sylphs? It's all sheer silk this and gossamer lace that."

"Gigli's clientele," Adrian answered my question, a black frown settled on his brow.

"And they took my spectral whips. The price of those have positively skyrocketed ever since the poltergeists learned they served as an aphrodisiac."

"Really?" I slid a glance toward the door, the memory of the entwined bodies still fresh in my mind. "Those were poltergeists out there? Huh. They didn't look ghostly at all."

"That's because they aren't. Gigli uses the lounge as a cover for her real clients."

"The poltergeists," I said, trying to look as if there were nothing out of the ordinary in the idea of a whorehouse for ghosts.

"Exactly."

"They pay extremely well," Gigli added, evidently having worked out her tirade on the mutinous sylphs. "Not in money, of course, because everyone knows poltergeists have no head for any form of treasure, but they are expert kobold catchers. The market here for tamed kobolds is incredible."

"Kobolds?" I asked, trying not to look too stupid.

"A form of house imp," Adrian answered. "If we can get back to the point—"

"Very popular amongst the affluent set," Gigli said in a confidential tone. "A fully matured kobold can fetch anywhere from four thousand euros up. You can see why it pays to keep the poltergeists happy."

"Of course I can," I agreed, wondering if now was the point where my head exploded from all the strange things I had seen or heard about in the last seventy-two hours. "It makes perfect sense. You have to buy sylphs so the poltergeists can get it on with them, thereby obligating them into hunting kobolds for you. What's not to understand?"

Adrian's hand descended upon my shoulder, squeezing it gently. "Gigli, you're frightening Nell."

"I'm not frightened. Disturbed, yes, I'm disturbed within a hairbreadth of going stark raving mad, but I'm not frightened."

"We need two tickets to London," Adrian said, ignoring both the rising note in my voice and Gigli's attempt to smother laughter. "If you can provide us with them, I will consider your debt to me paid."

"Done," she said, lifting a black phone from the black glass desk that sat diagonally in a corner. She punched a few numbers, covering the mouthpiece to add, "I will need your passport numbers."

I looked at Adrian. He looked at Gigli.

"What?" she asked, her red brows pulling together slightly. "Don't tell me you don't have your passport!"

"I have mine," Adrian said slowly, his gaze dipping to where I sat.

"But mine got left behind in Christian's castle."

Gigli set the phone back on its cradle, her gray eyes suddenly hard and assessing as she looked me over carefully before turning to Adrian. "Christian? C.J. Dante?"

He nodded sharply.

"If you don't have your passport, how did you cross from the Czech Republic into Germany?"

"Adrian used me to do a mind push on the conductor on the train, which worked great, even though I had no idea how to make someone do what I wanted them to do just by giving them a mental shove, but…" I gnawed on my lower lip and slid him a quick glance. His face was frozen, his eyes locked on Gigli. "But I had a bit of an accident in the Cologne train station, and we can't do that again."

"Can you not have Dante send you the passport?"

"Are you kidding?" My lips curled into a jaded smile as Adrian's fingers tightened on my shoulder. "Christian wants to see us dead. I don't think he's going to help us escape Germany."

She sucked in her breath, her eyes huge as she turned them on Adrian. "You did not mention that Dante is the Dark One pursuing you."

Pain radiated from under Adrian's grip. I touched his fingers, wordlessly asking him to loosen his hold. He did so immediately, rubbing the sore spot as he answered Gigli. "Does it matter who is trying to find us? We still need to get to London."