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“Bad idea.” Zee folded his arms and leaned back in his chair.
Victor slid the cloth across the table. “What do you make of this?”
“And nobody listens to the handsome demon . . . again. When you all come crying back to me because it turns out baby vampire Wesley is a backstabbing murdering psycho-sucker—no offense—imma say I told you so.”
“I’m not going to hurt you guys. I’m not even that powerful. I’m just looking for my friend.” Wesley studied the cloth, carefully laying it flat again, removing its crinkles.
“Zee has a lot of history with vampires, is all.”
“Which makes me a fucking expert.” He shoved the lollipop back between his lips and sucked aggressively.
“Silver kisses,” Wesley mumbled. “It’s almost like poetry. Service echoes thrice? Service?” He looked up. “Did you find this in the hotel?”
“Nope,” Zee lied.
“Yes,” I corrected.
“Service and something echoing could be a bell of some kind? Like the pull-bells found in old hotels to summon the staff, right?”
“A bell?” Like the one I had behind my back. “Huh, that’s very interesting, isn’t it, Zee?”
Zee rolled his eyes.
“Silver kisses could be maybe . . . striking that bell? Three times. Thrice is obviously three.”
“Indeed.” Victor leaned forward. “Do go on, Wesley.”
Zee muttered something incomprehensible around his lollipop, and eyed Wesley as though he’d like to shove the younger vampire into a closet. Preferably dead.
“Day births anew?” Wesley looked up. “Dawn?”
“Unlikely,” Victor rumbled. “As the precise time of dawn changes by incremental minutes every day.”
“Midnight—it’s midnight,” Zee blurted. He’d sucked the lollipop stick clean and tossed to onto the table. “Strike the bell three times at midnight to find a path.” He tilted his head and glared harder. “What? I do have a fuckin’ brain.”
“You just routinely choose not to use it.”
“You wanna get sassy with me, Daddy?!” Zee growled. His tail rattled now too. “Let’s go. Bring it. Right here. I’m ready.”
Victor’s eyes narrowed. “Zodiac, are you quite alright?”
Zee was acting more sensitive than usual, although it didn’t ever take much to trigger him. “Wesley, can you give us some space? We’ll meet you on the top-floor landing just like we said.”
“Alrighty.” He handed me the cloth. “See you folks there.”
As soon as Wesley was out of earshot and nobody else appeared to be listening in, I turned to Zee—who was scowling, arms crossed, tail slapping the floor—and then to Victor who just seemed perplexed by it all. “Alright, look. Victor? Zee is having some difficulty with Wesley.”
“I can see that,” Victor grumbled. “Your prejudice against vampires is hindering our progress—”
“Excuse-moi? My prejudice?”
“It’s not a vampire thing, Victor,” I butted in, before they got into a physical fight. “It’s a jealousy thing.”
“A jealousy thing? How is Zodiac . . . Oh.” Victor stopped his own trail of thought and glanced after Wesley, then back to Zee’s grumpy face. “ I see. Wesley’s behavior toward me is making you uncomfortable?”
“No,” Zee groaned. “Maybe. He’s all Victorveus is great.” The whiny voice did not sound like Wesley at all. “I will worship at your feet, oh wise, ancient one. He wants to fuck you—which I totally fuckin’ get. And he’s a vampire so . . . you know, he’s like you. Me and Adam are not vampires. And I might be having a tiny problem with feeling all kinds of fucked up and weird, which is a whole new fucking thing for me. I don’t do jealousy. Ever. Didn’t even know I could get jealous. It’s new and does not feel nice at all and I’m having a hard fuckin’ time—”
Victor reached across the table and captured Zee’s hand in his, silencing him. “Zodiac.”
