“Indians have coats of arms?”
“Compliments of the British. There weren’t any fire hydrants to piss on in the old days, so they had to mark everything with a sword and a lion.”
I glanced at the silks lining tables and chairs, the tapestries hanging from the walls and their matching footstools, the double-wide lounge chairs with their red brocade. Crystal tassels set practically every inanimate object to sparkle. I guess nothing said “home sweet whorehouse” like black teardrop crystals. I blinked until I could focus properly again, turning to Terry. “You’re the photographer?”
“Unofficial,” he sniffed, casting a glance over his shoul der. Two small dark men were snapping photo after photo of the room’s focal point, a moon-shaped table where Suzanne sat, arms linked with her groom.
“So that’s Arun Brahma.” My initial impulse to revile him upon sight reared again, but I dampened it, not wanting it to affect an accurate reading of someone who could be worse than merely slick. He could be dangerous.
For a moment I thought he also might be sleeping with his eyes open. While Suzanne laughed gaily, tossing her hair before the cameras like it was an Olympic event, he just sat there, merely altering his profile every once in a while so the photographers had to move for him rather than the reverse. Yet when Suzanne said his name, brushing her hand against his shoulder in as intimate a gesture as one could get while still clothed, his response was immediate. His regally dull expression didn’t brighten, but it altered, like one of those paintings that seemed to follow your progress across the room with a knowing gaze. He leaned toward her with such fierce attentiveness that I wanted to slap him with a restraining order.
That wasn’t love, I thought, watching him drink in her every feature as if it were the first time…and he was very thirsty. That was just creepy.
“You haven’t met him yet?” Terry sounded surprised.
I shook my head. “He’s suspiciously private. Does he move from her side?”
Terry sipped from his bloodred drink. “Only when eyefucking her from afar.”
Also creepy, but then who could blame him? The bride-to-be looked fantastic, blond hair set in siren’s waves, lips as red as the tapestry behind her, eyes glowing. Still, there was something about the way he responded to Suzanne that just felt wrong. She tugged on his arm and he swerved toward her like a weight on a chain. A few months ago I would have closed in and tried to sniff out the problem-maybe he was drugged, maybe he was Shadow-but now all I could do was keep an eye on him, alert to even the smallest movement.
Or could I?
Easing back a step so I was out of Terry’s peripheral vision, I lifted my glass to my lips. From behind it I whispered in a voice so low only those with access to other realities and realms could hear it. “Hey, Arun…”
His head swiveled before he caught himself. Eyes meeting mine, now narrowed, he paused only a moment before looking away. But he’d swallowed hard before he did it.
Suzanne sensed the absence of his attention as clearly as if she’d moved from sun to shade. She caught the arc of his quickly averted gaze, and brightened when she saw me. Her crimson smile widened as she waved, and she pointed at her wrist to indicate my bracelet.
I gave her a big cheesy thumbs-up while Arun watched her with an intensely glowing gaze. Most women would kill to be looked at like that. But some had been killed after being looked at like that. Now that I knew that he was something other than he claimed, I worried for Suzanne. I had no clue what his angle was, if he’d left me protective weapons on a scavenger’s hunt, or if he was an ally. All I knew for sure was I didn’t want her marrying him.
“Well, she looks radiant,” I said to Terry, almost forlornly. Damn. She always had such bad taste in men.
“Yes. Jewels on every digit, and each one a testament to the power of blow jobs.”
Time to extract myself from this conversation, I thought, brows raised. I turned away, caught Helen lingering in the doorway, and turned back. “Um, where’s Cher?”
“Here, I’m here!”
“All done having bulimia, darling?” Terry asked as she joined us.
Cher shuddered delicately. “This ethnic food is hell on the American digestive tract.”
“Told you to stick with vodka,” Terry singsonged, holding up his glass.
“You should at least give it a try. I practically killed myself putting this party together,” I said, knowing Helen could hear. I’d done nothing but throw the name and number of Suzanne’s preferred party planner on Helen’s desk, and I smiled, seeing her back go ramrod straight before she stalked from the room. Good. The less time she spent around my mortals, the better.
“Seriously, Olivia.” Cher’s gaze followed my own. “What does your housekeeper do other than skulk in doorways?”
“That’s pretty much it.”
Oblivious to my frown, she patted down her streaked hair with alternating black and red nails. “You should can her ass. Just because your father put up with that behavior doesn’t mean you have to.”
“No, no, no.” Terry fisted one hand on his hip. “You need to look at her contract first. Otherwise she’ll go straight to the press and reveal all your nasty little secrets.”
“I don’t have nasty little secrets.” I just had nasty big ones.
“She’ll just make it up,” he said, jerking his head. “Don’t you read People magazine? Celebrities’ nannies do it all the time. And that bitch doesn’t like you.”
I wasn’t surprised Cher and Terry had noticed…or that they didn’t care for Helen. Mortals might be ignorant of otherworldly battles and politics, but everyone had intuition. Supersenses were just extremely well-developed extensions of that.
“Oh, here. I forgot this before…” Cher reached into her ample cleavage and withdrew a rolled up photo. “It’s the one you made me take on that awful scavenger hunt. I didn’t know if you still wanted it, or if you’d rather forget the whole thing, but it was developed along with all the other party pictures, so I made you a copy.”
I held the photo in front of me, shocked at the crispness of the image. The flash had caught the intricate etchings on the old treasure chest perfectly, along with the symbol that had been stalking my waking hours. I traced it with my fingertip, wondering aloud. “But what is it?”
Terry tossed a glance at the photo and finished the rest of his drink. “A snake. Duh.”
He set his glass on a passing waiter’s tray, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and turned back to me. Seeing my surprise, he leaned closer. “It is. See? Wrapped around a stick or some sort of staff.”
Studying the photo more closely, I decided he was possibly right.
“What?” he asked, clearly offended by my pursed brow. “Snakes are present in practically every mythological system out there. Google it. You wouldn’t believe the shit they represent.”
“Such as?”
“Guardians of sacred treasures and sites-”
“Like in Indiana Jones?”
“Yeah, temples and stuff.” He sniffed, tossing his head. “And, like, medicine and healing. Renewal and regeneration-shedding skin, get it?-and vengefulness, sometimes deceit…”
But my mind had snagged on the temple connection. A stupa was a monument containing Buddhist relics, which could be loosely interpreted as a sort of temple. As tulpas had derived directly from Tibetan Buddhism, the connection seemed more than coincidental. Because there was a stupa, or an extremely realistic rendition of one, in this very house. Not a definitive clue, but it was a place to start. “Thank you, Terry,” I murmured, refolding the photo.
“Sure,” he shrugged, then brightened. “Come on. For your sake I will risk death by Naga chili pepper.”