Either way, Hunter was pretty sure it was all Grace’s fault that nobody in the damned city smelled good enough to fuck except the dreamy, otherworldly man sitting on the couch, making his long-boned hands swim like otters through the air.
Danny smiled at them all beatifically, as though thinking they were all the sweetest children, wanting to help their sister find a lost toy.
Given Hunter had no idea how many laws they were about to break, he still couldn’t resist that tug of praise, of gentle approval, that Danny, Felix, and Julia seemed to emanate. It didn’t matter that he’d been raised by good heartland people who still liked hearing from him at Christmas but would never know much else about him. What mattered was that these people seemed to think he’d done a good job raising himself, and he was a valuable member of their team.
He didn’t get it, and he wasn’t sure he ever would.
But that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to take one more hit of that gentle approval-flavored Kool-Aid and love it.
“What do you have in mind, Uncle Danny?” Josh asked, his head cocked as though he were taking notes.
“Well, some reconnaissance first,” Danny said thoughtfully, looking over his shoulder for Felix’s nod. Tall, blond, as noble as a lion, Felix Salinger ran a highly successful cable news network. But Hunter had seen him manipulate people like chess pieces and had to admit the guy, like Danny, had the heart and soul of a true con man. Danny turned his attention back to Tabitha, but not without first giving Felix a secret little smile that made Hunter’s chest ache.
They were a little older than the rest of the crew—old enough for Felix to have claimed to have fathered Josh at an appallingly young age—but their love was apparently eternal.
“So, darling,” Danny said, his voice dripping reassurance. “When is your grandfather’s next trip?”
“Next week,” Tabitha whispered. “I know it’s got to be for Sergei because our show is so close to performance date. He’s not taking any dancers this time—there haven’t been traveling performances since his uncle died. But Grandfather is leaving us in the charge of an assistant director and the assistant choreographer right before showtime. It’s… he wouldn’t do that if he didn’t have to.”
“Hm. Bad form to leave the cast and crew to themselves before opening night, isn’t it?” Danny frowned when Josh nodded the affirmative. “What kinds of threats is Sergei making to Artur to keep him toeing the line?”
Tabitha swallowed and gave Grace a sideways look. “He’s threatening to set Grandfather up to take the fall. He’d be imprisoned, and the Conservatory would be shut down. I think… the way Sergei touched me that night….” She shuddered. “I think there’s been some innuendo about hurting me, and maybe some of the other dancers.” Her glance at Grace turned apologetic. “I was dancing so badly last night because Grandfather told me to tell you to watch your step. He was trying to laugh about it—don’t walk under ladders, stay away from black… cats….”
She trailed off as the two house mascots came chasing into the downstairs den in a tumble of playful black fur.
Abruptly she giggled.
“Oops,” she said, her cheeks dimpling into a smile that Hunter could appreciate. He scooped up the dervish nearest himself and scratched it behind its ears. Cary Grant—the older cat who’d been Chuck’s originally but had been adopted by the house—drooped automatically into an ecstatic purr.
Without a word, Hunter walked to the couch and dropped the creature into Tabitha’s lap. She cooed and started to rub the cat’s ears, and the cat—shameless attention whore that he was—went in for the whisker rub against her palm.
Tabitha’s desperation, her tremulous voice, her fear, melted to manageable levels.
“Thank you,” she said, her smile charming and poised. Probably her usual state.
Hunter nodded, and she smiled up at Uncle Danny and continued.
“So as I was saying, I think Grandfather wanted me to warn Dylan to be careful, but he didn’t want me to….” She bit her lip, then carried on. “He didn’t want me to say anything about Kadjic, because that could get him hurt—or arrested—and he didn’t see any way out.”
Danny nodded. “Hm. Tabitha, does your grandfather ever take people on his trips, now that they’re no longer done under the cover of the dance troupe?”
Tabitha thought about it. “Sometimes,” she said. “Last year he took me to Paris with him. He told me it was a last-minute trip, since we were on vacation and all, but he had to drop off a package at a hotel again. So I think he was making the best of a bad situation.”
“Mm.” Danny chewed on his lower lip. “How’s young Dylan for this next show, my dear? I mean, really, how much practice does he actually need?”
Tabitha gave Grace a disgusted eye roll, and the snotty little shit actually preened. “He’s fine,” she muttered. “He could learn the show cold in a day and perform it flawlessly in a week. We’re eight weeks in. The hard part is keeping him interested enough to listen for his cues.”
Grace gave a benign smile. “I’m a prodigy,” he said with no repentance.
Hunter scowled at him, and Grace scowled back.
“I am too!” Grace argued, as though that look had come with words attached.
Hunter raised an eyebrow.
“Fine! I’m being a brat. I’m just saying, I could probably miss a week to go do—” Grace looked at Danny. “—whatever it is you want me to do.”
Danny’s smile held more than a tiny bit of Peter Pan mischief in it. “Oh, my dear boy. The things I could name.” Danny turned back to Tabitha. “Do you think if you asked, your grandfather could take Grace with him? It’s not entirely necessary, but we’re going to need Grace to… run some errands with our friends in the city, and it would help if he wasn’t constantly trying to hide the fact that he was there from Artur.”
“But you don’t even know where he’s going!” Tabitha said, baffled.
Very quietly, Molly started chanting, “Please let it be Paris. Please let it be Paris. Please let it be Paris!”
Tabitha gave her an apologetic shrug. “I’m sorry. It’s Vancouver. His cover story is that he wanted to check out the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and see if we could perform there.” She nodded as though this were of utmost importance. “It’s supposed to be very grand!”
Alas, Molly was obviously disappointed. “Really? Our first chance to travel, and it’s to Vancouver?”
“I love Vancouver!” Julia exclaimed. “Shopping, culture, theater—it’s all very urbane.”
Molly gave her a suspicious look. “Vancouver?”
“Oh yes. The food is to die for. You can eat out in downtown Vancouver every day of the year and still not visit the same place twice. And the stores! Granville Island, Gastown. There are some wonderful tiny souvenir shops and high-end fashion boutiques—”
“Fashion boutiques,” Molly said quickly. She was currently wearing a gauzy forest-green skirt topped with a sleeveless jacquard vest in palest cream. With her riot of sunset hair—replete with a few ringlets dyed in mermaid blue—she looked like a bohemian fairy princess, and she’d designed all those clothes herself.