She stared. “Whoa. Wicked.”
This from someone who had to drink human blood to survive. Priceless. My martini arrived, and I smiled into it as I took a sip. The alcohol burning down my throat and hitting my blood fortified me.
“Dom, Ben’s gone missing. He was taken by a gangster named Faber—”
“Taken. Like kidnapped?”
“Probably. Do you know anything about Faber or where they might be holding him?”
He shrugged expansively, like it was an affection he’d developed to deflect questions. He’d probably been shrugging like that for decades. “I told you, Kitty. I keep to myself and let the rest take care of themselves. It’s a live-and-let-live kind of town. In a manner of speaking.”
“But you’re supposed to be in charge of this damned town! Don’t you have an ear on the rumor mill? Don’t you know anything?” Rick would have been able to figure this out. Rick would have known exactly what was going on.
“I know about Faber, and I know he isn’t into kidnapping. Are you sure your guy didn’t just, I don’t know—ditch you or something?”
Ignore it. I counted to ten. Even if I could take claws to his throat, the vampire wouldn’t die from it.
“Kitty,” Dom said, serious now. “If Ben’s missing, if someone took him, I think you’re looking in the wrong place. You know who in this town has it in for werewolves?”
“Who?” I said, glaring, and thinking about the gun show at the Olympus. Wondering if Sylvia and Boris had figured out that Ben’s a werewolf.
“Balthasar and that crowd over at the Hanging Gardens.”
The statement made me pause. Vegas didn’t have werewolves because of Balthasar’s troupe. They were the dominant lycanthropes and kept the others out. Had Balthasar done something to Ben? I shook my head. “Security video showed him with one of Faber’s henchmen.”
“Who maybe isn’t working for Faber.”
“No, I’ve talked to Balthasar and he hasn’t been anything but decent to me. If he was after Ben, why not go after me, as well?”
“I don’t know. I can’t explain how those guys work. You’ve seen them yourself, they’re a little odd.”
That I could agree with. I couldn’t imagine shape-shifting almost every day like that. Whatever Balthasar said to explain it, it couldn’t be healthy. Not to mention the S&M erotica portion of the show. Maybe I was just being judgmental. I didn’t understand the lifestyle, and maybe it scared me. But I didn’t want to think that Balthasar had anything to do with Ben’s disappearance.
Dom had given me everything he was going to give me. Maybe he was right pointing me at Balthasar, maybe he wasn’t. But the conversation was finished, and I was itching to leave.
I had one more question, and I might not get another chance to talk to Dom like this. “What do you know about Odysseus Grant?”
Dom looked confused for a moment, and I frowned with disappointment. Then he called to the bodyguard type. “Hey, Sven—Odysseus Grant. He that magician over at the Diablo?”
“I believe so, sir,” the bodyguard Sven said.
Dom smiled at me. “Odysseus Grant. Magician over at the Diablo.”
I nearly growled. “I know that. I caught his show.”
“Is he any good?” Dom said.
“Yeah, he is. I guess that means you don’t know anything about rumors that some of his magic is real. You know, he pulls a rabbit out of his hat and he really pulls it out of thin air instead of relying on trapdoors and sleight of hand.”
“That’s a good rumor,” he said. “I like it. You think it’s true?”
This conversation was making me want to gnaw on a sofa.
“I don’t know,” I said through gritted teeth. I needed another martini. “I thought you might. So much for that.”
“Maybe we should go to the show and see for ourselves. Does that sound like fun?” the brunette said. They all nodded and murmured, yes, it sounded like fun, but maybe another time, like next week, or month, or something.
I set my elbow on the table and rested my chin on my hand. I put on my cheerful voice. “So what’s it really like being a vampire in Vegas?”