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"It wouldn’t be ht," Holden said "I’m led to understand those little cocktail swords don’t hold up well against a real weapon" He was looking at his fingernails as though he was perfectly uninterested in the whole discussion I didn’t h soht Sorowled but didn’t rise to the bait He looked back into the kitchen,to find there was a shitty Ikea table and a uys tell me why you’re both here, the sooner you don’t have to be in the same place," I told them

"It wasn’t planned," Desmond replied

"You both happened to show up at the same time?"

"Unfortunately," Holden said

"You first" I pointed to the vampire "Why are you here?" I kneas here because I’d asked for his help It was the same reason Desmond would have come What I needed to knoas if either of theood intentions

"I found out soot both Desmond’s and my attention "What do you know?" Desht he was going to be able to inti or two to learn about my undead brethren

"Oh, Secret," Holden said, gazing up at Des teeth you have" He batted his eyelashes once for good ers

"For Christ’s sake, Holden, stop being such a knob"

And with that, the sain When he spoke again, his tone was cold, and all the huht I went to speak to one of Kellen’s friends Ifrom previous versions of the story"

"How?" I asked

He tapped the corner of his left eye "I can be a persuasive conversationalist" So he’d pulled a lie-detector-by-way-of-enthralling Can’t say I was upset with him for it

"What’d you find out?"

"Turns out someone did see her after she was dropped off This friend met her off Canal, and they went to a club called Eleven-B"

Not that I was up on the cool club scene in Manhattan, but I’d never heard of the place before listening to the ed one shoulder "Froirl told h-society ditz voice "Not for the rabble, you know"

"A secret club?" Desmond interjected

"Sounds like"

"Did Kellen’s friend see her leave the club?" I continued, trying to keep the infor

Holden shook her head "Last this so-called friend saw of Kellen was her going into a private room with someone She couldn’t say who After that she was too drunk to care"

Soet there?"

"She did me one better" He reached into the inside pocket of his blazer and withdrew a save me a key to the front door"

Chapter Nineteen

For a secret club in Manhattan I was expecting… a block off Canal Street, I was sure he’d been had Neverhim the truth, there was certainly sorocer, whose establishment had the faint dried-fish reek I had co up to Chinatown, and on the opposite side a dark-skinnedto sell a tourist couple a knockoff Coach bag It was a terrible knockoff too, one where the logo couldn’t have passed muster with a blind fashionista

It was patterned Hs, for God’s sake, not the fa an I Heart New York shirt didn’t seeu beau how everyone "back hoive her a ser fish to fry

Like finding an invisible secret nightclub

The building between the grocer and the knockoff vendor was our supposed destination, but it was nothingapartht be an ideal place for drunk rich kids to go, or an eht parties were popular