Eh. Next time, call in advance. Six tables, you understand? We cook for six tables! Tonight—tonight there is a cassoulet. We made it stretch. But Adrien smiled, gestured to one of the wait staff who brought over a basket. Croissants, no? And bread. For your morning. He nodded to John. "It has been my pleasure to meet Monsieur Harold's amoureux. He is a good man; it is good to see him happy."

"I'm afraid Harold is a bit—shy—about these things," John interjected smoothly.

At the time, it just seemed like the situation. Third number in thirty-six hours and they'd lost the guy in the middle, sure he'd been perp and not the victim, and John was tired—tired and already aching—and as he taken a quick shower and headed out the door with Harold's voice in his ear, all he could think was that he wanted to be touched by something that didn't hurt.

The third number was difficult to find, hiding under an alias, the target of a drug cartel—

(and why did drug dealers have to make things so goddamn complicated anyway, Reese muttered under his breath while he'd worked his way out of the cuffs and ropes and zip ties. "You just start with your basic business model—"

This isn't Harvard Business School, Harold said sternly in his ear.

"Well it isn't the goddamned Matrix either," he shot back, swearing as he ripped a nail almost down to the cuticle.)

Later he added "fond of knives" to his mental list of "things he didn't like about drug dealers," hissing as the blade slid along his rib, slicing him open deep enough to give him pause, and by the time he limped back to the library he felt like one giant bruise, everything hurting.

John said, "Harold's alive."

Grace didn't stare at him, or ask questions, or react very much at all. She folded her arms around herself and looked out of the window. After a minute, she said, "I wish you hadn't told me that."

It wasn't accusing, just sad; she sighed and dropped her arms and looked back at him. "I think I need some tea," she said. "Do you want some? Or a drink. You know, I think I want a drink." She turned and went to the small cut-glass and wood bar in the corner, an antique piece, and took out a small glass and a bottle of something.

"You already knew," John said, blankly.

"Yes," Harold said. "The Circean Society is a small and fairly obscure organization that was once murkily involved in city politics, but for the last few decades has done very little other than run the annual auction, which benefits AIDS charities. The auction and the subsequent private dinner is one of the very few events that Ms. Althorpe attends outside her home. She's gone every year since her college graduation."

"So we'll be crashing the party?" John said.

"In a manner of speaking," Harold said. "I've taken the liberty of hacking their fairly unsophisticated database to put you on the list of, shall we say, merchandise."

"What?" Reese said, blinking.

Harold wasn't above enjoying the situation. "The auction is for dinner companions," he said blandly. "Ms. Althorpe regularly purchases one for the evening."

"How am I supposed to get her to buy me?" John said.