"Drat," I snarled at myself.

"Is something the matter, Allegra?"

Oh, yes, something was the matter. Christian was not mine; I did not claim him. I forced my snarling lips into what I prayed looked like a cheerful, "casual acquaintance minding my own business, not in the least bit interested in the man next to me" sort of smile.

Christian's lips quirked as he dropped his free arm over my shoulders.

"You wish to volunteer?" the miniskirted hussy asked breathlessly, her eyes all but devouring him. I stopped trying to shrug his arm off my shoulder and wondered how bad raising a minor demon could be.

"Alas, I do not have the skills that are required to sit successfully in a Summoning circle, but my companion does. She is very interested in the trust and would be delighted if it were possible for her to be one of the chosen ten."

I glared at him and decided two demons were in order.

The woman glanced quickly at me, her brow fur-rowed in doubt. "I can't guarantee that your friend will be chosen. Mrs. White reviews all of the information and makes all of the decisions about who is to sit with her."

Christian's voice—always beautiful and velvety smooth—achieved a new level of polish that made his words so slick they positively skated off his tongue (and I'm ashamed to admit that a tiny little fire started in my groin at the thought of that tongue). "Is there nothing you can do to ensure that my companion will be chosen? I assure you she is more than worthy of that honor."

The woman's brow smoothed out under the close-range influence of his words. She nodded vehemently. "I'll do what I can."

She quickly took down my name, occupation (I just told her I worked for UPRA), and a brief sketch of my experience.

"You are all that is gracious," Christian said with a smile so bright it made me want to offer the young woman my sunglasses. She staggered off with a sun-struck look on her face.

"Okay, Mr. Persuasion, now you can tell me just what you're up to. Why do you want me in that circle so badly?"

His brows rose in a protest of innocence. "What makes you think I have a reason for you to join the demonstration?"

A group of four chattering twenty-somethings sat down behind us. I lowered my voice. "Call it a hunch. You of all people don't want more attention on the realm of the paranormal—I'm sure it's only a short hop from proof of the existence of ghosts to great hordes of men with torches racing through the countryside armed with stakes and necklaces of garlic. Come on, Blacula, dish."

He got that martyred look on his face again.

"You know, there's nothing you can do to make me go up there if I don't want to," I pointed out to him in a whisper. "If you want my help with something, you're going to have to spill it first. By the looks of things, you have about ten minutes before they start calling people up. You can either hem and haw and delay until it's too late, or you can tell me now and give me as much time to prepare as possible. The choice is yours."

Christian sighed, tightening his arm on my shoulder. I fought between the unhealthy desire to snuggle into him, and the unwelcome knowledge that I should stop him before he got the wrong idea. "It is, perhaps, inevitable that you should learn of my suspicions. You would find out in the next day or so anyway."

"Really?" I gnawed my lip as I looked at him. "Why?"

The look he gave me could have cooked cement before it cooled down into something dark and troubled. "Three months ago a friend of mine, Sebastian, a Moravian like myself, disappeared from his home in Nice. After a month when he did not answer any of my calls, I became worried and ventured out to determine whether he had felt the need to leave Europe in haste, or if something unthinkable had happened to him."

"Unthinkable?" Two of the ARMPIT assistants swooped down on the group of four behind us. I leaned into Christian so they wouldn't see my hand (that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it) as I mimed a stake through his heart. "You mean that kind of unthinkable?"

He grimaced, and captured my stake-stabbing fingers in his free hand, absently stroking his thumb over my fingers as he spoke. "You are an unusually bloodthirsty woman. Oddly enough, I find that to be one of your charms. There are other ways to kill a Dark One, but yes, I was concerned that some fatality had befallen him. Sebastian was not the type to go off on his own without alerting me or another of our kind as to his destination. I tracked him first to Paris, then to London, then to a small house just outside London."

"Don't tell me—Guarda White and Signor Tassa-whatever were at the house."

He looked thoughtful. "No, but it was leased by Mrs. White's trust."

He was silent for a few minutes until I nudged him with my elbow. "So? Was Sebastian there or not?"

The ARMPITs moved off. Christian's finger stopped rubbing circles on the back of my hand. "He had been there. He left a message for me, a message that indicated he was being held prisoner and had little hope of gathering enough strength to escape."

"A message? What sort of a message?"

His mouth looked grim. I chanced a glance up to his eyes and quickly looked away. I hoped that whatever else happened in my life, Christian never had cause to look at me like that. "It was a message written in the manner of the Dark Ones."

I swallowed back a lump. "A message written in blood?"

He nodded. "Protected to keep it from the eyes of everyone but the person for whom it was intended. In this instance, me. Sebastian knew I would search for him once I realized he was missing, and although he was weak and had little strength, he used up a precious amount of his blood to leave me the message."

I thought about that for a minute as I watched the last few stragglers meet up with the assistants. People throughout the theater were talking in low, hushed voices that echoed like soft little brushes of a bird's wing against the high ceiling. "Urn, I may regret asking this, but I've felt the power that flows through you. How do you hold a Dark One prisoner against his will?"

His eyes turned a flat, lifeless black. "There are ways."

I shivered at the bleakness of his voice and decided not to pursue that particular avenue of thought. "Okay, so you think that Guarda and Eduardo are holding Sebastian prisoner somewhere, and you'd like me to get chummy with them so I can find out where. What makes you think I'm the least bit inclined to help you?"

His eyes positively caressed my face. My body melted at that look. "I have few resources available to me here. It was my hope that I could appeal to your curiosity and your desire to help those who are unable to help themselves."

I raised my chin. "That sounds like quite a different description than independent, stubborn, and lacking in self-confidence. Give me one good reason why I should help you."

His eyes never wavered from mine. "Because I am asking you most humbly for your assistance in locating my friend."

My innards melted even more at the sincerity and hope in his voice. I told my guts to get a grip on themselves and thought about it. Helping Christian wasn't in my game plan. I had only three weeks in London, and already five days had passed. If I got involved in this weird trust thing, it would severely cut into my time trying to Summon more ghosts. On the other hand, it would be good research to present to UPRA, and might go far toward keeping me employed. I glanced at Christian as I gnawed on my lip and, with an internal sigh, admitted the truth that it wasn't for job security, or even for Christian's helpless friend that I would accept his request; it was for him and him alone.

"All right, I'll help you, but I have a few conditions."

He rolled his eyes. "Why did I know there would be conditions?"