Coming up for air a couple of hours later, I grabbed my pile of notes, stuffing them into my laptop bag to transport them up to Rohan's room in the event Samson was still around, so he wouldn't see them. Bag slung diagonally across my chest, I stepped into the elevator and found Drio. "Nice photos," he smirked. "High much?"
"Took one for the team." I tapped my bag. "Wait and be amazed. Where did you end up last night?"
"Took the boys to an S&M dungeon."
I looked at him with horrified fascination. "Are they still alive?"
"Baby S&M." Such disdain. The place must not have met his standards of true sadism.
"Sucks to be you."
Drio shrugged. "T-Roy spent most of the night with a ball gag in his mouth so that was an improvement."
"You mean Troy?"
"Troy doesn't come with the cred he so desperately craves. He's T-Roy now," he said. I laughed. "Logan is the one constantly texting." He pitched his voice lower in impersonation. "Dope messages bespelling importance, bro."
I stumbled. Drio was cracking me up. What bizarro world had I landed in? "That doesn't even make sense."
"Yeah. I try not to listen when he speaks. My IQ has dropped ten points on this mission."
We stepped out of the elevator, bound for Rohan's suite at the far end of the hall. "You think they're," I pitched my voice lower, "human?"
"I don't know what to think." He shrugged out of his jacket, his quiet tone matching mine. "Part of me thinks the two guys closest to Samson have to be demons. But in all the time I've spent with them, they haven't made a single suspicious move. No sign of any evil agenda."
"Could they be under strict orders to behave? In case they blow Samson's cover?"
"They cause a scandal, Samson gets rid of them. If anything, his celeb status gives them leeway to let their demon tendencies out. Perfect cover for bad behavior. They could be human, but my gut is saying otherwise."
"Could be PDs," I suggested.
Half-demons were known by the pejorative term PD, from the old Rasha joke, "What do you call a half demon? Practice." The only way to tell that they weren't full evil was that when killed, PDs exploded in a shower of gold dust. I'd learned using that term around Leo was at my peril.
"Even so. Something doesn't add up."
"How do they feel about Samson?" I adjusted the weight of the strap on my shoulder.
"Troy doesn't say much unless he's kissing ass. Logan talks a lot of smack about King but never anywhere near him."
I veered around a housekeeping cart piled high with fresh linens. "Does the American accent get tiring?" I asked. "Do you ever slip?"
He shook his head. "Too many years doing Mom impersonations."
"Your mother is American?!"
It was Drio's turn to laugh. "Which part are you struggling with? That she's American or that I have a mother?"
"That you have a mother, obviously. I thought you were spawned."
A door opened revealing Poppy backing out of a suite with a cat-like smile. Rohan's suite. He of the rumpled clothes and messed hair framed in the doorway beside her. She trailed her hands down his chest.
I contemplated breaking her fingers. And his balls.
"Quit it. You're short circuiting," Drio grabbed my hand, flinching at the spark that arced off my palm against his.
"Excuse me," Poppy huffed as Drio pushed the two of us into the room, effectively breaking the two of them apart.
Drio flung his coat onto a chair. "You're excused." He made a shooing motion at her.
She looked at Rohan waiting for her knight in shining armor to step in but he'd registered my presence. His face colored in that purple apoplectic way as he opened his mouth, shut it, then jabbed his index finger between me and a chair. "Sit."
Guess he'd seen the photos.
14
Poppy's mood perked right up at Rohan's anger toward me. Smiling, she ran a finger along the outline of her obviously newly reapplied lipstick.
Refusing to sit, I batted my lashes at him. "Punish away, baby." I visibly shivered.
Drio unsuccessfully smothered a laugh.
Rohan murmured bullshit platitudes to Poppy, ushered her out the door, then slammed it shut.
Drio didn't let it bother him. He sank onto the couch. "What's the matter, Ro? True love getting you down?"
"Shut it, Desiderio."
Oh joy! That was his real name? I clapped a hand over my snicker.
"Call me that and die," Drio informed me.