“Hence the cane,” I added.
“Indeed,” Wolf said. “Unfortunately, it’s not often a forgiving disease.”
“Painful?”
His face darkened. “Incredibly so.” The moment passed, and he worked up a smile again. “What’s your fatal flaw, Jack?”
Promptly, I answered, “Curiosity.”
“Curiosity, at least, has a redemptive quality,” Wolf replied as our drinks arrived at the table. He lifted his glass of water to meet my cocktail. “To curiosity.”
I clinked my glass against his. As we drank, I scanned Rodolfo’s, people-watching as usual. “How come this place is packed but the rest of the Saint Angel is barren of guests?”
“You noticed too, huh?” Wolf rested his arm along the back of the booth and gazed across the restaurant. “I’m afraid the Saint Angel’s found itself in a spot of trouble.”
“It’s losing money,” I guessed.
“Left and right,” Wolf confirmed. “Too much competition from newer hotels with better rates. However, Rodolfo’s reputation precedes it. Everyone knows this is the best restaurant in the city. If the Saint Angel shuts down, we’ll lose a landmark.”
“You live here,” I reminded him. “And from what I hear, you have money to spare. Don’t you have the ability to save the hotel if it should fail?”
He laughed outright. “Goodness, I’m not sure this place is worth it.”
“In the elevator, you said you loved the Saint Angel.”
“I do,” Wolf said. “But like me, it has a fatal flaw. Should it fail, I shall view it as a circumstance of fate. Besides, I’m not in the business of saving things, least of all fragile hotels. That’s his job.” He nodded to a man sitting at the bar.
“I know him,” I said at once. “He sat in the lobby all day.”
“He does that often,” Wolf replied. “Staking out what he’d like to be his, most likely.”
I watched the man as he ordered another glass of red wine from the bartender. Once again, he wore deceitfully casual clothing: a forest-green sweater, black jeans, and weathered brown boots. His gold watch flashed on his wrist.
“Who is he?” I asked Wolf.
“Fletcher Stevens,” Wolf answered. “Big-time investor, especially in historic properties. He’s had his eye on the Saint Angel for a while.”
“He wants to buy it?”
“And return it to its former glory,” he added. “But the current owner won’t fold so easily.”
“Who owns the hotel now?”
Wolf leaned in as if to share a secret. “A mysterious entity only known as the Bianchi Group. No one knows anything about them.”
“Someone has to know something,” I said. “Otherwise, they couldn’t own a hotel.”
Wolf shrugged. “Perhaps your curiosity might uncover such details.”
The way he said it felt like a challenge, like he wanted me to look into the Bianchi Group. I faced Fletcher Stevens again and found his dark, sparkling eyes connecting with mine. His gaze flickered to Wolf Godfrey at my side, and I caught the inquisitive nature of his glance.
Quickly, I looked at Wolf. He gave Fletcher the smallest of grins.
“You know each other?” I asked Wolf. “Personally?”
“In a manner of speaking.” Wolf squeezed a fresh lime into his water and sipped again. “Ah, that’s better. Enough about me. Tell me about yourself, Jack. I hear a slight lilt in your voice. You’re not from around here, are you?”
“Growing up, I split my time between here and London,” I explained. “I moved back to London about a year ago, so the accent’s crept back in.”
“Posh,” he commented. “I like it. What do you do, Jack?”
“I’m a private investigator.”
Wolf coughed, spraying water across the table. He thumped himself on the chest and blotted his mouth with a cloth napkin. “Gods, forgive me! I can be such a horrible table partner at times. Don’t hold it against me.”
“It’s all right.”
As he wiped the table with a shaking wrist, he caught sight of something—or someone—across the restaurant. A wrinkle appeared between his eyebrows, and his lips turned down.
“Oh, dear,” he said softly. “My son is here.”
I whipped my head around for a look. Perhaps I was too quick to judge, but Wolf Godfrey was not the kind of man I’d expected to have children. Near the host stand, a trio of young men waited to be seated. My stomach kickflipped when the man in the middle laughed and casually brushed his golden hair out of his eyes.
“The one in the middle?” I asked, knowing the answer already.
“Yes, that’s him,” Wolf replied. “Jonathan.”
The server returned and silently set a basket of breadsticks on the table before disappearing again. I shoved one into my mouth and watched Jonathan’s flawless smile as he led his friends across the restaurant.
“You’ve met?” Wolf guessed, reading my expression.
“Last night,” I said.
“Ah, he charmed you, didn’t he?” He didn’t wait for an answer as his gaze returned to his son. “He’s quite charismatic.”
As Jonathan drew closer, he spotted me. His smile grew wider and warmer, but when he noticed Wolf sitting beside me, Jonathan’s handsome glow extinguished itself.
“Hello again,” he said to me. To Wolf, he added tersely, “Hello, Father.”
“Morning, Jonathan—”
Jonathan passed before Wolf had time to complete his greeting. Wolf’s face fell.
“I have to thank you,” Wolf said. “He doesn’t usually address me. You must have made quite the impression on him. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have risked our interaction.”
“We said hello in the elevator,” I explained. “That’s all.”
Jonathan didn’t look our way again as he and his friends sat at a freshly turned table and picked up their menus. Wolf sighed.
“He’s ashamed of me,” he said without prompting. “I’ve made some decisions in the past that he didn’t approve of.”
“Like what?”
He waved off the question. “Nothing of importance. Regardless, we have a complicated father-son relationship.”
“Does he live here too?”
“Depends on the day of the week.”
Surprise lifted my brows. “You live together, but you don’t talk?”
“It’s a long, inevitably tragic story.”
I let it go when I saw the way Wolf’s body tensed as he spoke about his son. His teeth clenched together; it pained him to harbor this kind of stress. I hurriedly changed the subject.
“Tell me
