“Darius?”
“Who else?”
Kai arched a dark eyebrow. “I’m telling him you called him the big man upstairs.”
Alarm shot through me. “Uh—”
“You’ll do better tonight, eh leng chai?” Izzah asked, planting a hand on her cocked hip. “You overdid it a bit last time, hm?”
“I was celebrating,” Kai muttered. “And Aaron kept bringing me shots.”
“It’s fiiine,” I sang, throwing my arm around his leather-clad shoulders. “It’s not every day he can celebrate joining his first guild—again.”
Izzah’s stern expression softened into a sparkling smile. “No, but try-lah not to throw up in the cab on the way home this time.”
“Whoa, you threw up?” I gasped.
Kai scowled darkly, then walked off with a low mutter about getting changed. Izzah sashayed after him, a predatory spark in her eyes. She had him on the run, and she’d keep teasing him until he exploded—by which I meant, until he pinned her to a wall somewhere and kissed her into speechlessness.
I watched them disappear in the direction of the stairs, beaming happily. Things weren’t perfect, but they were heading in the right direction.
Kai couldn’t change his family, but turning himself in to the MPD to save Makiko’s life had produced an unexpected side effect: it won him the support of her father. It’d taken months of careful maneuvering, but Mr. Miura had helped Kai respectfully end his engagement to Makiko, move into a business role in MiraCo, and, barely a week ago, transfer back into the Crow and Hammer.
Even splitting his time between MiraCo and his guild, Kai still got to chill at the pub, hang out at Aaron’s place, and do all the bounty runs that Aaron’s bad-guy-busting heart desired—when he wasn’t out with Izzah, that was. Thank goodness she’d given him one more chance.
I tapped my chin. The text message I’d sent her a week after Kai officially became single probably helped. It’d said something like, “Kai was an asshole because his family was gonna kill you. Tell him to tell you everything.”
Smirking, I got back to work on the party decorations. We spent a ridiculously long hour hanging balloons—with no small amount of time wasted by literally all of us static-charging ourselves with the balloons and trying to shock Kai—and just as we finished, Clara and Ramsey breezed in, both loaded down with bulging grocery bags.
“The food is here!” I cheered.
“Are we late?” Clara fretted. “The line at the store was a nightmare.”
I glanced at the clock. “You’re good. We have just enough time.”
We all piled on the groceries, separating the snacks from the hors d’oeuvres. Sin, Sabrina, and Kaveri emptied bags of chips into big silver bowls while I arranged the million cupcakes on the tiered dessert tray I’d last used for a long-ago Halloween party. Kai and Izzah reappeared to help, the former wearing slacks and a dress shirt, while the latter had changed into a strapless emerald dress.
As I nervously rearranged the napkins and plates stacked beside the dessert tree, guests began to arrive. The bell over the door rang every minute, voices called out excited greetings, and conversation swelled through the room. I zipped into the back to throw the cupcake containers in the recycling bin, and when I returned, Kai and Izzah were standing at the bar with petite, dark-haired Makiko.
The young MiraCo GM looked like a million bucks in a silver, knee-length sheath dress, her hair coiled into an updo. A Japanese man around her age stood beside her, and my eyebrows shot up. A casual plus-one or a special someone?
“Makiko!” I called brightly as I swung around the bar to join them. “How are you?”
“I’d be better if my most important meeting of this quarter wasn’t indefinitely postponed,” she huffed.
“The VP broke his tailbone in the golf cart accident,” Kai informed me. “He won’t be back to work for weeks.”
Makiko sighed.
“I’m sure it’ll work out,” I replied brightly, not in the mood to worry about random drunk VPs. “Or if you want a less stressful work environment, transfer to our guild!”
A small smile curved her lips. “We made it work for Kai, but my father needs me.”
I tapped my lower lip. “How did you make it work?”
“There are certain advantages to keeping his association with MiraCo unofficial. As a … consultant … he can get away with things a guild member can’t.”
“That was our spin on it, at least,” Kai added dryly. “My grandfather’s allowing it because I’m not a complete embarrassment for once.”
He said the last part with a spark of humor he wouldn’t have felt before, and I hid a sigh of relief. Kai was no longer running from his past. He’d found new confidence in dealing with his family, and he had a more relaxed air about him than I remembered.
Or maybe it was Izzah’s influence. Who knew.
The clock ticked closer to 2:45, and I did a swift headcount on the guests who’d arrived so far. If even one person was late, I would smack them into next Christmas for ruining my party.
The guild door swung open again and Darius stepped inside, dressed smartly in a black bowtie over a baby blue button-down shirt that made his gray eyes pop even more intensely than usual. A bunch of guildeds called out greetings as the GM headed toward me.
“Good afternoon,” he said. “I see everything is prepared.”
“Yep!” Clara chirped, sweeping over to us with Sabrina and Sin on her heels, grinning proudly. “We’re ready to go.”
“Excellent. Tori, I’d like a word in my office please.”
My eyes widened. An invite to Darius’s office almost always meant someone was in trouble. “Someone” being me.
“It’ll only take a few minutes,” he assured me before I could protest.
I hesitated, then nodded. Not like I had a choice.
He led me up two flights of stairs, past the officers’ desks, and into his office. As I sank nervously onto the chair in front of his large desk, he circled around it and took his seat.
I peered from the bookshelves to the stacks of papers on the desktop. It looked just like it had
