“You and Mia had a public argument tonight. She stormed off. As far as the supernatural community knows, you’ve broken things off.” Phenex grinned again, but then forced his lips into a frown when Az shot him a glare. “We’re running out of time to get an invite from Lars. If you don’t do something soon, we’ll lose our chance to get into that ball.”

“We don’t have time to worry about this,” I said, throwing up my hands. “We need to focus on finding Serena.”

“We’re going to have to worry about both, darling,” Caim drawled. “You and Az need to have a public date where we know Lars will see you. As soon as possible. Like…tomorrow. While you’re out getting your invite to the ball, we’ll huddle and form a plan for the killer.”

Phenex nodded. “After your date, you can come back to the club, and we’ll fill you in on the plan. We can do both. Easy peasy.”

“This sounds like the opposite of easy peasy,” I said flatly.

“As much as I hate to admit it,” Az finally said. “They’re right. If we don’t get an invite to the Covenant Ball by the end of this week, we aren’t getting one. All of those human lives will end.”

“Fine,” I relented. “On one condition.”

Az frowned. “I’m not sure I want to know.”

“Before we go rushing headfirst into this plan, whatever it ends up being, can we try something else first? Serena’s boyfriend was at the party with her tonight. He was by her side the whole time. If someone took her, maybe he saw who it was.”

Az cocked his head. “You mentioned him before, but I didn’t see him.”

“He was there,” I insisted. “Trust me. He might have stepped away for a moment, but I doubt she would have left the party without telling him. He must have seen something. Maybe he could at least give us the identity of the killer. That would help, right?”

“Maybe,” Caim said, nodding at Phenex. “If the killer is part of the supernatural community, there’ll be an address for him somewhere. If we could find out his name, we might be able to track him down.”

I loosed a breath. “So we could find him that way, instead of trying to set a trap for him again. Like Az said, he isn’t stupid. He’ll expect us to try something during the trade.”

“Okay.” Az nodded. “It’s a deal then. Shall I draw up the contract?”

My heart dropped. “You can’t be serious.”

A little, dimpled smile tickled the corners of his lips. “No, I just wanted to see your reaction.”

“Well, that’s annoying.”

Caim cleared his throat and jerked his head at Phenex. They locked eyes and made a few strange noises before they simultaneously drifted toward the door.