I bought a white chocolate mocha and slid into the chair opposite her. “Good morning,” I said.

She looked me over, noting the glamour. “And a good night?”

I shrugged. “Okay night.”

“You ready to meet the Army of Darkness?”

“Sure. I—wait. What did you say?”

“The Army of Darkness. That’s what the cult calls itself.”

“They know that’s a movie, right?”

She shook her head. “Honestly, it’s hard to say. They may have named themselves after the movie, for all I know.”

“This is so absurd as to be unreal,” I told her. “It all sounds like a joke.”

“If only,” she muttered. “Believe me, I’ll be glad when you get rid of them. Aside from the fact that Cedric makes me talk to them, I have to file a ream of paperwork each time they do something stupid. It’s really stressing him out. I keep trying to get him to do relaxation exercises, but he won’t.”

Her tone sounded genuinely concerned, almost as though she worked for Cedric out of true loyalty, rather than the forced servitude the rest of us bowed to.

“Well, I’ll see what I can do. Don’t you guys have a succubus up here? Why isn’t she working this group over?”

“She’s busy seducing the premier. Cedric didn’t want her distracted.”

“Whoa,” I said. It had been centuries since I’d had the initiative to go after a major politician. “I feel like a slacker.”

Kristin cut me a look. “Mostly I hear that you’re a troublemaker.”

“I like to think I’m just misunderstood.”

She snorted. “We’re all misunderstood. You have no idea how many times people try to use that as a reason to break their contracts.”

Between mourning Seth and being the target of Jerome’s annoyance lately, I’d had little time to think about much else. Kristin’s words suddenly triggered a memory, one I’d tried to keep buried for some time now.

“How many times do people try to break their contracts over an error?”

When Niphon had been here last winter, he’d gone to great pains to complicate my life and get me recalled to Hell. Since he’d been the one to trick me into selling my soul so long ago, I had plenty of reason to hate him. But why he’d hate me and want to ruin me? That had been—and still was—a mystery. Hugh had speculated that when an imp went to that much trouble to mess with their acquisition, there was usually a reason—specifically, a potential problem with the original contract.

My casual air didn’t fool Kristin. “You think there might be an error in yours?”

I kept my nonchalance. “Hugh—my imp—thought there could be. But he wouldn’t look it up.” His refusal to help me still stung.

“He’s smart. Looking into others’ contracts can get us in big trouble. The vaults of Hell are not a place you want to get caught snooping around in. It would take a lot to get an imp to risk that.”

I had no proof, but something told me that Kristin was older and higher-ranking than Hugh and that she might have more access than he did. I smiled sweetly. “What would it take for you to risk that?”