Arthur made a face. “I suppose because I’m being ridiculous. I never thought she’d be the type to have an expensive second wedding, but she’s a devout Catholic, so perhaps I should have. I just didn’t expect it, that’s all, and these days I don’t much care for anything I don’t expect.”

He picked up a pork bun from the steamer basket. “Rory did agree to bring the Tempest Ring and use it if there’s any danger. And I’m going to Boston with him, if not the wedding itself.”

Jade put her hand on her chin. “You, in Boston?”

“It’s been known to happen,” Arthur said.

“I thought you despised Boston because of baseball,” she said. “In fact, I seem to recall you once said you wouldn’t be caught dead within fifty miles of Fenway Park.”

He had said that. “Was that me?” he said innocently. “Surely that doesn’t sound like me.”

She grinned. “Boston’s not where we’re worried about danger, at any rate. It’s Philly.”

“Rory said that before Hyde killed her, the dream reader paranormal, Miss Shelley, sent a telegram to Baron Zeppler,” Zhang said. “We don’t know what was in the telegram, but we should probably assume Shelley told Zeppler everything they had discovered about Rory—his psychometry, his address, his association with the three of us.”

“But that was the last Zeppler likely heard,” said Arthur. “Because Miss Shelley was murdered, and Hyde incapacitated, and Sebastian de Leon ran off to London with Gwen and Ellis. Instead of gaining a psychometric and a relic, Zeppler lost three henchmen that night. He must be looking for answers.”

“Somehow I doubt he’ll come to America himself,” Jade said grimly. “After all, why directly attack when others can take all the risks for you? And it’s one thing to prey on a lone subordinate paranormal, quite another to start a fight when he knows Rory is now tied to several other paranormals in New York. He may be looking for a back door instead of a confrontation.”

Arthur pursed his lips. “What are my chances of getting Rory to agree to hide?”

“Oh, somewhere between zero and zero,” Zhang said dryly.

“But what if I suggested the Caribbean? We’re trying to destroy a Spanish pomander—let’s look for an answer in the places that speak Spanish.”

Zhang looked at Jade. “San Juan?” he said hopefully. “Havana?”

“As enticing as the Caribbean sounds,” she said, “there’s a world’s fair in Paris.”

But they couldn’t take Rory to Paris. Arthur stared at his fork. He wasn’t so selfish he’d risk the world so he didn’t have to be alone, but the thought of leaving Rory an ocean behind made his chest ache.

Jade exchanged another look with Zhang. “There is perhaps one more option,” she said slowly. “But don’t get mad.”