"I was and am," he said grimly; then his energy swept through us, zipping us across to the Hallowed Ground in no time at all.
He dropped me in front of the place, then disappeared again before I could question him. I cursed him softly and headed inside the club. Though there was no entertainer onstage, the club had lost none of its patrons. But I guess that wasn't surprising given it was barely one thirty and most of them were vampires. I walked across to the bar and showed the man idly polishing glasses my badge. "I need to talk to someone about the fill-in entertainer you hired today."
The bartender—a balding, pot-bellied vampire who smelled of an odd mix of garlic and alcohol—shrugged. "I'm afraid I can't help you, love. Not my line of work, that, and I don't talk to the entertainers much."
"Not even briefly?"
"No."
A non-chatty bartender was not what I needed right now. "What about the owner?"
"He's not here."
"Then who hired the replacement?"
"That would be Harry, the manager." Amusement lit his brown eyes. "But you didn't ask for the manager, now, did you?"
"I think it could have been taken as a given, seeing I asked to talk to whoever was in charge," I said, barely holding back the annoyance in my voice.
"Ah, but you see, if there's one thing I've learned over my many years of working in non-human establishments, it's that you should never take anything as a given or anyone at face value."
"Which isn't bad advice in general." I hesitated, remembering Hunter's warning, then gave a mental shrug. If she wanted answers, then I had to question the people who were here, whether she liked it or not. "Can I speak to Harry, then?"
"Sure. He's in the office down past the end of the bar."
"Thanks."
He nodded, and his gaze followed me, burning a hole in the middle of my spine as I headed down. I had a feeling that it would be a bad mistake to think he was as meek and as mild as he appeared.