The Priest (The Original Sinners #9) - Tiffany Reisz Page 0,34
some coffee. I’ll be right out.”
Cyrus retreated to the suite. He saw the unmade, very well-used bed, but no Viking. He poured himself a coffee. When he was sipping it, he noticed the door to the terrace. The Viking was seated outdoors at a black iron table reading the Sunday paper.
Nora stepped out of the bathroom wearing the hotel’s white bathrobe, Le Richelieu embroidered in gold thread over the breast pocket.
“Let’s go outside,” she said, picking up a chair to take onto the terrace. “Can you grab the door?”
Cyrus stopped her. “Let me carry that.”
“Oh my,” she said. “Aren’t you chivalrous?”
“Just polite,” Cyrus said.
“That was the beginning, you know,” Nora said, holding the glass door open for Cyrus. He watched as S?ren, the Viking, put his paper down on the table and folded it neatly. One of those types. A little anal. A bit too proper. Secret wild side. Cyrus knew the type. Used to be the type.
“The beginning of what?” he asked Nora.
“Chivalry. The subculture of male submission,” Nora said as she sat in the open chair, coffee cup cradled in both hands. Cyrus set his chair down and sat.
Nora continued, “It began in the courts of medieval Europe. Supposedly. Knights would choose a lady—almost always married because that was more proper—and he would devote himself to serving her chastely. Poems, heroic deeds, gifts… It was the start of the idea of Woman Superior and Man Inferior—not a common concept you find in most cultures outside a handful of matriarchal societies.”
“So you’re saying kink comes from King Arthur,” Cyrus said. “Crazy.”
“I still have male subs who bring me gifts, write me poems, offer to do all sorts of things for me. One offered to have him killed.” She nodded at the Viking.
“You never told me that,” the Viking said, giving her a look. Same look Cyrus might have given Paulina if she said one of her exes had offered to kill him.
“I wanted to keep my options open,” she said, winking at Cyrus.
The Viking picked up his coffee cup and drank from it, keeping an eye steady on her the whole time.
“I didn’t expect to be having these conversations when I agreed to find out the cause of Father Ike’s suicide,” Cyrus said.
“Any new news there?” S?ren the Viking asked.
“He called Nora before he shot himself, and he had that thing in his bedside table,” Cyrus said. “That’s all I got right now.”
“Did you decide what it was precisely?” the Viking asked Nora.
“Some custom piece,” she said. “Stainless steel cock blocker. With that thing on, no way would he be able to get an erection without agony. Like putting your dick in a spiked vice. I need one.”
The Viking’s brow furrowed. Cyrus crossed his legs.
“And kinky men really get into that?”
“Oh yeah,” she said. Her green eyes went bright and wide. “I could tell you stories, Cyrus Tremont.”
“Don’t tell me any stories,” Cyrus said. “No stories at all.” The Viking chuckled.
“Wish I could help you more,” Nora said.
“You could help me find Mr. Edge. I better ask him if he remembers giving your card to anyone down here.”
“You can ask him,” Nora said, “but I asked him yesterday and he says he didn’t.”
“I’d like to see him anyway,” Cyrus said. “The right question can jog the memory. I was hoping you’d be willing to come by Ike’s apartment with me. In case there’s more kinky stuff there, and I don’t know what it is.”
Nora glanced at the Viking, as if asking him permission.
“May I ask a few questions first?” S?ren said.
Cyrus tensed. “Yeah, of course.”
“Eleanor said—”
“That’s me, by the way,” Nora said.
“I figured. Go on.” Cyrus nodded at the Viking.
“Eleanor said you wouldn’t tell her who hired you to look into Father Murran’s suicide. You seem like a very decent man,” S?ren said. “But I need to know that before I let her get more involved. I’m sure you understand.”
Cyrus did. He respected the man for wanting to protect his girlfriend.
“No one actually hired me,” Cyrus said. “I’m doing this as a favor for a friend of mine on the police force. She was told to drop any investigation into his death, just rule it a suicide, clean up and move on. And with no evidence of foul play, she can’t really justify putting any man hours on the job. She asked me to dig a little, make sure there’s nothing more at play.”
“This is quite a favor she asked of you,” S?ren said.