Page 177 of Blue Moon

What Halloween party?

“I’m gonna have to get back to you on that. Did Bradley send the invite for the Egyptian thing?”

I’d been expecting a Halloween party—no way would Bradley let a sort-of-holiday pass without a celebration—but an Egyptian thing?

“No, Tia.” Who would only have done it at Bradley’s direction. “Like, an hour ago.”

“I don’t know anything about it.”

“The invite says it’s a celebration of archaeological discovery and also a pop princess’s future happiness. I’m not totally sure how the two of those fit together, but Isolde’s already planning our costumes.”

I sank onto the left side of a pair of giant stone testicles. Luna had just been kidnapped because a dude thought she was Cleopatra, and now Bradley wanted to celebrate that? Yikes. I desperately needed to book him in for some sensitivity training, or murder him, and I really didn’t have time in my schedule for the latter option.

“Costumes? Great. I’m actually calling about another matter.”

“Oh?”

“I have a candidate for the Sacker Foundation’s hardship fund.”

Ten minutes later, one problem was sorted, and I fired off a message to Bradley.

Me

Egyptian Extravaganza? WTF?

Then it was time to find Elene. It would be easy to come down hard on her, but at the same time, I admired her efforts. She’d worked out what she needed to do, and she’d done it. It was actually a pretty good plan. She’d just been a little naive as to how things would pan out.

I found her by the pool, dangling her legs into the water as she stared at the sky. If she thought the electronic tag wasn’t waterproof, she was shit out of luck.

“Enjoying your last few hours of freedom?”

She jumped, then twisted to face me.

“Relax, I’m joking. But we do need to resolve the situation. And by ‘resolve the situation,’ I mean you need to give Luna’s money back.”

“But—”

“We’re not going to leave your nephew high and dry. The cost of his treatment will be covered by the Sacker Foundation. It’s the philanthropic arm of the pharmaceutical company that’s developing the drugs for his condition.”

“So…so we don’t have to pay?”

“No, it’s all taken care of. Misho will get whatever he needs, and the foundation will also cover your sister’s living costs while she’s here.”

Elene stared at the water. “I don’t know what to say.”

“A thank you would suffice.”

“Thank you. A million times thank you. Will I be able to see Mariam before I go home? Just once?”

“A friend of a friend pulled some strings. You’ll be getting a tourist visa, so you can stick around for now, but you have to go back to Georgia before it expires. If you don’t, I’ll be the one who gets the pleasure of hunting you down, and trust me, you really don’t want that to happen.”

“I’ll go home, I swear.”

“Good. Now, let’s transfer that money back to its rightful owner.”

Well, kind of. Technically, most of it should have gone to Luna’s company, but that would have put it under her mom’s control. Instead, I had Elene send it to a new account Caro had helpfully set up with Luna as the sole signatory. We’d deal with any tax implications later. Hill had wasted a hundred grand, give or take, and Elene had spent a few thousand more, but she’d also had the sense to stash the cash in an interest-bearing account, so some of the loss had been made good. It was the best outcome we could have hoped for, realistically.

An hour later, Elene was detagged and on her way to the small apartment her sister was staying in. It was only a one-bed place, so she’d have to sleep on the couch, but all in all, she’d got a decent deal. And she’d left just in time. Ryder was on his way from Utah with Luna in the second helicopter piloted by Dusk, and she didn’t need the stress of dealing with Elene.

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