Ice Storm - Anne Stuart [19]
“What’s he supposed to do, wear a rose in his teeth?” Genevieve whispered to him.
“I think I see him,” Peter replied, zeroing in on a tall, slender man in an immaculate dark suit, looking around as if expecting someone. Isobel would approve; members of the Committee tended to be extremely well dressed. They didn’t usually bother with the rank and file, but were more likely to interact with the movers and shakers of the dark world they lived in. The young man would fit in perfectly.
Peter headed for him, still holding Genny’s hand. “Hiromasa Shinoda?” he said.
The young man blinked. “Sorry, my name is Weng Shui Lau.”
Peter felt Genevieve’s elbow in his ribs. “That’s not him.”
“I beg your pardon,” he said politely, before turning to look at her. “I figured out that much, but why…” His voice trailed off. Someone was standing directly behind Genevieve, taller than her impressive height, and Peter’s good mood vanished entirely.
“Oh, shit,” he muttered.
Hiromasa Shinoda smirked, tossing his long red hair back from his tattooed face. “I’m glad to see you, too.”
“Reno.”
“In the flesh. That man wasn’t even Japanese, he was Chinese. Believe me, we don’t all look alike.”
Peter ignored the jibe. “Taka sent you?”
A faintly disgruntled expression crossed Reno’s face, and he dropped his sunglasses down onto his elegant nose, hiding the brilliant, fake green eyes and tattooed blood drops on his high cheekbones. “I was informed it would be a wise idea for me to leave Japan for a time, and Taka thought I should do some good for a change.” He glanced around him with casual disdain.
“It would be a novelty,” Peter said.
Genevieve smacked him in the arm. “Stop it, Peter. He helped save your life in Japan last year, and you know it. He just likes to pretend he’s scary.”
Reno growled, offended. “I am not interested in your idiot organization or your delusions of sainthood. I promised Taka I would come, and I will stay here and do what you want until it’s safe for me to go home.”
“And how long will that be?”
“It depends on how angry the police are, how unforgiving my grandfather is and how interested Taka is in letting me come home.”
“What terrible thing did you do?” Genny asked, sounding fascinated.
“None of your business.”
“Watch it,” Peter warned him. “You don’t want to mess with Genevieve—she can turn you into hamburger if you annoy her.”
She laughed. “Nobody can keep secrets from me,” she declared, and Peter remembered with depressing speed that his wife had always had a soft spot for Taka’s punk cousin. She’d even tried a little bit of matchmaking between Reno and Taka’s future seventeen-year-old sister-in-law, the Amazonian Jilly Lovitz, until Taka abruptly dragged him back to Japan.
And now he was here again, and likely to stay for a while, and it was up to Peter to ride herd on him. First Thomason, and now Reno. If it weren’t for Genevieve he’d count the day a total disaster.
“You’re coming home with us, aren’t you?” she continued, ignoring Peter’s horrified expression. “You know you’re always welcome, and you can ride into London with Peter each morning. He’s arranged for an apartment in Kensington, but I know you’d rather be with us.”
Reno was looking just as aghast. “I like cities.”
“But you really should—” Genevieve began to protest, until Peter interrupted her.
“You’ll like the apartment. And besides, I don’t think you’d enjoy it out in Wiltshire very much. Genny and I spend all our time in bed.”
His wife kicked him, hard, avoiding his bad leg, and then realization obviously set in. They’d have a hard time making babies with a curious houseguest wander ing around.
Reno lifted his sunglasses and gave Genevieve a cool, assessing look, one that Peter immediately wanted to wipe off his pretty face. “Taka promised me an apartment if I did this. Or do you think you need to babysit me?”
“I didn’t know it was you,” Peter grumbled. “I thought it was some nerd named Hiromasa Shinoda.”
“I am some nerd named Hiromasa Shinoda. I just don’t go by that name,” he said loftily. “Are you