This Side of the Grave (#5 Night Huntress)

had my ass been so thoroughly kissed, and the management here didn’t have a reputation for expressing displeasure with their people by impaling
them on long wooden poles. At least, not that I knew of.
Once inside the elevator leading up to our floor, however, I understood the reason for the employees’ over-the-top graciousness. If the fur-clad
woman next to me had her nose any higher in the air, she’d get altitude sickness—and really, who wore a full-length fur coat in the summertime,
anyway? The man with her, her husband, I deduced from their matching rings, also looked like a stick took up permanent residence in his ass. She
gave me a cool glance, her gaze traveling over my windblown hair and somewhat unkempt appearance with a disdain that took me right back to my
days as a small-town outcast. Hey, for riding straight through from Chicago to New Orleans on a motorcycle, I looked pretty damn good. Nary a bug
in my teeth or anything.
A slight sniff accompanied her turning away to whisper, “Clientele here seems to have slipped,” to her husband, loud enough that even without
supernatural hearing, I would’ve heard her. My teeth ground together while I reminded myself that mesmerizing her into believing her ass had just
grown by five sizes was not a mature thing to do.
The elevator doors opened in the next moment, thankfully on the couple’s floor. As they exited, Bones gave the husband a bland smile.
“She’s rogering the plumber every Thursday while you’re at the club. Did you really think your loo needed repairs four times this past month?”
The woman let out a shocked gasp even as her husband’s face became mottled.
“You told me he was laying pipe, Lucinda!”
Bones grunted. “Right you are, mate.”
The doors closed just as the woman began to sputter out an indignant, yet unconvincing, denial. My jaw still swung open at the whole exchange.
“Bones!” I finally managed.
“Serves the sow right for what she was thinking about you, and he was no better” was his unrepentant reply. “Now they’ll have something else to
occupy their time aside from looking down their noses at people.”
Part of me was horrified at what he’d done, while another, less charitable part cackled shamelessly. God, the look on that woman’s face! She’d
had “busted” written all over her formerly haughty expression.
“Not like I broke some poor, innocent bloke’s heart, either,” Bones went on. “He’s shagging his barrister. Pair of them deserve each other.”
“This just reinforces my opinion that I don’t want mind-reading powers,” I said, shaking my head. “I never need to pick up on things like that from
other people’s heads.”
The elevator doors opened again, our floor this time. Bones’s hand rested lightly on my back as we walked to our room. Once inside, my jaw
dropped again. This wasn’t a hotel room; it was the size of a house. I slowly looked around at the gorgeous hardwood floors, Oriental rugs, elegant
antique furnishings, a dining room complete with crystal chandelier, ornate family room with gilded fireplace, floor-to-ceiling glass doors that
afforded a view of the Mississippi River and the outdoor courtyard—and I hadn’t even gotten to the bedroom yet. The other time we’d come to New
Orleans, we’d stayed at Bones’s town house in the Quarter, but we knew that would be the first place anyone looked for us, so checking into a hotel
seemed safer.
Though a lot more expensive, judging from all the finery around me.
“Did we win the lottery and you forgot to tell me?”
He flashed me a grin as he tossed his jacket onto a nearby chair. “Know one of the advantages of being mates with a vampire who used to get
regular visions of the future? Two words, luv. Investment advice.”
I laughed even as I shrugged out of my own leather coat. “Now I have another reason to hope Mencheres’s visions get back to full strength.”
“Even so.” He sauntered over, brushing my hair back from my face. “We have time to wash up and change, but don’t get too comfortable. We’re
going out.”
My brows furrowed. “I thought we weren’t seeing Marie until tomorrow night.”
“We’re not.” Bones brushed the barest of kisses across my lips. “Tonight, we have other plans.”
I looked at the river several stories below me, wondering if this was some sort of joke. The bridge I stood atop of—under construction and
therefore empty of commuters—swayed slightly in the breeze, or maybe that was just a result of me clutching the beam next to me too hard.
“Say again?” I called down to Bones. He stood at the bottom of the bridge, having flown there after dropping me off on the overhanging beam
with only one word of explanation that I must have misheard.
“Jump,” he repeated. No, I hadn’t misheard him before.
I glanced back at the swirling waters of the Mississippi below. “If this is your way of saying you want a divorce . . .”