Fall of Night The Morganville Vampires - By Rachel Caine Page 0,34

too.’

‘Yeah, but not with so much style.’ Jesse winked. ‘Go on, you. I’ll tackle the metre maid if necessary.’

Claire led Pete upstairs, pointed out the box, and Pete very happily (and super easily) picked it up and got it down the long flights without a problem. ‘So, you’re just moving in, right?’ he said. ‘New student?’

‘Does it show?’

‘Not as much as most. I don’t see a lot of kitten posters and boy bands on the walls up there.’

Claire almost laughed. ‘Not my style. Though if you know of any place I can get a sparkly unicorn poster …’

‘Ask Jesse,’ he said, and stood aside as she opened up the door. ‘She’s the sparkly unicorn fancier.’

He said it loudly enough that Claire figured it was bait for Jesse to respond, and the redhead probably normally would have done it, but she was standing very still, facing away. This time of year, and with the height of the buildings, the sky was a dusky blue, well into twilight, and Claire couldn’t see much farther than the other side of the street, so she couldn’t figure out what had attracted Jesse’s undivided attention.

Then a streetlight flickered on, shedding a cold pale light over concrete, a fireplug at the corner, some trash bags … and a man standing on the sidewalk, leaning against a wall, watching them.

‘Friend of yours?’ Jesse asked. She sounded calm and relaxed, still, but her body language said something different.

Claire couldn’t see his face, but the size looked right. ‘It’s probably Derrick. My roommate’s ex. He’s a stalker.’

‘Want us to go have a little chat?’ Jesse asked, and Claire realised with a start that she was serious about it. ‘Pete?’

‘Always up for a little heart-to-heart chat,’ he said, ‘but Anderson was pretty firm about this thing being a priority. So maybe we leave it for later, okay?’

Jesse hadn’t moved; Derrick had her attention fixed as if she’d been glued down in one direction. She finally sighed and turned her head to give Pete a disappointed look. ‘You take all the fun out of life, you know that?’ Pete shrugged, as if he lived with disappointment, and carried the box down the stairs to the car. Jesse stayed put, still attentive toward Derrick’s silent, still presence across the street, as Claire locked and rechecked the door. ‘Do you have an alarm in there?’

‘No,’ Claire said. ‘I told Liz we need to get one, but she doesn’t think we can afford it.’

‘Better broke than dead,’ Jesse said. ‘I can smell the crazy on that man from here. I have a nose for it.’ In the dim light, a passing car’s lights hit Jesse full in the face, and lit her up like a billboard. Her blue eyes were very, very bright, and for a second Claire had a Morganville déjà vu … but this was the real world, and Jesse was just a badass. Like Pete.

Maybe that was enough.

CHAPTER FIVE

SHANE

I was up to my elbows in hot water.

I don’t mean that figuratively. It was actual hot water, with suds, and I was washing bar glasses. My second full day in Cambridge, and I had a job – crappy as it was – at a place called Florey’s Bar & Grill, although the only thing I’d seen them grill so far had been some burgers and hot wings. It was the kind of place that offered up a food menu small enough to fit on a business card, and a nine-page drinks list.

So even though my official title was dishwasher, I was washing glasses. Every once in a while, there was a plate for variety. Maybe a fork. Not much else.

Like all industrial kitchens everywhere, it was humid, hot and a little nasty; the building was old and had probably seen various owners shilling drinks for at least a hundred years. The plumbing probably hadn’t been significantly upgraded in all that time. Hell, it probably had rats older than me, and maybe bigger, too. When I was done with the glasses – if that ever happened – I’d be expected to mop and scrub the place out.

A kitchen is run like an army; in fact, they call it a brigade system. The chef de cuisine (‘Yes, chef!’) is the general; his second-in-command is the sous chef; and then there are chefs des parties, who are responsible for individual workstations. Somewhere way down at the bottom of that organisational chart is something called a plongeur – as in, dishwasher. That’s what I was doing.