"Jesus H. Christ."
"On crutches," Vicki added.
The walls had been marbled. The windows wore four different types of swag. The furniture appeared to have been upholstered in raw silk. The overlapping carpets were Persian. Artwork, two dimensional and three, had been arranged for effect. Number 1409 looked like it had been decorated for the benefit of photographers from Vancouver Life Magazine.
"I didn't think people actually lived like this." Turn?ing her back on the splendors of the living room, Vicki started down the hall. "Do you think the rest of the place is the same?"
A pair of concrete Chinese temple dogs guarded a huge basket of dried roses in one corner of the master bedroom. One end of the king-sized bed had been stacked with about fifty pillows in various shapes and shades. The silk moire duvet cover matched the wall?paper. The drapes, although the same fabric, were sev?eral shades darker.
"This room probably cost as much as my whole house," Celluci muttered.
"Certainly classier than the Holiday Inn," Vicki agreed, stepping back into the hall and opening the door to the smallest of the three bedrooms. "Oh, my God." She froze in the doorway. "I can't stay in this."
Celluci peered over her shoulder and started to laugh.
A huge doll, with a pink-and-white crocheted skirt, sat in the middle of the pink satin bedspread. The pink frilly bedskirt matched the pink frilly curtains which complemented the pink frills on the pale pink armchair tucked into a corner. The dresser and the trunk at the foot of the bed were antique white. The bed itself was the most ornate brass monstrosity either of them had ever seen, covered in curlicues and enam?eled flowers, with a giant heart in the center of both the head and footboard.
Laughing too hard to stand, Celluci collapsed against the wall clutching his stomach. "The thought," he began, looked from Vicki to the bed, and couldn't finish.
"The thought ..." A second attempt got no further than the first.
"What's the matter, chuckles? Can't handle the thought of a vampire in such feminine surroundings?"
"Vicki... " Wiping his streaming eyes with one hand, he waved the other into the room. "... I can't handle the thought of you in these surroundings. I hadn't even started thinking about the other."
Her lips twitched. "It does look like it's been decor?ated by Polly Pocket, doesn't it?"
A few moments later, Tony found them sitting shoulder-to-shoulder on the hall floor, wearing the ex?pressions of people who've nearly laughed themselves sick. "No one answered when I knocked," he ex?plained. "What's so funny?"
Vicki nodded toward the room and gasped, "A pink plastic crypt that fits in the palm of your hand."
"Yeah. Okay." He glanced inside, shrugged, and looked back down at the two of them. "I have no idea of what you're talking about, but the stuff to block the window's outside. Henry thought it would be best if he didn't come in. You know, keeping his scent out."
Braced against the wall, Vicki got to her feet, ex?tended a hand down to Celluci, and stopped herself just before she lifted him effortlessly upright-displays of strength bothered him more than anything else. When she noticed Tony watching her and realized he understood what she'd done, she clenched her teeth in irritation. "This is not a case of a woman being less than she can to save the machismo of some man," she growled. "This is a person making a compromise for someone she cares about."
Tony backed up, both hands raised. "I didn't say anything."
"I could hear you thinking."
As she stomped by him, Tony glanced over at Cel?luci. "Has she always been that moody?"
Celluci ignored him. "What machismo?" he de?manded following her down the hall. "What the hell are you talking about?"
Tony sighed, "Never mind." Trailing along behind, he waited for a break in the argument and announced, "Henry says that once you get the stuff inside and before you put it up, we should all meet in his apart?ment to discuss the case."
Resting two sheets of three-quarter-inch plywood against the wall, Celluci frowned. "Wouldn't finding neutral territory make more sense?"
"He says his place'll do since Vicki's already scented it."
"He what?"
"Hey! Victory!" Eyes wide, Tony backed up until he hit a sideboard and he stopped cold, one hand flung out to steady an antique candelabra rocked by the impact. "Chill. I'm just repeating what Henry said."
"He makes it sound as though I've been spraying the furniture."
Remembering his earlier conversation with Celluci, Tony didn't think it would be wise to add that Henry had also drawn in a deep breath, his expression had softened, and he'd murmured, "God, how I miss her." At the time, Tony had been tempted to remind him none too gently that Vicki was just down the hall and that if he missed her it was his own damned fault. That wasn't, however, a tone one took with Henry Fitzroy.
"While Vicki and I secure that room, I suggest you head over to the city morgue at Vancouver General and ID a corpse."