you're acting like such a prick, they just might sic one or two of them on us for the hell of it."
I stifled the impulse to cheer. Also, to rip Sinclair a new one for not mentioning that little factoid. "So when you planned our honeymoon, you picked Vampire Central?"
"Of course." He had the audacity to look surprised. "Where else would I choose? The staff can accommodate anything we wish. The Grange was a natural choice. Of course" — he gave Nick a heavy-lidded look — "I wasn't expecting company."
"How many of the staff?" Nick asked in a voice that sounded like he was being strangled. "And which ones?"
"That," my husband replied, "I will not tell you."
Jessica and I looked at the men, then at each other. It was never much fun to watch a pissing contest, especially when the odds were so firmly stacked in one person's corner.
After a long, awful moment I said, "Jessica's right, Nick. We'd never let them hurt you."
"You didn't even know about them, you stupid bitch!"
"Nick!" Jessica gasped.
Sinclair's fist slammed on the table, which obligingly cracked. "Do not speak to my wife like that ever again."
"It's okay, don't fight, I've been called worse, please don't fight," I begged. "Let's just get the check and get out of here, okay? Oh, and, um, pay for the table."
"Go back to Vampire Central?" Nick cried, aghast.
"Well, there's a Hilton down the block."
"Hilton," Sinclair sneered. "Enjoy."
"What've you got against the Hilton corporation?" I cried. "Besides them, you know, spawning Paris and all."
"Isn't that more than enough?"
"I've had more than enough," Jessica snapped. "Check, please!"
Chapter Seven
We'd barely gotten down the block when we saw the flashing lights and crowd.
"Uh-oh," Nick said. "Crime scene."
"The perfect end to a perfect evening," Sinclair muttered.
"You guys stay here. I'm gonna check it out."
"You're a little out of your jurisdiction!" I called after him. "Like, by two thousand miles!"
"Fifteen hundred," Sinclair and Jessica said in unison.
"You know, now that he's gone, how much longer are you going to let him torture us?"
"I'm sorry," Jessica said at once. "I guess this is turning out to be a pretty crummy idea. I just thought — I don't know what I thought." She cleared her throat. "You, uh, will mention to the staff not to snack on us, right?"
"There's an old vampire saying," I told her. "Don't shit where you eat."
"Ah, yes, that old vampire saying," Sinclair said, smiling for the first time since the waiter took our order.
We chitchatted for another minute or two, and then Nick came trotting back. "There's a dead kid in that alley," he said, almost snarling. "And if he's more than thirteen I'll eat the candles on his last birthday cake. So which one of you two dead assholes just couldn't wait for a little snack? Huh? Or did you team up on the poor kid? Did you —"
I slapped him. The sound was almost inaudible with all the background noise. One thing about New York I'd never get used to. All the noise. "That is enough, Nicholas J. Berry! You know Goddamned well I wouldn't do that and neither would Sinclair. I know you're pissed at us and I understand that, but there's pissed and there's ugly, and I've had enough of your ugliness. You don't want to be here? Get the fuck lost. If you are going to be here, watch your fucking mouth."
He didn't say another word all night.
Chapter Eight
"He couldn't," Jessica said the next night. "His jaw was numb for hours afterward. No feeling at all. I tried to talk him into going to the E.R. but he wouldn't do it. I was afraid you'd broken his jaw. But you just bruised the hell out of it."
"Oh my God," I said, appalled. I'd only been awake for about twenty minutes and she dropped this on me. "I didn't mean to hurt him! That much."
She shrugged. "He didn't exactly not have it coming. It's so hard to defend your boyfriend when he's being an unreasonable dick."
Tell me about it, I almost said, but managed to bite my tongue in time. Instead I yawned and jumped out of the bed.
"I don't know why you bothered to pack clothes at all," my friend snarked, eyeing my naked form.
"Stop me if you've heard this before, but it is my honeymoon."
"Where's Sinclair?"
"Dunno. But I'm betting he's conducting a private investigation about the dead kid. You know we'd never, and I know we'd never, but victims like that make us all look bad.