Page 29 of The Grave Robber

Oh, right. The furball.

“I’ll take care of it. I’ll pay for the sheets and have themattress and carpet cleaned.”

“You don’t have to do that,” he said, his tone suddenlyflirtatious. “The boss doesn’t need to know everything, but he should probablycheck out soon.”

“I’ll take care of it,” she repeated.

I tried to look at her, but I just couldn’t focus onanything other than the backs of my eyelids. Either that fifth had hit meharder than usual, or my subdural hematoma was acting up again. Of course, herhand resting on my rib cage wasn’t helping. I had focus issues as it was. Herministrations were only making them worse.

Darkness fell over the room when the man closed the door,and I asked in a gravelly voice, “Who’s Nolan?”

“A friend from high school who works here. Who’s this?” Shepicked up the pitch-black furball. It whimpered excitedly in her arms. Hallelaughed, the sound curative.

“Her name is Buttercup.”

“Does she have a collar with a tag?”

“No, but she reminds me of a hellhound named Buttercup.”

“You know a hellhound named Buttercup?”

“She’s a cuddler, too.”

“Well, this little sweetheart needs her own name. How aboutFluffy? Or Flavia? Or Flutura the Warrior Queen?”

The horrified expression I flung at her was more thanwarranted. “What is wrong with you?”

She hmphed and continued to snuggle the pup, cooing andcrooning. I’d never been so jealous of an animal in my life.

I threw an arm over my eyes, realizing I probably lookedlike death warmed over. The longer the night wore on, the more swellingappeared, and the worse my scrapes, bruises, and the deep abrasion across myjaw got. Then I remembered my arm looked just as bad, so I gave up and wentback to admiring the view.

She wore a peach sundress with a pale-yellow sweater like asummer breeze come to life.

“Why aren’t you at work?” I asked.

“I was on my way, but I thought I’d stop by and check onyou.”

“How did you know where to find me?”

“You texted me seventy-three times last night and invited meover.”

I bolted upright, ignoring the onslaught of pain as Iscrambled for my phone. If I texted anything to her about Paul, the securityguy, he would know. No way he didn’t have some kind of surveillance on bothHalle’s and her father’s phones. How could I be so careless? And only hoursafter I’d promised Donald he could trust me with his daughter’s life.

“Kidding,” she said in a sing-song voice. She buried herface against the furball’s neck. “Jason told me. Where did you get Flutura?”

After squelching a burning desire to throttle her, I scootedup on the bed and swung my legs over the side, careful to keep the sheetcovering my most pertinent parts. “First, we’re not calling her that. And second,she was outside my door last night, whimpering in the rain.”

Halle turned the full force of her admiration on me with asingle, heart-stopping smile. “And you brought her inside?”

It was admiration I didn’t deserve. I ducked my head andchecked my phone for messages. “She was shivering.”

“And then you let her sleep with you?”

I stopped and stared yet again. “She was shivering.”

She stared back. Fora really long time. Long enough that my lungs began to burn, and I realized I’dstopped breathing.

While I sat there like an ass, struggling to provide mycells with oxygen, she was apparently more worried about the mutt. “Flavia!”she shouted, shifting her focus back to the tiny creature.

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