Page 35 of Hard Luck (Blackstone House)

The countertops were the exception—those were granite—and I ran a hand over the cool surface. The year before last, an insufferable bitch of an oligarch’s mistress asked me what my favourite stone was, and I’d said granite just to annoy her. But granite was more practical than sapphires. I’d yet to find a pretty jewel I could crack a man’s skull against, but granite did the job nicely.

Cole poured two glasses of wine, then pulled a face at the chopping board on the central island.

“Guess I’d better leave out the garlic,” he said. “Do you like olives?”

“Sure.”

Apart from Marcel—whom we’d employed mainly for his culinary skills—the last man to cook me a meal had been Nolan de Luca. In Blackstone House, he’d often madefood for the rest of us as well as himself, although I suspected his generosity had partly been an excuse to cook for Echo. He’d cared for her, but in a brotherly way, not reciprocation of her crush. When she first moved in, she used to live on junk—crackers, potato chips, chocolate—thanks to a lack of cooking facilities. It was only later that she’d discovered a taste for sushi, wagyu beef, and French macarons. Part of the reason she travelled now was to explore all the cuisines the world had to offer.

Cole was no gourmet chef, but he knew how to make pesto-and-olive-crusted cod, and the roasted carrots, cherry tomatoes, and bell peppers that accompanied it were cooked to perfection. We ate side by side on stools at one end of the island.

“How’s your leg?” he asked. “Still sore?”

“Pretty much the same as it was at lunchtime.”

“Right. Sorry.”

If Dusk were standing next to me, she’d say, “Don’t be a bitch, Jez.” I made an effort to lighten up because as far as I knew, Cole hadn’t done anything wrong.

“As long as I don’t put weight on it, it doesn’t hurt too much. The doc said the cast needs to stay on for at least another month.”

“At least you have a desk job.”

“Right, waiting tables would be awkward right now.”

“A waitress at the Galaxy broke her ankle two weeks ago, and she still showed up to work. Said she couldn’t pay the rent otherwise.”

“Did you let her hop?”

“No, I switched her onto a stool at the host stand.”

Of course he did, because Cole was a nice guy. Maybe too nice—he needed to make hard decisions if the Galaxy was in as bad a shape as he described, and I wasn’t sure he was capable.

“How is work? Did the guy who was asking for money come back?”

“Which guy?”

Fuck, there was more than one?

“Jimmy?”

Cole shook his head as he speared a piece of fish with his fork. “Haven’t seen him.”

“But more people are showing up?”

“Most of them are calling. Only a couple came in person—one offered to resend the paperwork, and the other had a bunch of text messages from Uncle Mike promising three hundred bucks for repairing an AC unit.”

“Were the messages genuine?”

“I think so.”

“If you want, I have a techie friend who could take a look.”

Plus she could check out the other data on Cole’s phone too, just in case there was anything relevant to the assholes in the morgue.

“Thanks, but I paid the guy out of my own pocket to make the problem go away.”

It took effort, but I resisted the urge to face-palm.

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