“Mom,” Luke groans and takes my hand back. “You’re getting all sappy and shit.”
“Stop swearing.” She whips a hand out and smacks her son on the stomach. “Dammit, Luke. Have we taught you no better?”
“You taught us to cuss in context, and only when we mean it. Goodbye, Momma.” He places one more kiss on her cheek, then he moves to Kit. “KitKat. Keep her inside tonight. We don’t need her up in our business, stinking up a crime scene.”
“I’ve got her on lock,” Kit laughs. “We’ll do ice cream and peanut butter cups.”
“Ugh!” Luke looks to his father and murders him with a glare. “You disgust me.”
“Me? I didn’t do a damn thing.”
“No. He only had to stand there.” Casey smirks and slides under her husband’s arm. “And then lay there.”
“Filth!” Luke drags me out of the house and onto the front porch, and a minute after that, he bundles me into the truck, slides in on his side, and slams the door. “I swear to all that is good in this world, I didn’t need to know about the peanut butter cups.”
“She was just teasing.” I set the small gift bag on top of Luke’s bundled hoodie between us, and fix my seatbelt as he pulls out of the driveway and slows at the security gate. “My mom has played games like that too. It’s basically the world’s most effective cock-block, because they know you aren’t getting busy while you’re hearing that story.”
“Well, you ain’t wrong about the not getting busy, and the cock-blocking. But I assure you,” his eyes come to mine as the gate slides open, “the peanut butter cups are real. Casey Hart does not lie about sugar. Which means there really was a sale on Reese’s, and then she really did forget them in the hot car. And because she doesn’t waste, she really did have to find something to do with a bunch of melted chocolate.” He bounces his shoulders and starts through the open gate. “My father really did just have to lay there. Ugh!”
He digs a hand into his pocket and yanks out his phone. Hitting dial, we wait only seconds before Rob’s voice enters the cab of the truck.
“Yeah?”
“Mom gave Dad a melted chocolate BJ, and I feel sick about it.”
“Ugh! Why would you tell me that?” Rob gags on his side of the line. Retching, breath catching, the synchronized sounds make me want to sympathy-spew. “Luke! You sick prick. Why would you call to tell me that?”
“Because I had to hear about it, and I can’t take that on my own. I can’t carry that kind of heavy all by myself!”
“So call someone else! Get a fucking dog, and tell him.”
“Rob! I need you—”
“Fuck off!”
The line goes dead, and Luke’s grimace turns to a smile. “I feel so much better now. You gonna open your present?”
“My…” My eyes snap down to the gift bag, then back to Luke. “Wait. Go back. You feel better now? You were dry-retching just a second ago, and now you’re smiling.”
“I offloaded it to Rob. He’s wherever he is now, with whoever, and he’s thinking about the story. He took it from me, and now I’m good to roll on our activities for the day. Where do you live?”
“What?”
“Live? Where are you staying while in town?”
“Um… at the hotel over near the hospital.”
“You’re staying at a hotel?” His gaze whips back over to me. “What?”
“What?”
“You’ll be here for months, right?”
“Right?”
“Months! In a hotel. Are you rich and forgot to tell me?”
“No.” I sit back and smile as he turns a corner and heads toward the hospital. “I don’t know if you know, but apart from Christmastime, and only then because of the fight tournament, this town’s hotels aren’t all that in-demand. I got a deal on my room, so long as I clean it myself. It’s a studio, with a washer and a dryer down the hall, so I strip the bed and do all my laundry once a week. There’s a vacuum in the closet, and a tiny stove in the kitchenette, so I buy meat and salad for dinner.”
“You’re living in a hotel!” he exclaims. “Does Sonia know?”
“Well… I don’t know. I never mentioned it, and she didn’t ask.”
“You know the hotel over by the hospital is mainly used by transients, right? Out-of-town people visiting family in the hospital. Medical staff who have been brought in for specialist care or whatever. Hospital staff who wanna fuck and can’t do it in the storeroom while on shift.”
“Aren’t all hotels, by design, for transients? They’re rooms and beds people pay to use for a night. It’s literally part of the mission statement for hotels worldwide.”
“It’s unsafe,” Luke growls. “People are allowed to wander in and out whenever they please. The security is shoddy, and now you’re telling me you do your own cleaning, which means they won’t even be sending staff in once a day to check on you.”
“No, but I’ll be in Sonia’s office every day. If I get shanked by a transient and don’t show up for work, I’m certain Sonia will get word out.”
“Not funny.”
Luke pulls up outside the five-story brick building with ‘Hotel’ painted on the side in blue and white paint, and studying the place with a jittery eye, he taps his fingers on his steering wheel. “I don’t like it. Anyone could get into your room while you sleep.”
“Uh, I don’t know if you’ve heard about this new-fangled technology – since you’re still daydreaming about Britney Spears – but nowadays, we have these things called locks and keys. The lock is to keep people out, and the key is this tiny piece of metal with its own special design. It releases the lock and allows entry to the bearer. I’m the only one with the key.”
“You, and the hotel staff, the hotel staff’s son, his friends, and anyone else who has stayed in that room and never gave the key back.”
“Wait. You’re seriously worried about this?”
“Yes! Hotels are notoriously unsafe for single women staying alone. Do you set the chair in front of the door, at least? Do you set up pots and pans, or drinking glasses, or a party popper, or something to alert you when the door opens?”
“Well… no. But I will tonight, I guess.”
“We’ll get you party poppers before I bring you back here,” he growls out. “Dammit, Ally. Why’d you have to make me care, huh? Grab the bag.”
“The bag?” I scramble out of my side of the truck when Luke goes his way. “What?”
“The gift bag.” He slams his door and leans against the hood. “Your gift. Bring it inside.”
“That’s not my gift! It’s not possible.”
“It is possible, and it is yours. I bought it myself.”
“It was buried beneath cleats and gear you haven’t touched in a decade. It’s not possible.”
“Get the fucking bag, Allyson! Let’s go. We have to get Chester back home, and I need to eat before my body starts eating itself.”