Blood Trade: A Jane Yellowrock Novel Read Online Free PDF

made it mighty nifty in my opinion.
    I pulled Bitsa into the shade and studied the facade. The bullet holes had been repaired and the place looked good. The guys pulled in behind me and, just like last time we were here, I left them to unload while I took the three low steps to the door, which opened before I knocked. The owner stood there wearing a huge smile, a bizarre mixture of colors and fabrics, and her trademark string of pearls wound around her neck and resting across her little rounded belly. Esmee was a skinny, wrinkled woman with shocking red hair and no fashion sense. Today she was wearing purple velour elastic-waist pants and a frilly shrimp-toned blouse with full, pleated sleeves, bright red lipstick that had bled into the creases of her mouth, a stars-and-stripes scarf, and a pair of emerald green ballet slippers with feathers on the instep.
    Hands clapping joyfully, she rushed through the door, saying, “You came back.” She held her arms out to me for a hug.
    Crap . I’m not a hugger. I don’t like to be squashed up against a stranger. I’m not even real fond of back-slapping handshakes. I took a quick step back, but Esmee was fast for a tiny elderly woman, and she caught me. She was also stronger than expected. Her grasp on my elbow stopped me in my tracks and she wrapped her arms around me, her head stopping about midchest on me. She rocked me back and forth in a fast little shimmy. “My son said you’d never come back, but I’m so glad you did.”
    I managed a startled, “Huh?” Son?
    She pulled away to look up at me. “I hadn’t had so much fun in years as when you were here last. Not even when Ronald and his charming wife stayed here.”
    She was talking about President Reagan and his wife, Nancy. Esmee’s home had been a B and B for years. “Um.” Succinct. That’s me. I added, “We got the place shot up.”
    “I know,” she said, as if that was the best thing in the world. “I hadn’t shot my gun in years till that day. Since then, I’ve been target shooting several times, and the sheriff and I even shot some skeet. I beat the pants off that girl. Come in! Come in!”
    I looked back over my shoulder to see Eli watching, one corner of his mouth tilted up. I was reasonably sure he was laughing at me as I was pulled inside.
    Esmee’s grasp on my hand was like the talons of a hawk as she pulled me through the living room, past the dining room, butler’s pantry, wine closet, and coffee bar. Off to the side were the wet bar, billiards room, music room, TV room, servants’ toilet, powder room for guests, and a coat closet bigger than a small garage. The downstairs was exactly as I remembered it, sans holes in the ancient plaster. The place had copper-coffered twelve-foot ceilings and tricolored wood parquet floors covered with silk rugs. Her family had been rich for centuries and the place was full of antique wood furniture. It was decorated in generations of treasures, stuff you might see on Antiques Roadshow that was worth tens of thousands of dollars. Each.
    A maid and the three-star chef lived upstairs, which meant we would have to do no cleaning and someone else would keep lots of food on hand, which always made me happy. Esmee stopped in the small nook off the kitchen, where there was a table and four cozy chairs, probably a breakfast room. A roast piglet—still steaming from the grill—lay on a cast-iron tray on top of a trivet, the kind that whirls around for ease of serving. My mouth started watering as if I hadn’t eaten in days. To the side of the trivet were small bowls of condiments and a loaf of homemade bread with several slices already cut. There was also a bowl of fruit and a tray with cubes of different cheeses, each stuck with a toothpick.
    “I asked Jameson to put together a small repast. Now let’s see. You take tea—am I right? Sit, sit.” She pushed me into a chair and I sat. It was that or fall over from her shove. The little woman was wiry and strong.