Page 72 of Client from Hell

“Lucy has information we need to hear before the meeting. Wake your woman up, get her showered, and toss her in some clothes. You’ve got twenty minutes. There will be breakfast ready when you’re done. We’ll be waiting for you in the conference room.” Darlene scowled at her brother. “If I have to come back in here, I’m sinking my claws in your ass, and you won’t be sitting anywhere for a week.”

Jonas grimaced, and he tightened his hold on me. “Ouch. We’re getting up, we’re getting up.”

I waited for Darlene to leave before asking, “We are?”

“We are. When my sister threatens to make use of her claws, she means it—and she makes it hurt as badly as possible. I won’t be sitting for a week if I push her. A smart man knows when it’s time to cooperate without protest. Now is that time. Lucifer wouldn’t get us up unless it was important. If he wants us up, it means we’re expected to contribute during the meeting, and he doesn’t toss people into a bad situation without appropriate warning. That’s how we lose negotiations.” Releasing me, Jonas rolled me off the bed and hopped to his feet, stretching.

I already missed his fur-covered wings, which he’d banished after realizing I’d spend all night playing with them rather than indulging in the rest of his person. “I feel like I was rewarded, but now that I’ve enjoyed my reward, I’m being punished. Having to get up after only three hours of sleep is definitely a punishment.”

Jonas took hold of my wrist and hauled me out of bed. “You’ll feel better after a shower. Lucifer’s a lot of things, but he doesn’t drag people out of bed unless there’s a damned good reason for it. It probably has to do with the body he brought in after you left the lab. There’s been enough time by now for the fucking assholes to have autopsied the body before putting him back together.”

“That poor guy.”

“Yeah. Since he was a vampire, he was probably still alive when they first started cutting him apart.”

Shit. “Are you serious?”

“Deathly so. Lucifer’s mad.”

“How can you tell?”

“I can sense it. Since he converted me himself, I’m more sensitive to his moods. Lucifer’s not just mad, he’s pissed. When he’s pissed, people get hurt. Darlene seems okay, but he’s careful to buffer her if he’s that angry. He’s probably influencing her and feeding her energy and attention to keep her tricked. That’s one of his favorite tactics.”

“Give me something to work with here. What’s the difference between mad and pissed? Use a scale for me.”

“Mad is he’s upset you were five minutes late for a meeting or he doesn’t get to go home to Darlene for an extra hour. Pissed is when he finds out somebody shaved off one of my sister’s spots.”

I stared at the incubus, although I followed him into the bathroom. “That scale doesn’t make sense to me.”

“Okay, mad is you knowing you don’t get to be my bed buddy for a week for a good reason. Pissed is when you don’t get to be my bed buddy for a month, and there’s no good reason for it.”

I gasped. “An entire month?”

“Absolutely wrong, right? That’s him when he’s pissed. He’s probably breathing literal fire right now. He’s angry enough his shroud might slip, so I bet Diana is working on shrouding him to prevent any mistakes he would later regret. He’s come to learn if in doubt, get Diana to cover him. He might ask you for help, too.”

“We better make this a quick shower,” I muttered, and went to work restoring myself to a semi-coherent state. Aware I’d have to go to a meeting that mattered, I took the time to apply makeup, grunting over my short hair. “I should be happy I have any hair, but this stubble is not cutting it for me.”

“Oh, right. Your hair.” Jonas, who’d taken a blitz shower and thrown on a suit, strode out of the room and returned a few minutes later with several scraps of paper. “Lucifer had a practitioner specialized in hair work make the runes for you, so you can just give them a good shake and activate them with the word written on each sheet. That will fix that. You’re going to be a blonde with fairly long hair. He wanted to give you the option to cut it to whatever length you’d like.”

I took the runes, examined them, and activated them in the correct order. My scalp itched, but within five minutes, I’d gone from mostly bald to having waist-length hair. Muttering curses over the new problem of how to style my hair, I stared into the mirror. “Now what?”

“Leave it. You’re not there because of your hair, and if anyone has a problem with how you look, I’ll become their problem and teach them why it’s none of their business.” Jonas narrowed his eyes and looked me over. “I’m going to have a great deal of fun with that hair on my pillow tonight, however.”

“If that’s a lie, you will pay for a long time, Jonas.”

“It better not be a lie, because I’ll suffer, too. I’m too beautiful to suffer, Sandra.”

Despite my growing worry over Lucifer’s mood, I laughed. “I’m probably in line to be punished. I confessed I’d burned his house down.”

“And I missed it?”

“He seemed rather miffed at himself he hadn’t considered me to be a suspect.”

“You just look so innocent, Sandra. And you were until I got my hands on you.”

“Well, I’m guilty as hell, and now he knows it. I’m doomed.”

Jonas chuckled and left the bathroom so I could finish getting ready. “If Lucifer doesn’t punish you, I will, so don’t worry about it.”