Page 58 of Aftertaste

Maura’s metabolism was unreal.

Another mystery to solve, right up there with those scars on her wrists and that mid-coital blackout. Not to mention all the stuff she knew about the Dead. But that was probably just an occupational hazard of being a psychic. And she’d just let him in about Everleigh, so it was only a matter of time before she’d share the other stuff, right?Right?

Sure. Yup.

It was fine. This was fine.

Fine, fine, totally fine.

“Stan?”

“Hm?”

“There’s a good Cuban place a few blocks away. You haven’t lived till you’ve tried one of their cigars. Or we could go back to your place… order in….” She twirled a piece of purple hair around her finger. “Findsomeway to kill half an hour… Unless you’re not hungry?”

He was, suddenly. Very.

“I could eat.”

MAURA LEFT HISapartment around midnight, her scent still lingering in the air, perfume and shampoo and sweat like olfactory ghosts. He’d wanted her to stay, had nearly begged, but she had work early the next morning, an aura cleansing for some celebrity—You’d die if I told you who—and needed to prep.

She’d liked his place, had asked for the grand tour—Oh my God,there’sanotherbedroom?—astonished by the square footage until he explained that he hadn’t always lived alone, that his best friend had been his roommate.

“Is he coming back for his stuff?” she asked. “Because you could totally sublet.”

“No, he, um… he died. Couple months back. He—he was a chef, too. There was a fire. At his restaurant.”

Her eyes grew wide. “Oh my God.”

“Yeah. Wolfpup. On the Upper West Side. Frankie was the sous.” Kostya pulled up a photo on his phone, Frankie in his chef’s whites, plating a dish with one hand and flipping him off with the other. “He ran that ship.”

“Whoa.” Maura stared at the picture for a long time. “Can you taste him?”

Kostya thought of the rum cake from earlier that night, the flavors appearing right there in the room.

“Sometimes.”

“It must be nice,” Maura said. “To know he’s there.”

“It is,” Kostya agreed. “But it’s hard, too. Most of my life, I’ve felt more connected to the Dead than the Living.”

Maura moved closer. “Maybe you just need to live a little more.”

He breathed her in, her smell intoxicating. “Maybe you can show me.”

She swallowed the space between them, kissed him slow. The sensation of her mouth was honey, sweet and sticky and thick. He kissed her back, and it was agony, this kiss, the way it consumed him. She pulled him in, close, closer, desire pushing every other thought to the back of his mind.

AFTERWARD, ALONE, KOSTYAstood in his kitchen, and stared at Frankie’s note, the menu he’d scrawled a message from beyond the grave. He read it again. The last line, over and over.

Special Seatings—Chef’s Tastings (Limited)

Yes.

This was it.Of course.

Thiswas how he opened a restaurant—one that could seat lots of people while still raising just a few ghosts a night.Thiswas how he solved Viktor’s volume problem.

He would offer a permanent menu of the best ghost flavors he’d tasted from beyond, prepped and ready for ordering à la carte. And then, for the more adventurous eaters, a special dining experience to reconnect them with their own personal ghosts, the seatings limited to a select few each night. Chef’s Tastings.

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