"Esther M. Friesner - At These Prices" - читать интересную книгу автора (Friesner Esther M)

and cooed, “Tsk, tsk, wasn’t that a near thing? You almost got to drink some
Tiernan House Blend again, and we both know what that would do. Lucky I saved
you just in time.”
“Whatever you say, milady.” A lone tear trickled down Bixby’s cheek.
Berry and Mel approached the bar, glamoured to the nines as
Eurotrash—sleek, chic, bored, and black-clad. “I trust everything is to your liking,
ma’am?” the dwarf asked from an unusual (for him) height.
“It’ll do,” Bella replied languidly. “But whose stupid idea was it to make the
centerpieces that big?” She gestured at the towering thickets of day lilies, orchids,
and roses on every table.
“That would be Lyndon, ma’am,” Berry replied. “He likes to think big. It
comes naturally to an ogre.”
“An ogre who’s also one heck of a shrewd businessman,” Mel put in.
“What’s so shrewd about cramming half a garden onto every table?” Bella’s
gesture swept the room. “It’s wasteful!”
“Not when he can reuse the same arrangements at several events.”
“He can?” Berry seemed genuinely surprised by this news.
Mel nodded. “No shrinkage, you see. None of the floral arrangements can go
walkabout between the one o’clock bridesmaids’ luncheon, the four o’clock tea
party, and the seven o’clock testimonial dinner. Who’d want to take home
something this big? Who could?”
“You mean that after my party he’s going to recycle my flowers at someone
else’s affair?” Bella began to seethe.
“To be honest, ma’am, they’re not your flowers.” Mel produced Bella’s
detailed list and handed it back to her. “You’ll notice you forgot to specify
centerpieces of any sort, big or small. The fact that the Hotel Tiernan provided them
anyway—”
“Your halo’s in the mail,” Bella snapped. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to
see to my invited guests.” She pushed her way past Berry and Melusine, Bixby
bobbing in her wake.
Tom the troll lumbered up behind his friends. Like them, he was in human
guise. He looked quite dashing in his security guard uniform, and quite ill at ease with
the unwanted attention it attracted from the Speranza Storm crowd. “Mind if I stick
close t’ yer?” he asked, casting nervous glances at the predatory females. “Brrrr!
They looks ready t’ gobble me up like I was a nighty-night mint onna pillow.”
Selina zoomed down from the chandelier to perch on his shoulder. “Can’t
blame ‘em if you’re irresistible, Tom,” she said. “It’s those rock-hard abs. Pity the
girls don’t know they’re real rocks.” She laughed so hard that she fell into the troll’s
ear.
“Selina!” Without pausing to think what such a spectacle must look like to the
casual observer, Berry stuck two fingers into Tom’s ear and saved the pixie from a
waxy fate. “Burnt beans, look at the mess you—”
“Eeeeeuuuuwwwww!” The shriek of utter horror and disgust that burst from
the throat of the Speranza Storm bigwig who’d just witnessed Selina’s rescue
caused every eye in the Oberon Suite to latch onto the four poker buddies. “What is
that thing?” the woman yowled. “A cockroach? Stuck in his ear?”
“Hey! I’m no cockroach!” The very idea infuriated Selina beyond all measure.
Her tiny wings vibrated with such violence that all traces of her recent sojourn down
Tom’s ear canal liquefied and were flung everywhere. More of the women squealed
in revulsion as droplets of trollish ear wax spattered their best polyester bib and