"Lackey, Mercedes - Born To Run" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lackey Mercedes)

The pub had just opened for lunch a little while ago, but she really hadn't been that hungry when she first sat down. And in the last few minutes, as the place filled up, she noticed something kind of peculiar: although she'd have been glowered at for nursing a single cup of coffee instead of buying a meal or a drink anywhere else, no one was hassling her here. It had been that way every time that she had come in to get something on the tab; the girls smiled at her and were nice, and no one gave her any trouble, acted just like the night she'd been here with Tannim, in fact. Right now no one had even bothered her about getting something besides coffee. They acted like she was someone important; someone who should be given privacy and space, if that was what she wanted.
Maybe that man had something to do with it. Maybe because he had taken notice of her, they had extended that “courtesy to a good customer” umbrella he seemed to travel under to include her as well.
Every time someone darkened the doorway of the dining room, she looked up, squinting against the light, to see if it was him. As lunchtime filled the place up, she began to think she'd picked the wrong time, or day, or something. Even with the best wishes in the world, the waitresses were going to have to ask her to leave pretty soon, and let a paying customer have her table.
Of course, she could go ahead and order something. There was still enough cash left on the tab. And the aroma of the bean soup from the kitchen was enough to make a corpse hungry. Bean soup and bread—that wouldn't cost too much, and she could have some more coffee with lots of cream and sugar. . . .
She started to look for one of the waitresses, when movement at the door made her turn her head out of habit to see who it was. And there he stood, looking a lot like she remembered, only maybe cuter. A beat-up leather jacket this time, really nice Bugle Boy jeans and a hot brown-and-gray shirt—he could have been making an ad or something, he had that kind of style about him. She glanced down at her second-hand bike shorts and flushed a little. She was tacky. But it was the best she could do, and it was clean, anyway.
She looked up again. On second glance, the young man also looked tired, like he'd been working really hard.
Maybe he won't notice my clothes.
He squinted into the relative darkness, then started to turn away to go into the bar. She threw up her hand in an involuntary wave, then snatched it back, not certain now that she really wanted to talk to him again, after all. He might not be real happy to see her here, now. He might, in fact, be mad that she'd shown up, at least during the daytime.
Too late—he saw her signal, hesitant though it was; smiled and waved back, and started across the floor through the crowd.
But someone else had seen him too.
A really gorgeous dark-haired woman, dressed all in black leather and cream-colored silk, intercepted him at the entrance to the bar where she had just materialized as he crossed the room. Tania's heart sank. This must be who he was meeting. He hadn't come here looking for her He hadn't even really seen her. He'd only seen the waving hand, and he'd thought it belonged to his lunch date. And God, she was incredible. The kind of woman Tania would have expected him to be seeing, not some tacky kid in Spandex.
She sidled up to him and put one hand on his shoulder, smiling brilliantly into his eyes. Her lips moved, although Tania couldn't hear what she was saying. He continued to scan the crowd in Tania's direction, a slight frown on his face. She blushed so hard she felt hot all over, and wanted to sink into the floor in embarrassment; her eyes burned, and her throat tightened. In another second, she was going to cry, she just knew it. And on top of looking tacky, she was going to get mascara smeared all over her face. She knew what he was looking for; now he wanted to know who had pretended to know him. Probably so he could make sure his lunch date with this fabulous babe wasn't interrupted by some scruffy little—
Abruptly, Tannim shook his head, said a few words, and brushed the woman's hand off his shoulder. His brow wrinkled just a little, and he stared directly into the woman's eyes. Then he drew his right hand up into a fist, slowly extended his thumb, and pointed it over his shoulder towards the door. The woman stood there, wearing the most stunned expression Tania had ever seen on anyone's face. He walked away from her as if she wasn't even there.
And as he got close enough to Tania to make out exactly who she was, his face broke out in a wide, welcoming smile, so warm it dazzled her.

Tannim had the feeling he really ought to go to Kevin Barry's for lunch today . . . it was a very strong feeling, and Tannim never, ever ignored those silent hunches of his.
So, although Keighvin had assigned him out to Roebling Road with a brake-mod this afternoon, Tannim decided to take a long lunch break.
Once again, he endured the bone-rattling cobblestones of River Street. He kept his “feelers” out for an incipient gap, then spotted one. He took instant advantage of the opening, shoving the Mustang into a parking space, right on the tail of a departing Caddy. He grinned at the driver of a Beemer, a suit-and-tie executive type, who scowled at him in frustrated annoyance.
Eat your heart out, buddy, he thought in smug satisfaction. Here you are in your tie and execu-cut, and here I am in my jeans and long hippie-freak hair—and I know I'm happier than you are. Why don't you just spend the rest of the afternoon trying to figure out what I know that you don't?
He felt just a little smug as he grinned into the yuppie-type's scowl. He'd gotten one of the primo spots, too; hardly more than a wink and a nod from Kevin Barry's. As the Beemer pulled away in search of another place to park, he eased himself out of the car and headed for the door to the gift shop—for the tiny gift shop let directly out into the dining room side of the pub.
He waved at the lovely lass behind the counter of the gift section, and looked over the new shawls, letting his eyes adjust to the dim light. It was pretty dark in the stage/dining area, and really crowded for a weekday; it looked like half of Savannah had decided to hit the pub for lunch. All of the tables were full, and there was a line of about four people waiting for one to clear out. But after a moment, that sixth-sense tingled again, and he peered off into the far right-hand corner.
Someone waved tentatively at him from the very back of the room. Tania?
It might be; whoever it was, she was female and blond.
He started towards the corner, easing his way around tables surrounded by people obliviously chattering and munching away. But there was a huge group in the very middle; they'd put three tables together to form one big arrangement, and to get to the rear he would have to go past the pub entrance on the right-hand wall. Well, that was no problem, as long as there wasn't anyone in there who wanted to have a chat with him.
Just as he reached the double-doors into the pub, someone pushed her way past the stand-up crowd at the bar, and intercepted him at the doorway.
Before he realized she wanted him, she laid her hand on his shoulder, forcing him to stop whether he wanted to or not. He turned involuntarily to look at her; she smiled at him as though she was an old friend. “Hello,” she crooned, in a voice just loud enough for him to hear over the babble of voices in the pub. “I've been hoping you'd be here today; I'm glad to see my intuition is working.”
She was stunningly beautiful: long, raven-black hair with a slight wave to it, huge brown eyes, sensuous lips and high cheekbones, and a flawless, rose-and-cream complexion. She was dressed in an ivory silk blouse and black leather skirt, both expensive, both understated in their elegance.
She was no one he'd ever seen before in his life.
Just before she'd touched him, all his internal alarms went off, for she had donned a glamorie that would have sent a Vulcan into heat. This was trouble, and all of his shields went up in full defensive mode.
While she spoke, he did a closer check, using mage-sight; as he had guessed, her appearance was nothing like her real self. There was no mistaking the white-blond hair, nor the cat-slitted, green eyes and the pointed ears.
Elven. One of the Sidhe. And since she was no one he knew, the odds were high that she was Unseleighe Court.
But she hadn't done anything to him but stop him—at least, not yet. So she wasn't declaring open warfare, not unless you counted attempted seduction as an aggressive act.
On the other hand, she could have assumed that Tannim was just as young and inexperienced as he looked.
I don't think so, lady.
But this was neither the time nor the place to answer her with a challenge. If that was Tania back there, he didn't want a kid to see him having even a verbal battle with a Sidhe. He calculated a dozen possible responses to her approach, trying to figure the one that would leave her the most stunned, and selected one by the time the last word had left her soft, wet lips.
He brushed her hand from his shoulder as if it was an inconvenient bit of dandruff.
“Your friends and mine don't get along, lady,” he said, without the least bit of inflection. “Run along and we'll leave it at that.”
He indicated the door, and watched the woman's energy fields fluctuate wildly as she tried to process this unexpected stonewalling. It was hard not to laugh, even dire as the repercussions might be.
There was a split-second of astonishment before the woman clamped down her mask of impassivity. He could still see her body stiffen in the universal posture of defensiveness.
Score more status from the Bad Guys. She's trying to play it off, but she's counting me as an equal, or a superior.
He then moved past her as though she was not there.
I'll have to ask one of the girls what her face looked like to them. Heh.
* * *
Aurilia had perused the new agency's report very carefully. This one had quite a bit of new information, besides all the dossier nonsense that anyone with a phone and a lot of patience could pull up out of public records. According to the detective, young Tannim favored one particular pub over every other establishment in Savannah: a pub called “Kevin Barry's.”
Well, the lad was young, in his twenties, and if there was one thing a young man was susceptible to, it was sex. There hadn't been a young man yet that Aurilia hadn't been able to lead about by the nose, sooner or later. Generally sooner.
But just to make certain, she put a glamorie on herself that could make a corpse rise. Not even the pure Sir Galahad could have withstood her now. And she smiled to herself as she stood at the bar, sipping a glass of uiskebaghe, and waiting for the youngster to make one of his appearances. He would, too—she had that feeling, and her premonitions were never wrong.
Those two fools were so busy persuading themselves that the only way they could dispose of the human was by combat that they never even bothered considering other options. Idiots. Why do anything with violence that can be accomplished subtlely?
She toyed with her glass, signaling the lady bartender for another, and considered what she would do when she had the mortal safely beguiled. He might be useful, especially if he is any good as a mage. I could take him Underhill, to my own stronghold. . . . Yes, that might be the best solution. He'll be tended to in a gilded cage, and I can drain him slowly of power without the others knowing I have him.
Movement of power at the edge of her shields alerted her that there was a mage within the confines of the pub; turning to check who had just entered, she saw to her immense satisfaction that the quarry had arrived. She left her glass, and quickly conjured a crumpled twenty, identical to the one she had kenned a few days ago, to leave beside the glass.
She intercepted Tannim just as he passed beside the door to the pub, placing one hand on his shoulder and whispering something innocuous while she exerted her glamorie. He stared at her for a moment, and she felt a flare of triumph. I have him; I truly do. Now let's see what Vidal says about me—