The Jennifer Morgue - Charles Stross [89]
I can tell when I’m not needed. ★★Sure,★★ I say. ★★Want me to get you a drink?★★
★★I’ll handle it from here.★★ She smiles at me then opens her mouth and gushes, “Isn’t this wonderful, Bob? Be a dear and circulate while I go powder my nose. I’ll just be a sec!” Then she’s off, carving a groove through the little black dresses and plastic smiles.
I shrug philosophically, spot the bar, and go over to it. The bartender is busily pouring glass after glass of cheap, fizzy white plonk, and it takes me a while to catch his eye. “Service over here?”
“Sure. What do you want?”
“I’ll—” a thousand fragments of half-grasped TV movies take control of my larynx “—can you make it a dry martini? Shaken, not stirred.”
“Heh.” He looks amused. “You’re not the first guy who’s asked me that.” He grabs a cocktail shaker and reaches for the gin, and in just a matter of seconds he’s handing me a conical glassful of clear, oily liquid with a pickled sheep’s eyeball at the bottom. I sniff it cautiously. It smells of jet fuel.
“Thanks, I think.” Holding it at arm’s length I turn away from the bar and nearly dump it all over a woman in a severe black suit and heavy-framed spectacles. “Oops, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t mention it.” She doesn’t smile. “Mr. Howard? Of Capital Laundry Services?” She pronounces my name as if she’s getting ready to serve a writ.
“Um, yes. You are . . . ?”
“Liza Sloat, of Spleen, Sloat, and Partners.” Her cheek twitches in something that might be a smile, or just neuralgia. “We have the privilege of handling the Billingtons’ personal accounts. I believe we nearly met yesterday.”
“We did?” Suddenly I remember where I know her from. She’s the lawyer who was dogging Billington’s footsteps, the one with the briefcase who went to see the casino president. I smile. “Yes, I remember now. To what do I owe the pleasure?”
The twitch turns into a genuine smile, albeit about as warm as liquid nitrogen. “Mr. Billington is running late today. He’ll be along later in the evening, and meanwhile you’re to make yourself at home.” The smile slides away, replaced by a stare so coldly calculating that I shiver. “That is his prerogative. Personally, I think he is a little too trusting. You’re rather young for a bidding agent in this auction.” The smile reappears. “You might want to remind your employers of our history of successful litigation against individuals, organizations, and entities that try to interfere with the smooth running of our legitimate commercial operations. Good day.”
She turns on one spiked black heel and clicks back in the direction of the inner room. What the hell was that about? I wonder, unwisely taking a mouthful from my glass. I manage not to spew it everywhere, but it tastes even worse than it smelled: pure essence of turpentine with a finish of cheap gin and a tangy undernote of kerosene. “Gah.” I swallow convulsively, wait for the steam to stop trickling out of my nose, and go looking for a potted plant that appears hardy enough to survive being irrigated with the stuff.
The salon next door is thickly carpeted, and curtained like an upmarket whorehouse in a movie about fin-de-siècle Paris. Most of the folks here are clustered around the gaming tables and while some of the ladies from Pale Grace™ Cosmetics have wandered in, it looks to be mostly Billington’s court of louche shareholders and their anorexic, artistically inclined, fashion-model fuck-bunnies. I’m moving towards the baccarat table when one of the younger and pushier sales associates appears in front of me, smiles ingratiatingly, and holds out her hand. “Hi! I’m Kitty. Isn’t it great to be here?”
I squint at her from behind my regrettably full glass, then raise an eyebrow. “I suppose it is,” I concede, “for some values of ‘great.’ Do I know you?”
Kitty stares at me, freezing like a rabbit in the headlights of an oncoming juggernaut. She’s blonde, her hair lacquered into place like the glass fiber weave of a crash helmet awaiting the resin spray: she’s pretty in a mascara’d and lip-glossed kind of way. “Aren’t