The Widower's Two-Step (Tres Navarre #2)(53)

The front door led directly into a living room the size of a small church sanctuary. The walls were whitewashed stucco, striped with alternating columns of window and Oaxacan wall hangings that each must've represented the year's work of an entire village. There was a brick fireplace against one wall and a full bar against the other.

The three white sofas around the fireplace would've taken up most of any other living room, but here they seemed ridiculously small, huddled together in the corner of a Sautillotiled wasteland. Plopped with apparent randomness around the rest of the room were pedestals displaying artwork—some folk art, some bronze sculpture, some ceramic vases. All valuable but totally unrelated to each other.

There were two people together on the edge of the nearest white sofa but before I could really process what I was seeing Brent Daniels had jumped sideways and was straightening his checkered shirt and his jeans.

That left only Allison SaintPierre on the edge of the sofa, leisurely tightening the belt on her white terry cloth robe.

Her blond hair was dishevelled, her face a beautiful shade of red like she'd just taken an invigorating swim in ice water.

"Sweetie," she said to me. "Don't you knock?"

25

Allison took a cigarette from a teak box on the coffee table. She lit it with a ceramic roadrunner that had the business end of a lighter sticking out of its mouth, then held the cigarette with all five fingers, like a cigar.

We were sitting around the fireplace on the big white sofas. Milo crossed his arms and glared at Allison. I looked at the flecks in the iced tea the maid had just poured me.

Sassy dozed contentedly with her head hanging off the sofa and her rump in Milo's lap, her tail thwacking against his belly. Brent Daniels was frowning at his own zipper, which he'd probably just realized was still halfdown.

"This is fun," Allison decided.

If she was at all uncomfortable being halfdisrobed in front of three men and a basset hound, she did a good job hiding it. She hooked her left foot behind her right knee, then made a feeble attempt to nudge the terrycloth back over her thigh with the bottom of her iced tea glass. It was quite a nice thigh.

Next to her on the couch was a foldedover section of newspaper. I could see half a headline—DANIELS SET— and half a photo of Miranda. Allison caught me looking at it.

"You read this yet?" she asked.

When I shook my head she glanced at Milo, silently asking him the same question. It was the first time she'd acknowledged Chavez's presence.

"I've seen it," Milo muttered.

I looked at Milo for elaboration. He didn't look back.

Allison grinned at me. "Pressure's on, sweetie. This morning's Recording Industry Times. They did a nice writeup on Miranda, found out her demo is going to Century Records next week. Apparently one of their in house reviewers caught a show of hers last week—said if the tape was half as good as the concert, Miranda Daniels was going to be Century Records' next chart buster. That's the kind of article creates a nice buzz going into a contract negotiation. Chalk up another one for Les SaintPierre."

Her eyes glittered with amusement. Milo's did not. Brent shifted uncomfortably, eyes still fixed on his zipper.

Allison continued, unfazed. "We were smart, we'd use this to sweeten the deal. Get Brent better than fifty percent on the song royalties, go for a multirecord contract.

Screw Les, anyway. We could do better."

"We?" Milo scratched the base of Sassy's tail. "You going to start managing again, Allison?"

She kept smiling. She lifted her pinkie as the cigarette burned down, but there was nothing dainty about the way she did it. "That depends."

Milo sipped his tea. "Geez, I don't know. You think the agency could afford it? You willing to start collecting commission payments outside the bedroom?"

Allison's expression hardened instantly. She shook her head, like she'd just asked herself a silent question and had decided the answer was no. "You're a complete ass**le, Chavez."

Milo nodded his thanks.

"Brent?" Allison stretched out his name, making her voice sweet again like she was about to ask for a really huge favour.

Brother Daniels looked at her. She waved her cigarette toward the front door. She smiled nicely.

Brent frowned. He reluctantly undraped his arms from the top of the couch, stood, then zipped his pants. He looked at me like he wanted to say something.

"Bye bye, sweetie," Allison said, dismissing him. "Thanks again."

Brent closed his mouth, lost a very brief staredown with Allison, and left. Allison looked me in the eye, daring me to speak. I didn't.

"I've been staying in Austin with friends," she explained. "Miranda's party being tonight and all, I thought I'd come back to town. Brent was nice enough to drive me down."

"Uhhuh," Milo said.

Allison set down her glass very slowly. "You want to say something about that, Chavez?"

"Don't act so sensitive, honey. Not like Les would be surprised. Not like it's the first time you've tried to sleep your way in good with a major client."

Allison stood and dropped her cigarette. She took two normal steps toward Milo and then two very quick ones, making fists right before she came down on top of him.

Sassy extruded out the middle like a sausage coming out of the grinder. Milo's tea glass toppled off the sofa and shattered on the tiles.