Page 102 of Festive in Death

Alone—at last—Eve took her glass of champagne, drank. Breathed for a minute or two. All that female energy in one place tended to make her jittery. And, yeah, Mavis had it right. All that energy focused a little too closely on her made her jittery.

She looked at the dress again, then the shoes Mavis had set down by the bed. Gold again, with high red heels, red piping around the edges, even around the open toes. But, thankfully, no fussy straps. Still, she wasn’t putting them on until zero hour, she promised herself, and glanced down at her feet.

Her toenails were painted gold. When had that happened?

She’d live with it, that was all. It was one night. She could live with gold toenails for one stupid night.

She saw the incredibly tiny thong-type deal with the dress, sighed and wiggled into it. Happily, Leonardo had built in the tit support, so now she wiggled into the dress—as ordered—from bottom up.

It fit like it had been made for her because it had been. So there was comfort, at least, and it was really nice fabric, soft, sleek, with a gleam rather than a glitter. She could live with gleam.

She opened the jewelry case. Long, twisty diamond-and-ruby drops for the ears, another ruby in a star-shaped setting dangling from three thin chains twinkling with tiny diamonds. Her dressy wrist unit, and a trio of thin bangles—one ruby, two diamonds.

She had some small relief she’d, at least, seen all the pieces before. So he hadn’t gone out and bought her more.

She put on the earrings, the necklace, was fighting with the last bangle when Roarke came in.

Trina was right, she thought. He did look strip-me-naked good in his dark suit and his perfectly knotted tie of gold and red. He wore the little petunia on his lapel.

“When did you get dressed?”

“I used alternate quarters. You look wonderful. Absolutely wonderful.”

“The word’s ultramazing.”

“It certainly fits.” He circled his finger in the air, smiled when she huffed at him. “Indulge me, would you?”

She did the turn.

“Once more?” he asked as he approached her. Then he caught her shoulders from the back. “Well now, that’s adorable.”

“What? What?” She struggled to see her own back, caught sight of something painted just above the low, nearly ass-brushing, back of the dress. “Shit. Shit! What the hell is that? What did she paint on me? Get it off!”

“I believe it’s a sprig of mistletoe, and I wouldn’t remove it for the world.”

“Why would she do that?” Aggrieved, Eve kept twisting to try to get a full look. “I was actually nice to her. Sort of.”

“That may be why. Mistletoe, Eve. And what is the tradition for under mistletoe?”

“How the hell do I know—that kissing thing? That’s the kissing deal, right?”

“So it is. And it appears to me she’s just given you a celebrational way of saying kiss my ass. It’s you, darling. Absolutely you.”

“She’s not supposed to—wait.” She twisted herself around again, narrowed her eyes in the mirror. “Kiss my ass? Huh. Maybe I won’t kick hers for doing it.” She untwisted, looked at him.

“You dressed me to match the decorations.”

“Precisely the opposite. The decorations were chosen to spotlight your dress. You.” He flicked a finger down the dent in her chin. “We should go up to the ballroom, be ready to greet guests—or we’ll both suffer Summerset’s wrath.”

“Okay.” Ordering her feet to suck it up, she put on the shoes. “If men had to wear heels, they’d be outlawed across the land.”

But she took his hand, walked with him.

•••

It did look pretty great, Eve admitted, and looked even better really when people began to arrive. When they began to mingle around or gather in clutches. Servers wove through with offerings from the spectacular display of food or sparkling drinks from one of the bars.

Speaking of colorful, she spotted Peabody and McNab come in. He wore Christmas red tails with a silver shirt, a reindeer tie, and short silver boots. To complement, Eve supposed, Peabody’s frothy dress of holly green picked through with glittery silver. Since her partner’s hair was a mass of tiny curls with silver banding woven through, Eve felt less self-conscious about the hint of curls in her own.

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