"Doranna Durgin - A Feral Darkness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Durgin Doranna)

hersтАФbarely licked the collar of his shirt. And yet . . . scruffy.

"тАФmade you speechless, apparently," Emily teased.

Brenna went back and collected the Cocker, letting the stocky bitch stand on the table while she hunted
up a #5 blade. "It's Roger I'm thinking about. He's up to something. Look at his expression and tell me
he's not." The black Cocker, a badly bred individual with developing skin problems, eyed the floor and
gave a wag of her stumpy tail; Brenna put an absent hand on her back and finally found the blade,
accomplishing the switch one-handed and popping the new blade home with an expert flick against her
thigh.

"You're no fun," Emily said, coming to stand in the doorway.

"Blame Roger for that, too. Did you see how he ran up the schedule today?"

"You need your own place," Emily said, completely unaware of Brenna's thoughts on the subject and not
the least deserving of the sudden angry frustration that rose up in Brenna.

She turned her back to hide her glower, and concentrated intently on cutting the dog's nailsтАФnot entirely
without necessity, since the Cocker had thrown herself back on her haunches and was jerking on the
entrapped foot with manic intensity, a low moan in her throat that long experience told Brenna would
soon be the sort of scream to draw spectators from two parking lots over. She startled the dog by
swapping her end for end while maintaining her hold on the paw and quickly targeted the nails while the
Cocker struggled with the notion that she could neither yank the leg forward nor up from that position.
"Roger'll yell at you if he sees you behind the counter."

"No he won't," Emily said, somewhat smug. "I'm a customer. He'll do anything for a customer."
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"I've taught you well, I see," Brenna said, finishing the nails and exchanging tools, firing up the clippers.

"Well enough so this is one placeI'll never work," Emily said over the buzz of Brenna at work, smoothly
drawing the clippers over the Cocker's dumpy back.

"As if you'd ever let a job take you away from the family." Not Emily, married right out of her two-year
college program and a mother a year later, in love with her good-natured garage mechanic and totally
devoted to her girls. Happy, that was Emily. Happy and given to occasional fits of childish
rowdinessтАФthe best kind of rowdy, the water hose fights in midsummer, sledding and snowmen in the
winter. Brenna envied her kids, and enjoyed being her neighbor.

But sometimesтАФon days like thisтАФEmily just didn'tget it . Didn't get that while Brenna was obliging her
with light conversation, she was twisted up with the pressure of achieving the impossible in a day with
constantly shifting rules. She'd never be done before dark at this rate, never mind at shift's end. And one
day she'd just walk right out on Roger, because she'd told him no and he'd ignored her and for once
she'd meantno .

Hang on. You've got tomorrow off.