"Laura Anne Gilman - Retrievers 03 - Bring It On" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gilman Laura Anne)

back over his shoulder.

тАЬGo. Get paid. Go home. And next time you have to deliver anything here,тАЭ she said as he crawled back
out the small kitchen window onto the fire escape, тАЬbring your own damn lunch. Or at least clean up after
yourself!тАЭ

The mess actually wasnтАЩt too bad; P.B. was a mooch, but not a slob. Wren had managed to give the
entire kitchen a wipe-down, throw the dark green coverlet over her bedтАФcovering night-rumpled
sheetsтАФand straighten the books and papers in her office before the client was actually due to arrive.
Not that the client should be seeing either bedroom or office, but her motherтАЩs training seemed to kick in
at the most inconvenient times. God forbid someone should be in the house when a bed was unmade.

The buzzer rang before she could start to contemplate the state of the kitchen floor, all five square feet of
it.



тАЬIs thisтАжdo I have the right address?тАЭ

The voice on the other side of the intercom was female. Attractively nuanced. Young. Educated, but not
hoity-toity, to use one of her motherтАЩs most annoying phrases. You could tell the difference, if you
listened. People gave so much away in their voices, you could close your eyes and see their emotions in
the tenor of their throat. And that had nothing whatsoever to do with current.

Wren waited.

тАЬIs this The Wren?тАЭ The voice was coming as though from farther away than street level. тАЬItтАЩs Anna
Rosen. We spoke yesterday?тАЭ

Upstairs, Wren leaned against the wall, pressing her forehead against the cool plaster as though to ward
away the headache that had kicked in the moment the buzzer sounded. Bad sign. Very, very bad sign.

Finally her hand came up andтАФdespite the headache, despite the forebodingsтАФhit the door buzzer,
letting the client in.

The intercom was new. Or rather, not new, but newly working. Sergei had hired an electrician to come
in and fix it after years of waiting for the landlord to do something, paying triple-time to get it done over
Labor Day weekend, and making her promise to use it. No matter who she knew was coming, no matter
how silly it made her feel.

The fact that the first time anyone used it was a potential client, a potential client that she was meeting
behind his back and without his knowledge, wasnтАЩt something she was willing to think about, yet. Maybe
not ever.

She hadnтАЩt had a secretтАФa real secretтАФfrom Sergei since she was twenty-four.
 Rosen took the stairs at a decent pace, and wasnтАЩt breathing heavily when she stood in front of the
apartment door. Wren gave her points for that, then promptly took those points away when she saw the
ridiculously expensive and useless shoes the client was wearing. Still, if she could afford those, she could
afford WrenтАЩs fees. And then some. Well-heeled, you betcha.