"Ian R. MacLeod - Nina" - читать интересную книгу автора (Macleod Ian R)

of another unforgettable night. Nina wore the scrap of sky tied back in her
hair. Walking across the carpark with the salt breeze lifting from the faintly
glowing waves far below, Max saw that it was now deep purple, playing off the
soft gleam of her lips, the rosy cast of the skin. The first thing you came to
through the high porticos inside was a wall of mirrors. Max tried to look away
from himself as Nina turned.

"Darling." She surprised him with her arms and a warm kiss.

Max hugged her back, feeling a lifting and tightening inside his whole body
that
was more than anything the surgeons had ever managed.

"This thing you gave me." Nina's hand reached to the back of her head. "It's
quite marvelous."

Max nodded. She was right. The cloth had the texture of velvet, dark and
endlessly deep. The tips of his fingers disappeared as he touched it, were
swallowed by the prescience of night.

"Let's dance," she said.

In a happy daze, he followed. The music was the same music they played here
every night. The band was the same band. But tonight it was all new. Max was
only used to watching from the bar, the ridiculous effect it had on the trim
bodies, the graceless contortions. Now he was part of it. Nina twirled. Her
dress fanned out and her body drew him into the beat. The sky in her hair grew
darker as she twirled. It began to glitter with stars.

What, Max wondered, had ever been the problem with this music? The beat was
straight, hard, inevitable. As he danced, he turned in a breeze that carried
the
scent of Nina's shoulders, her breasts and her hair, the dark open spaces
between the stars. And when Vernon came up, his muscles sliding inside his
suit
as he called Max Sir and asked Nina for a dance, Max didn't have to say a
word,
Nina simply smiled and waved him away. That was the best moment of all.

Driving back, his hands and his thoughts easy on the wheel, just enough drink
to
make the tires slide smooth and easy along the white road through the dark
plantations, Nina's hands were smooth and easy too. Around his shoulders, on
his
lap. She pressed close to him and the scrap of sky brushed his face. She
whispered in his ear about all the things she would do to and with and for him
when they got back to the Corienne. A thousand promises. And every one of them
turned out to be true.

Late next morning, Max and Nina sat in their usual place at the bistro beneath