A Garden of Vipers by Jack Kerley Page A

DeeDee?”
    Dani said, “You didn’t get one?”
    â€œWhat are you talking about?”
    â€œThe station sent it for me,” Dani explained.
    Doakes’s grin melted into confusion, then fear. She hustled away on the arm of her escort, shooting over-the-shoulder glances at Dani like she was twelve feet tall and glowing.
    The soiree was in the ballroom, entered via a dozen marble steps sweeping to the floor, spotlit top and bottom. The only thing lacking was the monocled guy announcing the arrivals.
    We descended to the milling crowd. Soft light fell from above, a sprawling chandelier resembling a wedding cake iced with glass. The edges of the cavernous room were columned every dozen feet, walls of dark velvet. Forty board feet of food waited at the rear, carved roasts of beef, glazed hams, shrimp, crab cakes, cheeses, breads, sweets. A fountain dribbled minted punch. Three ice sculptures rose above the food: two swans and a four-foot-tall Channel 14 logo.
    Three bars were at the edges of the room, black-vested barkeeps already pouring fast to manage demand. On the stage, a ten-piece band tuned up.
    The round tables were filling fast with employees and clients and guests. I saw a vacant table near the stage. I couldn’t figure it out until close enough to see a tabletop placard announcing RESERVED . We took a table with staffers from the station. I was the only attendee in a gunslinger tuxedo.
    The band kicked in and we launched into the mingle portion of the program, Dani moving like a dervish, barking “Hey-yas” and “How-de-dos” and spinning from one clot of revelers to the next. I finally got to meet the news director she adored, a shambling, fiftyish guy named Laurel Hollings. Hollings had missed a button on his shirt, mumbled when he spoke. He kept checking his phone, maybe hoping some major catastrophe might pull him from the event. I liked Hollings from the git-go, even more when he expressed admiration for my tuxedo, saying he wished he “had the balls to wear something like that.”
    Dani talked shop with reporters, discussed industry trends with home-office types, schmoozed station clients—car dealers, Realtors, mobile-home manufacturers, supermarket owners—with either modest propriety or bawdy wit, depending on the client. After a half hour, she called for a minute off her feet.
    The closest chairs were at the still-empty RESERVED table. I set my beer on the white tablecloth and took a seat, gnawing a roll while she slipped off her shoes and squeezed her toes, cursing the inventor of high heels.
    â€œExcuse me, sir,” said a voice at my back and a finger tap on my shoulder. I swiveled to a pout-mouthed man wearing a bow tie, purple vest, and a name card announcing EVENT MANAGER .
    I set my roll on the table, picked up my drink. “Yes?”
    â€œI’m sorry, but this table’s waiting for someone.” He pointed to the RESERVED card. I saw his glance take in crumbs of roll on the tabletop and a damp circle from my drink.
    â€œThe lady’s resting her feet. If the table’s owners arrive, we’ll move.”
    â€œI’m sorry,” he said, ice on his vocal cords. “No one can sit here.”
    â€œI hate to disagree with you, sport…” I said, about to point out we were already sitting. Dani heard my voice shift to the one I use for supercilious assholes. Her fingers tapped my wrist.
    â€œDon’t be that way, Carson. There’s a table across the way. Follow me.”
    We moved. Event Manager signaled for the bus staff to change the RESERVED tablecloth, like I’d left some kind of stink on the table.
    The band stuttered to a halt in the middle of a rhythmically challenged “Smoke on the Water,” launching into “Hail, Hail, the Gang’s All Here.” Heads swung to the door. A party of three men and three women gathered atop the marble steps as two photographers raced to shoot