Robert Asprin's Dragons Run by Jody Lynn Nye Page A

fine,” Roxanne said, clipping her words off hastily. Like everyone in this house—if you could call this sprawling resort complex a house—except Henry, she was terrified of Val.
    “Do you have anything special going on this weekend?” Val asked in an encouraging voice.
    “Oh, no. I don’t, I mean.”
    Wow,
Val thought.
    She subsided in the chair and let Roxanne work on her. When the roaring of the blow-dryer stopped and the pulling at various tresses of her hair ceased, a hand mirror peeped shyly around the edge of her vision. Val took it and looked at her reflection. Behind her, the beautician was almost trembling as she held up a large, rectangular mirror so Val could see the back of her own head. Her long blond hair was parted on the side and combed out in waves like Cameron Diaz’s.
    “It looks beautiful,” she assured Roxanne.
    “Thank you. Shall I do your makeup now?”
    Val opened her mouth to protest, then thought of facing Henry again. “Sure. Thanks.”
    At least she didn’t look like a drag queen when Roxanne was through with her. In fact, she looked like the pages in the fashion magazines that touted “The Natural Look,” finished and smooth without seeming to be made up at all.
    “That’s fabulous! Will you show me how you do that?” Val asked, turning her face from side to side to admire the effect. “I mean, tomorrow?”
    “I . . . uh,” Roxanne stammered.
    “You have to get permission?”
    “Yes. Um. Shall I help you dress?”
    “No, thanks,” Val said firmly, rising from the chair. “I’d rather dress myself. Tell Henry I’ll be ready in five minutes.”
    Roxanne gathered her tools and shoved the cart hastily out the door. Val shrugged out of her robe and dropped it on the bed. The room was so tidy that the single rumpled garment stood out like a neon sign. Val grinned a little naughtily. She could make her own mark.
    Before the promised five minutes were up, Val marched out into the broad hallway toward the grand staircase. The thick blue carpet swallowed the sound of her high-heeled sandals. The wrap dress that was tied just above her bulge almost matched the shade of blue. Not that the décor had been chosen to complement her looks, of course, but she could pretend that it had. All those programs on the Discovery Channel about royal palaces and mansions around the world that zoomed around to show those pilastered columns and frescoed ceilings didn’t really tell how it felt to live in one. She could have told those fulsome voice-over announcers that it was daunting but comfortable.
    When she reached the head of the stairs, Henry appeared out of nowhere and took her arm.
    “Very nice,” he said, looking her over critically. “Very understated. Come on. Everyone needs to get back to work.”
    “I don’t have to do this,” Val said. “They can work without having me check on them every day.”
    “Melinda always checks on the staff. She left you in charge, so you need to keep everything moving. Here’s the day’s itinerary.” He opened up a little palmtop computer and handed it to her. The little gray screen displayed several columns, each headed by a single word: MAINTENANCE, SUPPLY, COMMUNICATIONS, DISBURSEMENTS, DELIVERIES , and so on. Val absorbed as many of the items as she could before Henry whisked it out of her hand and nodded toward the banister. She took hold of it, wary of her heels.
    Normally, at that time of day, she would be wearing jeans and a T-shirt, cleaning up from the lunch crowd in the bar where she worked, and looking forward to reading a book while a few people wandered in for a Coke or a Bloody Mary. Her greatest intellectual exercise was figuring out if young-looking patrons were as old as the birth date on their driver’s licenses said they were. In forty-eight hours, she had turned into Junior Miss CEO.
    She wasn’t sure yet if she liked it.
    At the bottom of the stairs, nearly fifty people were waiting for her. Val was dismayed at the