Total pages in book: 192
Estimated words: 192810 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 964(@200wpm)___ 771(@250wpm)___ 643(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 192810 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 964(@200wpm)___ 771(@250wpm)___ 643(@300wpm)
“I didn’t know what you liked, so I told them to give us two of everything,” he explained.
Seriously.
He could have saved me and my gals a lot of intense dissection last night if he’d been even slightly like this guy at the club.
I tore my attention from him and looked to the sauces. Spoiled for choice, I was my usual indecisive.
But who was I kidding?
For Captain Jacques’s chicken oars, it was always herbed cream sauce, and for the fries, it was garlic aioli.
I grabbed my packets, split them open, perched them in my schooner and nabbed an oar.
I was munching when the prince queried, “The fish is greasier than this?”
My gaze flew to his face to see his handsome features fixed in a picture of sheer disbelief.
I wanted to laugh, but I was horrified.
I mean, he probably frequently ate foie gras (diabolical), which wasn’t that healthy.
But if he had a hankering for strawberries, they’d jet them in supersonic, fresh from Land’s End.
“I could…”
I faltered as my mind mentally scanned the contents of my integrated Chill-Cupboard/Cook-Companion as to what I could program up for him.
When was the last time I’d sent in a food supply order?
“Calm, Laura,” Prince Aleksei said in a low, soothing voice. “They’re very good, as food like this tends to be. But they’re also greasy.”
“Okay,” I whispered.
His eyes dropped to my mouth (and yep, more sensation in those regions south).
Fortunately, his attention slid over the seating area, and before he took another bite of his oar, he noted, “You’re working.”
“Yes,” I said, though I wasn’t working as such. I was trying to work. But he’d long since interrupted me before he even showed up.
He chewed, swallowed, I watched his corded throat introduce the food into his stomach, I worried his beast’s sense of smell would share precisely what was happening in my regions south, and he asked, “Did I interrupt you?”
I shook my head, shaking some sense into it (I hoped) while I did.
This was just a male.
A rich one. A handsome one. And recent evidence suggested possibly even a sweet and thoughtful one.
But just a male.
“No, I’m kind of stymied.”
“Not that I can help, but I’m interested. How are you stymied?”
I squinted my eyes at him. “I take it you know I’m a costume designer.”
He nodded once, his gaze sharp, and I knew he was studying me closely, missing nothing. “Yes. I’ve had a limited brief on you.”
Mm-hmm.
I decided to set that aside, for now.
“Well, I’m doing a period piece. It’s early days, so I have time. A lot of pre-production stuff is going on. But part of that pre-production stuff is me giving them ideas of where I’d like to head with the design so they can sign off, and then I can get stuck in designing. And I’m not sure where to take it.”
“What’s the period?”
“The Troll Invasion.”
He nodded again, this time more than once, “Year of the Dragon, thirteen twenty-four. Art was interesting then, most of it rough, due to the rudimentary implements and materials they had to use. I never noticed it, but I can imagine the artists didn’t tend to spend a good deal of time documenting what people were wearing.”
“No, I can get a sense of that,” I told him. “It’s the troll skin that’s throwing me.”
As my work had wont to do, and since we were talking about it, I got into it. I set my schooner on the table and reached for some swatches I’d been trying, and failing to make work.
I fanned out the leathery, scaly, spiky pieces in my fingers and flapped them at him.
“I’ve seen you and your brothers wearing the troll skins, but only in pics. The hero appears in one in the final scene, the big climax that shares he was victorious, and he has the skin to prove it. Not to mention, the SFX people need a direction to go with building the creatures. I want to get it right, but I can’t get the feel of it. I just know none of these are it.”
I tossed the swatches onto the table and kept blathering.
“Troll skin is so valuable, none of it’s on display. I’ve been to the Musée de Vêtements I don’t know how many times. Millions?” I asked with maybe a slight exaggeration, but I didn’t expect him to answer.
I was on a roll.
“They have garments from the thirteen hundreds, even before. I’m a member, and friend of a few of the curators. They allow me to get close, touch, examine, look at the stitching, the fabric weaving, the fastenings, etcetera. But the limited troll skin they have is kept under lock and key. They never take it out. I’ve magnified some of the pics of you and your brothers wearing them, but, it might sound weird, I need to see it up close. Feel it, not only to feel the design I’m going to make, but how I’m going to create the textile to make it.”