Page 29 of Midsummer Phoenixes
Purple Coat winked at her. “Thank you kindly, but maybe more fun than you can handle.”
“This is perfect,” said Grenadine, putting a Bluetooth speaker down on the counter with a thud.
He had also taken off his tracksuit. And yes, he was wearing clothing underneath. The best way to understand what he was wearing was imagining one of Freddy Mercury’s stage outfits having sex with a rainbow, then both of those coming all over the colorful blend in a mess of sparkly rhinestones. And, for some reason, a feather boa.
“What in the hell…?” I said.
Ben chuckled. “Oh, this will be good.”
“You a friend of Amory’s? Nice feather boa,” Dwayne said from the passthrough, but then he vanished again, not putting a stop to…thesomethingthat was happening.
Grenadine spun. “Gentlemen, we are sorry to impose, but we need your help,” he said to the leather daddies.
“Let me get them menus first,” I said, but Rae tsked at me.
“You keep busy with the salt. And don’t look so shocked. What are people going to think?”
Roland at table one was looking up from his phone and frowned deeply.
“Roland! You are not leaving,” Rae said.
“Huh? What is this? A hostage situation?”
“It’s not a hostage situation when you get free rainbow cupcakes,” Rae said.
One of the leather daddies, a blond and blue-eyed man who’d shaved one side of his head, looked up and focused me in a stare. “Is this true? There are free cupcakes?”
I was dumbfounded. I nodded.
Rae leaned forward, hitting a button on the speaker.
Music flooded the Moonlight, something made for dancing, something that should bounce off a disco ball. Then again, Grenadine could pass for a rainbow disco ball in that costume. As I watched his bedazzled butt—an accident when all I wanted to do was look at the salt shakers—he started moving his hips.
It was magic, the way he moved. I couldn’t follow the flow of limbs, but it was beautiful, exquisitely graceful, enthralling. He deserved that costume. And all the rhinestones.
Something occurred to me, and I veered off toward Ben just as Rae jumped up on the counter. And began dancing around my salt.
“Is Table Fourteen a stripper?” I whispered to Ben.
“Yup. Good one too.”
I let that sink in. Not so much about Grenadine, who I didn’t know. But apparently Ben knew strippers. It surprised me, because he was always so formal. Unless he shifted into a massive werewolf.
As I watched, using Ben as a shield, Rae and Grenadine were dancing, Rae on the counter, Grenadine in front of it. I saw Dwayne look out from the passthrough, telling Rae they’d scrub the counter clean when they were done, which they acknowledged with a twirl of their hips. Then Dwayne simply went back, coming out a few minutes later with a fresh batch of rainbow cupcakes on a tray. I didn’t know whether I should feel betrayed or what, but at least, failing to uphold order clearly wasn’t my fault alone.
Dwayne remained standing next to me, and the three of us watched as Rae jumped off the counter and they and Grenadine danced their way from Roland to the leather daddies, three of which got up and joined the wreathing dance show my new colleague and their stripper friend were putting on.
The Marys were busy filming the whole thing. Liam and Dave as well. It was a show. With a conga line of leather, rhinestones, and feathers.
“This is good,” Dwayne said.
My eyebrows went up. “Huh? But you always say music gives you headaches.”
“Once a year, it’s fine. And this is marketing. We have all those fancy napkins with the logo. We need to use them. And I’d rather have more kinksters in here than—you know. The more colorful, the better.” He grunted, shook his head. “I still can’t get over the fact I bought all those napkins just before the fire. Damn waste.”
That was a lot of sharing for Dwayne. He seemed to know it too and went back to the kitchen before I could apologize for burning his yearly supply of napkins. I wasn’t even sure he’d been told I’d done the burning.
Instead of thinking too hard about that, I focused on watching Grenadine move. There was some grinding, rainbow sparkles against leather, but both the daddies and he seemed to have fun.
