Damsel Under Stress

“You’d better look out for your friend,” Owen said, gesturing toward the dance floor. I followed his gesture until I saw Marcia dancing rather closely with Rod.



“She just broke up with someone, so he wouldn’t even need to turn on the juice to lure her in. He may be just what she’s looking for.”



“And she may be more than he can handle, from what I can tell. This could be interesting.”



I thought for a second that I saw Ethelinda on the dance floor, but it turned out to be Isabel, Rod’s secretary, dressed as a fairy godmother. She looked much as Ethelinda must have looked a few centuries ago in her prime, but wearing only one outfit and about four times Ethelinda’s size. I was pretty sure Isabel was part giant.



She danced up to us, waving what I hoped was a toy wand. “Hey, you two,” she boomed. “Great costume, Katie, and I presume the mysterious gentleman with you is one Mr. Palmer.”



Owen raised his mask slightly to verify his identity and gave her a smile.



“Why aren’t you two on the dance floor?”



We looked at each other, then Owen said, “Watching everyone else is more fun for us.”



“It gives us better office blackmail material for after the holidays,” I added.



She fluttered her fake wings at us as she returned to the dance floor. Others might have considered us to be wallflowers, but I had a good time sitting with Owen and trying to guess the identities of the various party guests in their costumes. Marcia and Rod were still dancing together, and still quite close. From what I’d heard about Rod’s social life, that may have been the longest he’d spent with any one woman in years. Philip had finally given up trying to ballroom dance in that crowd and was attempting to follow Gemma’s more contemporary dance style, even as he seemed to be a bit distracted by that catsuit. At least one fairy was floating and spinning above the crowd, and if I saw it, that meant my friends could see it, so I hoped they were too busy dancing to notice.



“I’d say it’s a successful party,” I remarked to Owen.



“Rod does know how to throw a party,” he said. He checked his watch. “It’s not long until midnight. I’d better fight my way back to the bar to grab some champagne.”



While he was gone, I slipped my feet out of my shoes and pointed and flexed my toes a few times to try to get the circulation going again. As I bent to put my shoes back on, a sudden wave of dizziness struck me. Maybe I should have asked Owen to grab some food before he got the champagne, I thought.



Owen returned more quickly than I expected. “They had the champagne all lined up on a table,” he explained. After he handed me my glass, he reached into an inner pocket of his jacket and withdrew two of those party things you blow into and make uncurl. “And we have something to help us usher in the New Year,” he said, handing me one of those. “I wasn’t sure if you’d want one of these or one of the noisemakers, but I figured there’s enough noise in here.”



“Very good choice,” I said, then blew it at him.



The band stopped playing and Rod took the microphone. “Are we ready for the countdown?” he asked.



Owen and I stood up and moved to join the rest of the crowd. Everyone counted down from ten together, then balloons and streamers floated down from the ceiling—where I hadn’t noticed anything hanging previously—and everyone cheered. Owen and I clinked our glasses together, then he leaned forward to kiss me. “Happy New Year,” he said.



“And happy New Year to you, too.”



I drank my champagne, and then things started to get a little fuzzy. And then things went kind of blank.



The next thing I knew, I was waking up in my bed with a killer headache, in my bedroom, in our apartment, and still wearing the red satin dress and fishnet tights.



Eighteen



It was hard to tell what time of day it was from inside my bedroom because so little light came through the airshaft no matter what time of day it was, but this didn’t look like morning sun. I had to squint and force my eyes to focus so I could read my bedside alarm clock. The clock had to be wrong. It said it was nearly three in the afternoon. That was impossible. It would mean I was missing about fifteen hours, since the last thing I remembered clearly was kissing Owen at midnight.



I reached to rub my aching head and found the horned headband, still clinging precariously. Removing it eased the headache a little bit, but not enough. With a supreme effort, I willed myself into a sitting position. Maybe a shower would help, I thought, if I could make it all the way to the bathroom. The wooden floor seemed to have turned to ice, it was so hard to keep my feet under me, and I had to hold my arms out like a tightrope walker to maintain my balance.