hall, Sally stepped completely inside, shutting the front door behind her. Clutching her customary clipboard and water bottle to her chest, she leaned back against the door and released a long, tired sigh. Her eyes closed.
Kitty stopped short, surprised by the exhaustion etched on the face of the usually energetic woman. "Sally, what's wrong?"
One of Sally's eyes opened and she grimaced. "That obvious, huh?"
Kitty nodded. "That obvious, yes. What's the problem?"
Sally grimaced again, then pushed her shoulders off the door and met Kitty's gaze squarely. "I hate to tell you this, but I have forty untamed rugby players out there."
Kitty groaned. "Not today." Not today when it was so hot and so late and she'd already been dreaming of lemonade and her book. "Not rugby players."
But Sally was nodding her head. "Rugby players."
"Women rugby players?" Kitty asked hopefully.
Sally shook her head.
"A rugby team of retirees, then?"
"You're grasping at straws, girlfriend. They're male. College age. I hesitate to label them something so grown-up as 'men,' however. You'll see what I mean. You're going to have your hands full."
Kitty shuddered. "Can't you tell them The Burning Rose is already closed?" she asked, even as the sound of forty untamed rugby players' feet rumbled on the wooden sidewalk outside.
"No can do." With a sympathetic smile, Sally moved to pull open the door. "They've been looking forward to visiting a brothel all day."
Kitty groaned one more time as she retreated to the parlor, dreading what lay ahead. She'd experienced tour groups like this before. Young men titillated by the legendary, infamous goings-on at the old brothel. Young men who asked brazen questions and who made outrageous proposals. But she really wasn't serious about refusing them entrance. With temperatures and gas prices at record highs this summer, the Hot Water Preservation Society, which ran the living-history district, rejoiced over each and every admission fee.
Resigned to the coming ordeal, she flipped the switch on the player piano. The plunking notes of "Clementine" tumbled into the room at the same rate as the rugby players. They were big men, with big, crewcutted heads and big grins. They jostled one another with big elbows and stomped on each other's big toes with their big shoes as they made room for their entire party in the small parlor.
Only a couple of them inspected the souvenir "passports" in their big, meaty hands, the passports that gave a brief history of the town and listed all of the restored businesses and homes that made up the six-block tourist attraction. The rest inspected her.
Inhaling a calming breath, Kitty resisted the instinctive urge to tug again on the black lace at her plunging neckline. The trick to handling this kind of crowd, and to maintaining her dignity as well, was to talk fast and to talk all the time. Once she started her spiel, she'd give them as few opportunities to heckle as possible. By keeping her concentration and her word count up, she'd keep the situation under control.
Rugby players were still cramming into the parlor when the first foray on her composure was made. With a teammate pushing on each side, one young man squirted forward, nearly bowling Kitty over.
Instead of stepping away or even just apologizing, he widened his grin into a varsity-caliber leer. "Want to go out tonight ... madame?"
Madame. Now that was original. Mentally rolling her eyes, Kitty shook her head. "I don't think so, sonny." Unabashed, he leered once more, then moved back, taking elbow jabs to his mastodon-sized ribs while wearing that same half-wit grin. Then his oh-so-mature buddies launched into a game of rock-paper-scissors. Probably, Kitty thought with a sigh, to decide which of their charming comrades would ask her out next.
The fact was, she rarely met a man who wanted to go out with Kitty, the flat-chested, ordinary-faced woman whom she greeted in the mirror every morning. Too often, men wanted to go out with Kitty the "madam," or - especially in the past six months - they wanted to date one of the notorious Wilder women.
Just as another grinning player stepped forward, Sally caught Kitty's eye and nodded, indicating the tour could begin. With a grateful smile, Kitty crossed to the player piano and switched it off. The audience automatically quieted, and before the boys could get rowdy again, she dragged a low footstool to the center of the room and stepped up.
Now. Kitty inhaled and -
Something distracted her. He did. Beyond the boxily built men gathered in the parlor, she spotted a tall,