Chapter Thirty
“KAYLIE, I NEED you,” Max said into her Bluetooth. She was almost back to Allure when she realized she had some legwork to do. She’d spoken to Treat early that morning but had held off on calling him when she’d gotten an early flight, wanting instead to surprise him.
“Why, Max, I never knew you were into women,” Kaylie joked.
“This is serious. I need help, and I need it now. Please?”
Kaylie’s voice softened. “Of course. What’s wrong? Did something happen?”
“No. Well, something did. Something big. But I can’t get into it now.” She’d never told Kaylie about what happened with Ryan, and she didn’t want to try to go over it now. She was too excited and nervous to waste another second thinking about the past. “Can you meet me at the mall?”
“You hate shopping.”
“No kidding. That’s why I need you. Please, Kaylie? I hate myself for sounding like a needy woman, but I am. So will you meet me before I change my mind?”
The situation with Ryan could not have been anticipated, and as Max had traveled home, she’d realized it couldn’t have gone any better. The pieces of her past were falling into place, clearing a path for her to understand what she had misconstrued years earlier. Although she felt horrible for what they’d both gone through, the fact that Ryan hadn’t been in control of his actions when he’d hurt her released her from the guilt she’d been harboring. She could no more take responsibility for causing his actions than she could for Treat wanting to change the way he ran his business in order to make their relationship work.
She’d spent years burdened with guilt she didn’t deserve and fearing the worst in the wrong people. Now she was dead set on making things right.
“Be there in thirty minutes,” Kaylie said.
“Meet me at Victoria’s Secret.”
“WHO ARE YOU and what have you done with Max?” Kaylie asked, peering around her.
“Shut up before I change my mind.” Max had purposely never stepped foot in a Victoria’s Secret store before. She’d stayed away from places that encouraged the idea of women being seen as playthings. But now, as she walked through the brightly lit, far-too-pink shop, with half-naked mannequins donning barely there, sexy lingerie, she saw it through the eyes of an undamaged woman. Or at least through the eyes of a woman who was coming out from under the cover of clouds, and she began to understand how sexy lingerie was about owning—and enjoying—her sexuality, not exploiting it or asking to be hurt.
If meeting Ryan was a big step, this was a giant hurdle, and she felt like she had springs on her feet. She was bound and determined to own Treat-worthy, seductive, take-me-all-the-way attire.
“Max, I’m scared,” Kaylie teased.
“I want a wardrobe that will turn Treat on. All of it, from my head to my toes.” She looked at Kaylie with a serious face and said, “Kaylie, make me hot.”
“Girlfriend, just saying that makes you hot.” Kaylie dragged her to the rear of the store, where she fingered through racks of lacy lingerie, holding up corsets and camisoles, lace bras and barely visible thongs. “What are we talking here, a few nights, a weekend? Seasonal?”
Max held up her credit card. “Whatever it takes. Whatever you would wear, I want to wear. Um, maybe. Be a little careful with that suggestion.” She laughed. “Then we’re going to buy clothes to go on top of the naughty bits.”
“Max, you’re talking about a lot of cash. Are you sure? Being sexy is expensive.”
Max rolled her eyes. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in all my life. Besides, I’ve had the same jeans and shirts for years, and a five-digit savings account that I’ll never spend. For Treat? Definitely worth it.”
“But you can buy a few nights’ worth and just use those over and over.”
“I want to be sexy all the time. I don’t mean that I’ll stop wearing jeans and T-shirts, but I want to know that what I have on underneath, seven days a week, is appropriate for making him lose his mind. I want to walk into my closet and find something that begs me to pull myself out of efficient Max and morph into seductress Max. I want options. And you know me well enough to realize that this is my one shot. I’m not suddenly going to turn into a woman who loves to shop. I’ll probably have whatever we buy today until I’m fifty. Besides, Treat has a major social calendar, and I want to make him proud with nice feminine dresses.”
“No, you want to make him horny. Because what you wear to elite social events will not show what we’re buying here.”
Max grinned. “I want to make him hot and bothered, and proud.”
That’s all Kaylie needed to hear to let loose. “We’ll have to go shopping another day for those social-event outfits. You can’t find the right dresses for black tie situations at the mall. Right now let’s focus on knocking his socks off tonight.”
Max tried on so many outfits that her head was spinning. She stood in front of the mirror in a pink lacy baby-doll nighty. “Wow.” She turned to the side. “Look at my butt. And look at these.” She grabbed her breasts and lifted them up. “They’re kinda hot, huh?”
“Scorching hot.” Kaylie pulled the elastic from Max’s hair, and her hair billowed around her shoulders. “You’re always gorgeous, Maxy, but now you’re too insanely delicious for him to turn away.”
“Oh, turning away hasn’t been an issue,” she said with a coy smile.
They left Victoria’s Secret with several large bags and sexy lingerie for every occasion. Kaylie took her hand and dragged her into Hot Allure, a trendy clothing store known for upscale and sexy clothing.
Kaylie and Max picked through the racks and carried enormous piles of clothes into the dressing room.
“You don’t know how long I’ve been wanting to do this,” Kaylie said. “This is like every girl’s makeover fantasy come true.”
“I feel like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. I really appreciate your help. I would never pick out half these things. I’m still not sure they’ll fit.” She held up a red clingy dress that looked too small to fit over one leg, much less her whole body.
“It stretches. Trust me,” Kaylie said. “I have an eye for fashion and figures and, girlfriend, we’re going to feature your figure in fabulous fashions.”
“What are you, on a shopping high or something?” Max laughed.
An hour and a half later, they collapsed onto a bench in the center of the mall, surrounded by bags of dresses, slacks, sexy skinny jeans, heels, lingerie, and accessories.
“Your man is going to be so excited every night of the week!” Kaylie squealed.
“Uh-oh. Kaylie.”
“What? Oh no. You look like something awful happened. Did you spend more money than you meant to? I’ve done that. Should we return some of it? Not the baby-doll nighty. Every girl needs a baby-doll nighty.”
Max shook her head. “I have no idea where Treat is. I know he was at his father’s ranch, but what if he went out? I want to surprise him.”
Kaylie took out her cell phone and started texting.
“What are you doing?” Max asked.
“I have an idea. He’s Blake’s cousin, so I’ll text Danica. She’ll ask Blake, and he’ll know how to find out where he is.”
“Thank goodness for the sister network,” Max joked.
Kaylie’s phone vibrated, and she checked the message. “She said hold on a sec.”
Max sighed and threw her head back. “How can I be so together at work and so bad at surprises?”
Her phone buzzed again. “It’s part of being a woman. We can’t be perfect all the time.” She read the text and said, “Fate is on your side! He’s at his father’s ranch.”
Max jumped to her feet. “It really is fate.”
“Settle down, doe eyes. Now what?”
Max gathered as many bags as she could carry and started for the exit.
Kaylie scrambled to pick up the remaining bags and hurried after her. “Max!”
Max held up her bags and said, “Home. Shower. Sex it up. Get my man!”