Unexpected Fate

Burlesque- and showgirl-themed days? Good lord, it’s going to be a long day.

AS PREDICTED, IT IS INSANE the second I step foot inside of Sway’s. The madness starts with Sway and ends with Sway. Madness and insane being the keywords.

“Sweet heavens you, my little belle! Sway was imagining you on your deathbed! When that hunky father of yours—stop looking at me like that, you would have to be blind not to see how hunky he is! Anyway, when he told me that my Danielle-Bell was sick, I was so worried. Darling, you look like you’ve lost weight. Weight, I will remind you, that you did not have to lose. Such a tiny little tinker.” He spins me with two hands on my shoulders, and I have to work hard not to bust my ass when my heels struggle to keep up with the rapid movement. “It’s a good thing you have your mother’s lush bottom or you would look like a stick. As it is, you look like a stick with a great ass.”

He spins me back around and looks down at my chest. Oh here we go. Reaching up to my black blouse, he unsnaps the two buttons that kept me decent and nods to himself when my red bra is peeking through the opening.

“Perfect. Now give the girls a little tuggero and we’re done. I’ll make sure to put some more weight on you, Belle.”

“You do realize that this would be considered sexual harassment in most work environments,” I remind him. Again.

“It would. But lucky for you, I haven’t swung for the kitty cats once in my life. I think, for the harassment to be sexual, I would have to actual want to get in those pants, darling. The only pants I ever want to get into happen to be carrying far different equipment than you, sweet girl.” He laughs and smacks my rear when I turn to walk to my station.

“Good God, Pops! Do not talk like that!” I hear Stella yell as she walks in from the back room, where we do all of our color mixing. “That’s just . . . No, that’s just too much, even for you. I don’t ever want to think about my dad’s junk or my pops lusting after it.” She rolls her eyes and walks over to give me a hug. “Hey, you. I missed you around this circus.”

“I heard that, Stella!” Sway laughs and struts to the front of the studio in his glittery, gold heels—heels that, as predicted, are taller than mine.

“I wasn’t trying to hide it, Pops!” she yells at his back.

Ah. Never a dull moment at Sway’s.

I was busy doing Karen Oglethorpe’s hair for about twenty minutes before the cameras walked in. Of course. Film day. I must be completely off my game if I had already forgotten the filming rotation.

I loathe film day.

Not only are the cameras always in my way when I’m trying to do hair, mix color, and move between the washing station or the blower station, but the producer and his people are freaking annoying. Devon Westerfield. He’s been a constant presence around the salon since this time last year, and I think I might actually hate him more now than I did then. Not because he’s a bad person. He really isn’t. He’s doing his job just the same as I am. But it’s because of him that I might publicly, in front of millions, make a fool of myself when the reality series goes live.

“Ah! Danielle Reid. Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” he says and leans in to give me a light hug. “You know Don and Mark?”

“Hey, Dev. Nope, I don’t think I’ve had the pleasure,” I respond with fake enthusiasm.

“Hmm. Oh that’s right. You weren’t here the other day when I brought them by to meet everyone. They’re my assistants this go-around. Here to help with the crew and also with anything small to large that I might just be too stretched thin for.” He starts looking around, and I can tell he has already forgotten about me.

“Okie dokie, Devy boy.”

Returning my attention back to Karen is effective enough in getting him off my back, but the two shadows-to-be stick around. I pause in my brushing of her color and look up.

“Is there something you two need?” I ask in annoyance.

“Well, Devon said you were the go-to person here. Manager and head stylist of Sway’s. We just thought—” the short one—Don, I think—starts, but I interrupt him before he can get started on his crusade to get me to tell him how to do his job. They’re all the same. Devon has been through more assistants than I can count in the year and a half I’ve known him.

“One thing to know and remember, boys: I don’t have time for you to act like you don’t know your head from your ass. Nice to meet you and all that, but please don’t act like the last few idiots who all but licked the ground Dev over there, walked on. It won’t earn you points with him. In case you haven’t noticed, he’s a little tunnel-vision prone, and I assure you that it won’t do you any good to try and fuse yourself to me.” Dismissing their shocked faces, I look in the mirror and give Karen a wink, earning a giggle from her in return. She loves it when the girls around here are sassy.

They mumble something under their breaths, and I turn to give them a sharp glare, which of course they miss because they’ve tucked their tails again to run after an order-barking Devon.

Two hours later, I finally have a chance to go grab a quick bite to eat. Well, I would have if Sway hadn’t yelled from the front that I had a call-in that would be here in fifteen.

I hate call-ins. Since I’m one of the best stylists in the local area, my appointments are booked weeks out. But there are a handful of people I always allow to call in, and Sway wouldn’t have said yes to them had it not been one of those select few.

Mentally, while shoving as much of the sandwich Stella grabbed me when she did a lunch run down my throat, I try to figure out who could be coming in. I know it’s not Nate or Liam; I cut their hair last week. Daddy doesn’t need a cut since I did his the other day. I’ve seen the others it might be recently enough. I pause with my last bite to my mouth when I realize who it will be—the only person who I haven’t cut in a while.

Cohen. Freaking. Cage.

Son of a bitch. I know I told Sway no more scheduling or allowing him to come in on a film day.

“Breathe, fancy pants,” Lyn whispers in my ear on her way towards the back breakroom. “He hasn’t been a biter since he was a kid.” She continues walking with her laughter trailing behind her.

I’m going to kill Sway, I think to myself before going to wash up so I can prep my station.

I have just put down my trimmers when I feel it.

That magnetic charge that floats over my skin, heating every inch and leaving a trail of awareness in its wake. That pull that has always been connected to one man. I shiver and give myself a pep talk about how to treat him with friendly indifference while there are cameras around. Of course they have been filming a few things that the cameras mounted all over the room can’t capture perfectly. I have already tripped over one of the assistant asshats twice today.