Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 65643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 328(@200wpm)___ 263(@250wpm)___ 219(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 65643 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 328(@200wpm)___ 263(@250wpm)___ 219(@300wpm)
“You have an appointment with Noemi’s colorist tomorrow morning.” He tucked the phone back into his pocket and folded his arms, ready for a fight.
I wasn’t going to disappoint him. “Like hell I do,” I snapped. “I never said I’d change my hair.”
“Your hair is non-negotiable if we’re going to work together.” Garrett reached out, and for a second, I froze. The unexpected forward motion, the realization that he was much taller than I was, combined with the proximity I’d put us in, scrambled the instincts in my brain. They replaced Noemi’s ex-husband with half a dozen other powerful men in the industry who’d thought they could reach out and touch me without permission or warning.
But Garrett only tweaked the end of one long lock of my hair between his fingers and examined it before asking, “What the hell did you ask for that made them do this? To look like a fire engine?”
I inhaled, exhaled, settled the nerves that jumped underneath my skin. When I was sure that my hand wouldn’t shake, I smacked his away.
Garrett held it up in mock surrender. “Listen, kid. Do what you want, but our deal is off if you don’t neutralize your hair. Not a damn person in this town can see past it.”
I knew he was right, but it was so infuriatingly unfair. This was a town that could see Noemi as a futuristic space explorer. Andrew Quinn as a 19th century gangster. But because I had bright red hair, they couldn’t see me at all.
“Noemi agrees with me,” Garrett added.
“Of course she does,” I snapped. “You two agree on everything. Why did you even get divorced?”
I had genuinely wondered the answer to that question over the years. They’d stayed so close. Garrett had been her date to more than a few awards shows, and they always looked so right together. Her pale, golden beauty complemented by his bronze leading man good looks.
“I’d tell you, but it’s none of your business, kid.” Garrett said after a moment, a shutter dropping over his eyes. “Your hair, on the other hand, is my business. Change it for a few months. If it doesn’t help, you can change it back.”
But I was suddenly intrigued. “Why did you get divorce?” I repeated. “If you tell me, I’ll change my hair.” I couldn’t have said why I cared enough to capitulate on my hair. Maybe because I knew I was going to have to give in eventually anyway, I might as well get something out of it.
Garrett rubbed his lip, a habit I’d noticed at lunch the other day, and looked down at me speculatively. I tossed my hair back so he got the full effect of just how red it was.
“You change your hair back to brunette,” he stipulated.
“I’ll let Noemi tell them what to do.”
I couldn’t have said why I was suddenly so intrigued, but I was. Who had left whom? And if Garrett tried to tell me it was mutual, the deal was off. Nothing was ever mutual in a breakup, much less a divorce. Someone had chosen to walk away, and someone had been walked away from. I couldn’t imagine a man leaving Noemi, but then, it was hard to imagine a woman walking away from a man who looked like Garrett without a damn good reason. I mean, he wasn’t my type, but I could see the appeal. If he didn’t talk, or smirk, or–
“We got a divorce because she asked me for one,” Garrett said, interrupting my thoughts.
I processed it, then tried to picture it. “Just like that? You didn’t try to change her mind?”
Garrett was looking at me, but his eyes were still veiled, like he wasn’t seeing me. Then, suddenly, his gaze cleared. He rubbed his lip again, then twisted the corner into a smile. “Details weren’t part of the deal, kid.”
He gave my hair one last look, shook his head, and then was heading for the door before I could tell him to stop calling me kid already.
“I’ll have Noemi call the stylist. Your appointment is at ten,” he said over his shoulder.
I watched him let himself out, flicking a casual wave as he pulled the door shut, looking for all the world like the devilishly cool and unaffected man-about-town image he projected. It almost made me doubt that, just for a minute, I’d glimpsed something else.
A real person.
7
GARRETT
I called Noemi on the way home from Destiny’s apartment.
“Two things,” I said when she answered. “One, I need you to call Pierre at Partners and tell him exactly what to do to Destiny’s hair.”
“You got her to agree? Well done,” Noemi said approvingly. “What’s the other thing?”
“Why did we get divorced?”
Noemi laughed, shocked, then quickly sobered. “Are you really asking me that?”
“Yeah.” I reached up and rubbed my lip. I was sure I’d asked her twenty years ago, but I couldn’t remember. That time had been a blur. Working half a dozen part-time jobs, trying to make ends meet. Riding the highs of the close calls and sinking into the despair of this one didn’t work out. And then something had worked out. The day-player roles and the one-off appearances turned into a recurring role, and then there was a small part in a movie, and then a bigger part, and then a starring role. We’d divorced between the bigger part and the starring role.