merely shook her head. The three women Irene had brought with her had spent the past two hours adding highlights and trimming her long hair, adding gel to her nails, and applying all sorts of lotions to Melanie for reasons sh e’d lost track of.
The same woman who had done her nails had also waxed her legs and eyebrows, and had suggested something called a Brazilian.
“Never heard of it,” Melanie had said.
When the woman explained what it was, Melanie had sprung from the chair and drawn the line. Yes to the dress. The hair had needed a trim and the highlights were beautiful. But Melanie was not budging on this final point.
What kind of stylist doesn’t take no for an answer?
One that Charles hired, apparently.
Irene folded her hands over her chest and said, “We’re alone now. Drop the granny panties.”
A red flush of outrage went up Melanie’s neck and face. “Excuse me?”
Running her eyes over Melanie critically, Irene said, “You’re a beautiful woman, but those are a dime a dozen in the city, honey. You want to keep a man like Charles Dery, you have to step up your game. Now drop them.”
Maybe it was the authority with which the woman spoke, but Melanie opened her bathrobe and stepped out of her underwear. It was a little like being at a doctor’s office, but a whole lot more embarrassing. “Happy?” Melanie snarled.
“Oh, Lord. Did you trim that in the dark? You do need my help.”
Melanie whipped the robe closed. “You are the rudest, most insulting woman I’ve ever met.”
“It’s called honesty and I get paid for it,” the woman said confidently. “If you’re a complete wimp, choose a partial wax, but I’d go for the full if I were you. Men love it.”
“They do?” Melanie asked, suddenly uncertain.
Both of Irene’s eyebrows rose. “He sent me, didn’t he?”
Not giving Melanie time to change her mind, Irene took her by the arm and led her toward a table they had set up in one corner of the room. Melanie stood beside it, her eyes wide. “So women do this all the time, right? It can’t hurt that much, then. It’s like having my eyebrows done, right?”
“Sure,” Irene said and instructed her to lie back on the table.
An hour later, alone again, Melanie stood in the bathroom of her hotel room. Draped in a floor-length, form-hugging black dress, she eyed her reflection in the full-length mirror. From the sophisticated updo to her freshly manicured toenails, the woman who stared back at her was a complete stranger. Her brown eyes stood out, expertly accentuated. The red lipstick made her lips look fuller, pouty. Any imperfection in her complexion had been artfully concealed.
She winced as she remembered how intimate some of the makeover was. The soothing lotion had taken away the sting, but Melanie still winced whenever she remembered the pain—as well as the names sh e’d called Irene from the first strip to the last. Irene hadn’t so much as blinked, so Melanie figured she wasn’t the only one to express her feelings about having a Brazilian vocally.
They don’t make fairy godmothers like they used to. Whatever happened to the painless wave of a wand? Or did they simply leave these details out? Did Cinderella get a Brazilian? No one ever talks about what was going on under that dress.
Melanie turned and studied the low-cut back of the dress, admitting to herself that the tiny black thong fit beneath it better than her white, flowered cotton panties would have. She felt like a gift that had been carefully wrapped with one purpose in mind: pleasing the man who had paid for the makeover.
That thought sent a shot of excitement through her stomach. He told me that today was about dressing to please him. Is that what tonight will be about, too?
Teetering on strappy shoes with ridiculously high heels, Melanie walked out of the bathroom and over to a small pile of papers near the TV. She picked up the one with the phone number of Todd’s parents and closed it in one
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