Katy tilted her head down in my direction. Her eyebrows wrinkled together in the center of her forehead.
“Maddie, what’s wrong? What is it? Did something happen with Mr. Sinclair?”
I removed my bag from my shoulder and after suspending it in midair with my index finger, I dropped it on the living room table. It collapsed with a heavy thump.
“Well, that all depends on what you mean by ‘happen’,” I replied.
Spinning around, Katy turned down the flame on the pot. As she did, she glanced back over her shoulder at me and said, “Maddie, you aren’t making any sense. Are you going to tell me what’s going on or not?”
Fifteen minutes later, we stood side-by-side in the closet together.
As she spoke, for about the fiftieth time in the last three minutes, I flicked the hangers in my closet. One by one, sorry reminders of my wardrobe raced by me in a frumpy parade. No matter how much I willed the perfect dress to appear, it became obvious I’d have to see him again in the same dress I’d picked him up in a few hours earlier.
“Ugh!” I groaned, as I looked up towards the ceiling.
“I don’t get why you’re so upset, Maddie. What girl in her right mind wouldn’t want to go out to dinner with Greyson Sinclair?! Hot, young and rich--are you ill or something?”
She reached up towards my forehead in a mocking gesture, pretending to check my temperature.
I swatted her hand away.
“Would you stop?” I moaned. “This is really serious!”
She giggled as I protested.
“It’s one thing if I screw this up because I do a bad job, Katy, but it’s a whole ‘nother one if…”
“If… what?” she began, filling in my pause. Katy hesitated for a moment. Then, raising her index finger, she pointed at me and continued, “Ohhh, I get it. You think that unless you give it up for him, he’s gonna come back to me and tell me what a terrible job you did. Is that right?”
I shrugged. It was a terrible thing to think about him but after the way he looked at me in the back of the limo, what else could I conclude? I’d seen those looks from men ever since I turned thirteen. As much as I didn’t want to say that to Katy, those sorts of glances always meant the same thing.
“No,” I lied.
“Yes it is, Maddie. I know you well enough to know when you’re lying to me.”
I rolled my eyes and turned to walk past her towards the bathroom. Time wasn’t on my side and since it looked like I was stuck with the same outfit, I needed to salvage what I could at the mirror.
Blocking my path, Katy stepped in front of me and pressed her still-straight index finger in the center of my chest. She looked me in the eye and shook her head as she began to speak.
“I don’t believe Grey would do that. He might be a lot of things but unfair isn’t one of them.”
I leaned away from her. “Grey? I didn’t realize you were so chummy with him.”
“I’m not. It’s not like that. Look, don’t change the subject. What I’m saying is whatever you think his intentions might be doesn’t mean he’s not going to give you a chance to do your job.”
I exhaled. “Well, I just… I don’t know, Katy. I don’t know what I'll do when he tries to make a move. I don’t want it to affect the job, that’s all.”
“Why worry about it?” she replied.
“What do you mean?”
Wordless, she reached down towards my waist and spun me around to face a full length mirror, which leaned against one of the closet’s interior walls.
Gesturing at my body she began, “What I mean is business is tough and Grey Sinclair is the toughest customer you’ll ever have. You need to use all the assets you have to get this started out right.”
I bit my lower lip between my teeth as she spoke. A few last hints of my berry lip gloss rippled across my tongue as I listened.
Katy continued, “Maddie, you can trust Grey to give you a shot to earn his business. And, who knows, if you’re lucky, that could lead to something much more.”
“I don’t want to sleep with him, Katy.”
“Uh huh,” she snorted. “I’m sure you don't. If that were true, then why are you wearing the slinkiest dress you own? There’s more conservative looks you could have opted for, right?”
Breaking my eye contact with her in our mutual reflection, I shook my head. “Yeah, I mean, I know what you’re saying. Uh, I just don’t want to screw this up.”