Total pages in book: 110
Estimated words: 106935 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 535(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106935 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 535(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
“I’m meeting Anna Mayweather. Party of two.”
“Mayweather,” she says, repeating the name. A second later, recognition dawns in her eyes. Then, shock. “Oh. Mayweather. You’re Layla Mayweather.”
She’s not recognized me as the heiress to a lipstick line. In this kind of bar, money is presumed, it doesn’t surprise. This is something else.
Six years after my father’s murder, you’d think I’d be used to the stares. I mostly am, but I still don’t like it. Her thoughts might as well be plastered on her face.
You were the one who walked in on your father’s murder. You saw his business partner holding the weapon.
Then the question everyone wants to ask but no one ever dares—what was that like?
Knowing what hell is like can’t prepare you for the flames.
I paste on a Mona Lisa smile, revealing nothing. “Yes, I’m Layla. Is Anna here?”
“Not yet, but I’d be so happy to show you to her table,” the brunette says. There’s an apology in her tone and then on her tongue. “I didn’t mean to make you…” she fumbles. “I just meant…”
But she can’t even say uncomfortable as she escorts me to a table. She just exudes her own discomfort.
“No worries,” I say brightly. It’s easier than holding a grudge.
I take a minute to reset, trying to put the encounter behind me and focus on happy things—like my sexy date tomorrow night. It’ll be sex, and fun, and fantastic company, and that’s all.
A few minutes later, Mom arrives, click-clacking toward me on Louboutins. “Darling. So lovely to see you,” she says, then hugs me when I rise to greet her.
Once we’re seated again, she touches my arm, her expression hopeful. “I desperately need your help. I have to give a speech before the whole company next week. I want to look accessible to the young people we’ve hired recently. I brought some pics of potential outfits to show you. Do you mind?”
“I don’t mind at all,” I say, then I look at photos on her phone throughout most of the meal.
It’s a welcome change from dating machination.
When lunch ends, she heads to see her stylist, then sends me a shot of a pink pantsuit. I picked this one!
It’s not at all what I suggested for her. She’ll never wear it again, either, and in a month, it’ll be in a thrift shop.
Looks great, I say, since it’s easier than asking why she didn’t pick the one I recommended.
But the outfit’s inevitable future also gives me an idea.
As I walk to my next appointment, skull rings on, poised if I need to use them, I text Harlow and Jules and ask them to meet me tonight at my favorite thrift shop.
That evening, T-minus twenty-four hours until date time, I’m checking out the new arrivals at Champagne Taste in the Village, hunting for something to wear tomorrow night when I see Nick.
Harlow flicks through satiny tops while Jules fastidiously dismisses sundress after sundress. I scour the blouses, stopping at a pale pink short-sleeved one with tiny black polka dots.
“Oh, that’s perfect for your pinup style,” Harlow says approvingly.
Jules seconds the assessment with a firm yes, then studies the garment with quizzical eyes. “And you know that has never been worn.”
Harlow chimes in with, “And it’s hardly going to be worn on Layla at all.”
“I hate you,” Jules mutters.
I laugh as I head for the dressing room like I’m floating on a cloud of pre-date fun. But I haven’t seen Nick in three months. What if things are different with him here in Manhattan? What if we don’t vibe like we did in Miami? That was a bubble of heat and sex and flirt. This is my life. I was born in Manhattan. Wherever I go, I run into people I know.
And people who know me.
I plan to tell Nick my real name tomorrow night, in any case. Let him know I’m that Layla Mayweather, the daughter of makeup empress Anna Mayweather, founder, creator, and CEO of the makeup giant Beautique.
But if I’m lucky, Nick won’t have heard what happened to John Mayweather. My father was a defense attorney, not a celebrity, so his shocking murder is more of a salacious New York society thing. An if you know, you know tale.
I know it all.
And all at once, memories flash brutally in front of me.
That night.
My home.
The ride in the ambulance.
I shudder as the images slam into my mind like a tsunami wave, crashing brutally, battering me.
I gulp in air, hardly hearing the gentle knock on the dressing room door.
Then it comes again, more insistent.
It breaks my anti-daydream.
I don’t remember unlatching the door, but Harlow’s inside the cramped cubicle, setting a hand on my arm. “You okay?”
My throat squeezes. Too tight. A noose.
Breathe, Layla. Just breathe.
And I do. I breathe, and I breathe, and I breathe like Carla taught me in the countless therapy sessions I attended in high school, then in college too. Soon, the images recede.