“Maybe a week. I’ll be in Vegas.” Wendy gave him her optimistic grin. The effort in front of a friend made her so tired that she sagged against his doorjamb. “Longer, I hope, because I’m probably going to get fired at the end of it.”
“Oh, honey!” He stuck out his bottom lip sympathetically. “I can get you a job if you need one.”
“Thanks.” Wendy kept grinning. The threat of working at a strip club was one of the many reasons she’d been so eager to escape Morgantown.
“Kidding!” Bob exclaimed. “You would never pass for a man dressed up as a woman, unless we strategically placed your hair, Lady Godiva.” The turtle food rattled as he switched the jar to his other hand so he could tug her blond locks. “Vegas, huh? Who are you bailing out of trouble? Colton Farr?”
“No, the Blackstone Firm handles him.” She thought again of her nemesis from college, Daniel Blackstone. He was gorgeous in an ultraconservative way, his dark hair cropped close and perfectly styled, his dark eyes haughty, a hint of his father’s British accent breaking through when he gave a formal presentation in class. She felt a wash of pleasure at the thought that if he was indeed the rep whom the Blackstone Firm had sent, he had worse problems than she did today.
“What’s the latest you’ve heard on Colton?” she asked Bob.
“He got arrested last night for pissing in the fountain at the Bellagio,” Bob said.
“You’re kidding!” Wendy squealed in delight. “There’s a wall around the fountain. How did he balance up there long enough to whip it out?”
“In addition to his storied acting career, he has his own line of exercise equipment, remember?” Bob wagged his eyebrows. “He’s in good shape.”
“That is revolting and fantastic. Maybe I can engineer other inappropriate places for him to pee, and that will draw people’s attention away from my client. I feel so much better.” Wendy leaned in and kissed Bob on one baby-smooth cheek.
“Who’s your client?” Bob asked.
“Lorelei Vogel.”
Bob’s eyes widened. “Girl, she’s much worse than Colton Farr. Best of luck straightening out that little hellcat. You’re as good as fired.”
Wendy stuck her fingers in her ears. “La la la, I am not listening to you.” She backed through the door into her own apartment.
Glancing at the texts from the travel office on her phone, she saw her plane was leaving in two hours. She would have barely enough time to negotiate a taxi to the airport and the line through security, and she could not screw this up. She sprinted for her bedroom, snagged the suitcase she hadn’t yet unpacked from her trip to Seattle, slung it onto her bed, and dumped it out to start over for a new city. She’d spent enough time with debauched stars in Vegas that she had a good idea what she needed to pack.
Bathing suit.
No, bikini.
No, string bikini.
Cocktail dress.
Three-inch heels.
Cocktail dress.
Four-inch heels.
Cocktail dress.
Five-inch heels.
Rhinestone tiara.
Body glitter.
Teddy with matching thong.
Headband with bunny ears and cottontail to clip onto the back of her thong. Some celebrity parties got a little weird.
She didn’t really want to take the ears and tail. She lifted them from her suitcase and put them back into her dresser drawer. But if she didn’t take them, she would certainly need them. She would waste money and, more importantly when she was working, waste an hour buying another set. Shaking her head, she set them in her suitcase again.
Latex gloves.
Rubbing alcohol.
Scissors. Wendy’s hair was long, and Vegas was sticky.
As she packed, butterflies fluttered in her stomach. In the past, she’d loved going on salvage missions. She’d thought she was helping people. And she felt high whenever she grabbed the point of someone else’s rising star and held on for the ride. People all over America bought the tabloids and followed actresses’ every move online, fascinated with the lifestyle and the glamour. Wendy had grown up one of those starstruck girls. She still was one, even now that she’d seen divas at their worst.
But as she folded the complicated bra she wore with her lowest-cut shirt and tucked both garments into her suitcase, she realized this time would be different. She was desperate to save her job. And Daniel Blackstone might be there, stepping on her toes, getting in her way, looking down on her for making a ninety-seven on Dr. Abbott’s speech-writing midterm when he’d gotten a ninety-eight. If he actively tried to screw her up—which wasn’t out of the question, considering how strongly his father and her bosses hated each other—she would prove no match for him. Though she was in a terrible hurry now, the recurring thought of him drove her to her bathroom to touch up her makeup and brush her hair.
No, not just because of him, she assured herself. She never knew whom she’d run into on the flight from New York to Vegas. It was a common route for people in PR. Many of the biggest stars lived in New York and chose Vegas as the location for their nervous breakdowns.
As she wheeled her suitcase through her apartment, she slowed at the bulletin board beside the door. It was always the last thing she saw when she left her apartment, and she’d tacked things there that made her happy: A few photos of herself with Sarah. A few shots of herself with stars she’d saved and who hadn’t thrown her to the wolves afterward. Printouts of e-mail messages from those stars and from Katelyn, Jonathan, and Archie, praising her for jobs well done.
Squeezing her eyes shut against the tears, she kept rolling right out of the apartment. Her meeting with the bosses today was just a blip on the map of her career that nobody would remember this time next year, when she was enjoying her promotion and her raise. She would save Lorelei Vogel from herself. Lorelei would enjoy it and beg to retain Wendy’s services forever. Vegas would be welcoming. Wendy would not have occasion to use the rubbing alcohol after all. And maybe Daniel Blackstone wouldn’t even be there.
* * *
Daniel wanted to sag against the elevator wall and gingerly touch his mauled eye to assess the damage. But he wasn’t alone—Colton was with him—so he was still on display. He stood up straight in the elevator with his hands down by his sides. Breathing evenly through his nose, he tried not to think about thirty more years of keeping his cool in this job.
“I’m sorry I hit you, man,” Colton said quietly.
Bullshit. Daniel glared at Colton. But searching Colton’s face, he saw no malice. On a pained sigh he said, “It’s okay. All in a day’s work.”