CUTTING LOOSE

by Kristin Hardy

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  Contents:

  Prologue

  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17

  * * *

  * * *

  Prologue

  ^ »

  Los Angeles, 1995

  "Come on, everyone, sit down, please." Trish Dawson glanced around the room at the managers for the university's spring play. Why the producer had asked Trish to run the meeting in her absence, Trish had no idea. Maybe she had a head for details, but she was much happier acting as script doctor than ringmaster. Thanks very much.

  Trish took a deep breath. "Anita's sick so she's asked me to get things going. Now, we've got two weeks until opening night. We just need to do a status check before we start rehearsal. Martin, you first," she ordered, trying to avoid looking at the director with his razor-sharp cheekbones and spill of dark hair. He was too good-looking to trust, in Trish's book. She might have learned that lesson about men the hard way, but she'd learned it well.

  "We're in pretty good shape," Martin allowed, flashing his careless smile. "Right now we're still running about ten minutes long. Where are you at on the cuts, Trish?"

  "You'll have the revisions by noon tomorrow," she answered, mentally cursing the flush she could feel moving over her face.

  "In that case, I'd like to plan for a dress rehearsal in a week," Martin said. "How are we doing with the battle scene?" he asked the dark-haired choreographer, Thea Masterson.

  "Same as we were when you asked me an hour ago." Humor glinted in Thea's hazel eyes. "I've been running the cast through the sequences and they're coming along nicely."

  "How about costumes?" Trish turned to her best friend, Cilla Danforth, wardrobe mistress. "Are we on target for dress rehearsal?"

  "The outfits for the leads should be done," Cilla said, rolling up the cuff of her Marc Jacobs couture grunge shirt. "A couple of the bit players might have to play it in street clothes, but their costumes aren't that important."

  "Historically accurate?" Martin asked.

  Cilla stared at him blandly. "You worry about the actors, Martin, sugar. I'll worry about the clothes."

  Cilla never took anything from anybody, Trish thought admiringly, wishing she could be the same way. "How about sets?" she asked, turning to the design manager, Paige Wheeler.

  Paige consulted her tidy stack of notes. "Everything's ready," she supplied. "Touch-ups on the interior set for act three should be finished by tomorrow. 0therwise, everything's done."

  The day Paige missed a deadline was the day the planets stopped moving in their orbits, Trish reflected. She looked at a blonde in a Pearl Jam T-shirt. "Delaney, where are we at on marketing?"

  "Signage is up and Kelly's been running her 'Behind the Scenes' series in the school paper," Delaney responded, nodding toward Kelly Vandervere, staff reporter.

  "And there's Sabrina," Kelly reminded her.

  "Oh, right, thanks." Delaney turned to the group. "You guys all probably know Sabrina Pantolini, the one who's doing the documentary on the play. She's going to cut a commercial from her footage to play on the college station."

  There was a round of applause. Trish waited for it to die down and checked her watch. "Great, so it looks like everything's on schedule. I'll just write this up for Anita and we can get started with rehearsals."

  Everyone rose and began drifting out. "S&S meeting tonight at Tortilla Hats," Cilla reminded her before leaving.

  "S&S? What's that?" asked Martin, standing nearby.

  Tell him it stood for Sex & Supper Club? No way was Trish going to go there, especially not when her palms were already sweating from nerves. "Just a group of us getting together," she said vaguely, picking up her notebook.

  He considered. "Maybe I'll come along."

  To hear them dissect which guy they knew kissed better than the rest? Trish resisted snorting. "It's, um, a girl-only thing."

  "Maybe some other time, then," he said lightly. "So, are you nervous about opening night?"

  "A little," she admitted. "Are you?"

  "Not really. It'll be fine."

  "I wish I had your faith."

  He shrugged. "It's not hard. It's just a matter of trusting to luck."

  She met his eyes for the first time. "I guess everything is."

  * * *

  1

  « ^ »

  Los Angeles, Present

  "So this is your favorite sex fantasy, jeans and a T-shirt? All this time, I never knew you were acting out your dreams at the Supper Club meetings." Cilla looked out the door of her '30s Brentwood bungalow, an impish look on her triangular vixen's face as she stared at Trish and her casual clothes.

  "You guys always turn me on so much," Trish said, walking through the door.

  "I'll bet. You do realize you're going to have to change, right? Remember? 'Dress like your favorite sex fantasy?'"

  "'To see my fantasy become reality.' Yep, I read the invitation, too."

  "Sabrina's serious about her costume parties."

  "Right. Well, just now my favorite sex fantasy involves a bath and a foot massage," Trish sighed, setting her purse down on the hall table. Working for her sister Amber, at her home concierge company, doing errands for a living, was exhausting. "I am beat. Anyway, you're one to talk." She gestured at Cilla's plum-colored Michael Kors business suit. "Where's your costume?"

  "I just got home. The big Danforth's couture show is tomorrow, so of course everything went wrong all day long."

  "Rodeo Drive

  retail. It's a rough life you live," she said with false sympathy as Cilla stuck out her tongue. "So is it all taken care of now?"

  "I think so. We've got someone to pick up the designer when she flies in, so I'm off the hook for the night. And I do have a costume for the party, I'll have you know. I'm going as a naughty nurse," Cilla said, flipping back the neckline of her blouse to flash her the black lace of her bra.

  Trish fanned herself laughingly. "You keep that up, you'll give your patients heart failure."

  "Oh, but what a nice way for them to go," Cilla grinned. "So I'm set, but we've got to do something about you." Suddenly her eyes brightened in a way Trish didn't entirely trust. "You know, it's only seven-thirty," she said casually. "We've got buckets of time. Let's get a drink and we can fix you right up."

  Trish flopped down in one of the overstuffed chairs as Cilla walked to the kitchen. "It's been a long day. I'm as fixed up as I need to be."

  Cilla popped her head out of the kitchen doorway. "If you go like this, you'll feel totally uncomfortable and be convincing yourself to leave half an hour after you get there." She ducked back into the kitchen.

  Trish raised her voice. "I'll be ready to leave after half an hour anyway. You know how much I love parties. Right up there next to root canals."

  "So don't think of it as a party. Think of it as a Sex & Supper Club meeting with a few extra people there. Come on. Just this once, trust me." Cilla walked out, carrying fizzing glasses of something pale. "I'll make you look so gorgeous you'll be the toast of the evening. Now what happened with the hunky carpenter you were talking to when I called you this afternoon?"

  Trish shrugged. "He finished the job and left. They usually do."

  "That's all? You didn't talk with him?"

  "Of course I talked with him. I had to get him to sign the paperwork, didn't I?"

  Cilla blinked. "You spend half a day in a house alone with a gorgeous man and you don't even flirt with him? Trish, Trish, Trish, what are we going to do with you?" She clicked her tongue in disappointment.

  "The client could have walked in. Besides, he's a contractor we use regularly. If I'd joked back with him, he might have gone ahead and asked me out," Trish said, and took a sip of her drink. Ginger ale.

 
"So? He might have been a nice guy."

  Trish swirled her drink around. "Yeah, but if we went out, I'd have to talk with him, and then I'd be all stressed over saying something clever so of course I wouldn't be able to think of a single thing, and then I'd be worried about the silence and then I'd be worried that he would be thinking I was a boring goob and wondering how to end the evening as soon as possible. And there's the whole kissing thing at the end of the night, and I'm starting to think I'm just not cut out for it." She took a drink. "And if we hit it off, it would be worse. I'd spend way too much money on haircuts and new underwear and then he'd break up with me and I'd have to work with him later. It's just not worth all the hassle." Trish looked up at Cilla, who was suppressing a smile. "What?"

  "That's efficient. You got all the way through the entire relationship without even leaving the room, let alone talking to the guy. Look at all the money and time you saved."

  Trish flushed. "Look, it's just more than I want to mess with right now."

  "It doesn't have to be that hard," Cilla pointed out. "He might have been a really funny guy and all you'd have had to do was sit there and laugh." She leaned in toward Trish, "Who knows, you might even have had fun. Look, do me a favor."

  "What?" Trish gave her a suspicious look.

  "Forget about all that stuff. Come to the party and just relax. The gang will be there so you don't have to worry about talking to guys all alone. Besides, I'll get you fixed up so they'll talk to you no matter what. Consider it an experiment." She rose, slender and leggy in her short skirt. "You might even have a good time."

  Trish eyed Cilla skeptically and followed her as she headed down the hall. "You're not going to turn into my sister and start telling me it's all about appearance, are you?"

  "That's just Amber's excuse for making you do all the grunt work while she stays in the office filing her nails."

  "It's her company," Trish said simply. "Besides, she's better at the sales end. Amber likes dressing up every day, I'm happy in jeans. Someone's got to show the right image to the outside world."

  "Gee, can't imagine who said that." Cilla's voice was wry. "You know, if you just ditched the T-shirt and jeans and spruced yourself up a little, people would be so busy staring at you, no one would give Amber a second glance."

  Trish flicked her gaze to the ceiling. "I don't want people staring at me, thanks, and I like wearing a T-shirt and jeans."

  "And they like you," Cilla said smoothly. "But at a party? You'll feel more comfortable if you're looking your best."

  "Come on, Cilla, a little makeup isn't going to change things."

  "Mmm. I had in mind something a little more radical," Cilla stated, walking into her bedroom and pulling open the closet door.

  "If you think I'm going to be able to fit into anything of yours, you're dreaming," Trish said, coming in after her. "I'm three sizes larger than you are."

  "Give me a break." Cilla grabbed a handful of the cloth at Trish's waist. "You could take these jeans off without ever unbuttoning them. Why are you still buying clothes for someone you were ten years ago?"

  "They're comfortable," Trish muttered.

  "So's being naked, but I don't see you walking around like that."

  "This is ridiculous."

  Cilla pulled out garments at random, humming to herself. "Humor me."

  Trish tried again. "Cilla, no one's going to care whether I'm in costume or not."

  Cilla turned to her and smiled. "Trust me. They will when I get through with you."

  * * *

  "Let me see."

  "Stay still."

  "I just want to make sure you're not going overboard."

  "I'm not."

  "I don't believe you," Trish said, trying unsuccessfully to rise from her perch on the toilet seat.

  "You'll see when I'm done. Now sit," Cilla ordered, pushing her back down. She brandished the mascara wand. "Look toward the ceiling and try to keep your eyes open wide."

  "That's the third coat of mascara you've put on," Trish pointed out. Makeovers exasperated her. Good, bad or ugly, she was who she was, and all shining-up her act was going to do was make her expect things that were never going to happen.

  Yeah, she'd learned that the hard way.

  Trish reached out for the hand mirror on the counter but Cilla fixed her with a look. "You take one peek and I'm not giving your jeans back. Ever."

  "Come on, Cilla, I'm feeling like your personal Frankenstein monster, here. I can put on my own lipstick."

  "Uh-uh." Cilla came back from her makeup drawer with a lipstick the color of ripe cherries. "I want you to get the full impact."

  The full impact was what Trish was worried about as she worked to keep her mouth still under the tickle of Cilla's lipstick brush. Simple, low-key and in the background, that was the way she liked it.

  Cilla finished and set the lip color down, then she stepped back with her hands on her hips and studied her friend. "Now that's a sight to see," she said in satisfaction, and then laughed. "That was the most scared I've seen you look since that time we ordered a male stripper for your birthday."

  "Just tell me I don't look like Tammy Faye."

  "You don't look like Tammy Faye," Cilla assured her. "Okay, upsy daisy, but don't look at the mirror in here." She covered Trish's eyes until they got into the bedroom. "I want you to get the total effect all at once."

  "I'll get the total effect if I trip and break my neck."

  "Almost there, almost there … okay, you're in front of the mirror. Are you ready?"

  Despite herself, Trish felt a little tingle of anticipation. "So show me."

  "Ta-da," Cilla sang and dropped her hands.

  For a moment, all Trish could do was stare. And a gorgeous stranger in the mirror stared back at her. The other "her" stood with a silky waterfall of absolutely smooth red-gold hair flowing to her waist and a mouth as tempting as chocolate. The features that had always seemed too delicate in comparison to her sister's sun-tossed California blond looks were suddenly vivid and underscored with some special importance. Expert makeup played up the hollows in her cheeks and rendered her slate-gray eyes dark and somehow mysterious. "Wow." She raised her hands to the soft strands of her hair. "Wow," she said again.

  "Do you like it?"

  "I'm … wow, Cilla, really. I'm amazed." With a little surge of excitement, Trish turned to and fro to get the full effect. And, she had to admit, in the outfit she wore, it was some effect indeed. The evening required a bold statement, Cilla had decreed. Digging in her closet, she'd come up with her best studded-leather dominatrix look. To Trish's amazement, she'd actually been able to zip it up, although taking a deep breath made her breasts swell upward alarmingly. The leather bustier molded her waist, the skirt fit her like a second skin. Fishnet tights and high-heeled red ankle boots completed the ensemble. It might have been couture, but it looked like something out of an S&M club.

  And it looked really fabulous.

  Still, she wasn't sure she was such a good judge of party wear. "Are you sure this isn't a little over the top?"

  "Are you kidding? At a do like this?" Cilla sniffed. "You'll be tame. Too bad we couldn't get you a whip," she added thoughtfully. "It would add that little extra touch."

  "For that 'you've been a bad boy lately' look?"

  "Like I said, you never know. You might enjoy it."

  Trish rolled her eyes. "Hardly. Although it feels like the person I'm dressed up as would." She turned to inspect herself from behind.

  "That's the fun part, isn't it?" Cilla said cheerfully, slipping into her nurse's costume. "Haven't you ever wanted to do that, be someone else just for a night?"

  Trish's standard answer was that who she was would have to do. If she wasn't one-hundred-percent thrilled with life, that was only to be expected. She'd shed the crazy expectations of being a siren, of having men tumble at her feet, of finding true love with Mr. Right. She just wasn't built for it. Her friends could tell her she was a hopeless romant
ic all they liked. Wanting love and believing that it had any place in her life were two very different things.

  For one night, though, maybe it could be different. Maybe for this night she could be someone else, see how the other half lived.

  Slowly the corners of her mouth curved up into a smile and she vamped in the mirror. "Be someone else, li'l ol' me?"

  "Why not?" Cilla slicked her dark-gold hair back behind her ears and hung a stethoscope around her neck. "In this getup, you could have yourself a time. What do you think?"

  Trish grinned at her reflection. "I think we'd better get to the party."

  * * *

  Forty minutes later, as they stood outside Sabrina's house, the notion seemed altogether less brilliant. Sabrina lived in Venice, a small neighborhood south of Santa Monica. An ambitious developer in the thirties had built a neighborhood of houses along a series of narrow, criss-crossing canals dug into the California soil. Now, newly dredged and fashionable, the neighborhood held echoes of the real Venice or Amsterdam, with its small arched bridges and houses next to the water.

  It definitely didn't go with dominatrix-wear. "I can't believe I thought this was a good idea," Trish murmured, pulling futilely at her skirt as they made their way up the walkway to Sabrina's house. It was one thing to be wearing the outfit in Cilla's bedroom; it was another to wear it in public. Not even the silk duster she'd thrown over the top helped.

  "Stop picking at your clothes," Cilla scolded.

  "It's too tight."

  "It's Gaultier. It's supposed to fit like that."

  "How come I've never seen you in it, then?"

  Cilla shrugged and twirled her stethoscope playfully. "You know couture. You can get away with wearing it once, but that's about it."

  "So this is my one big chance?"

  "Make the most of it," Cilla advised, then groped in her candy-colored Louis Vuitton Murakami bag as her cell phone burbled for attention. "Hello?"

  Trish walked a few steps away, adjusting her bustier. Okay, so maybe she felt like the lead actress in some 1960s French sex farce. She just needed to get into character. It wouldn't be her walking into the party, it would be her alter ego, the one who loved being outrageous and living at the center of the whirlwind. It would be okay.