“I know what I would do.” Annalise wiggled her eyebrows. “Elijah wouldn’t stand a chance.”
Tess giggled. “Did you go on his tour group again today?”
“No, he only hosts tours on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Those are his short days. He works long hours somewhere in the back of the museum on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays to restore old paintings. He rarely comes up for air on those three days and he leaves well after the museum closes for visitors.”
Raven sighed. “What are we going to do with you? You’re a stalker, Annalise. I bet you even know his favorite color.”
Annalise smiled, unperturbed. “I think it’s green because he seems to wear greenish-colored shirts more often than any other color shirt. Unless he has to go to a meeting with the museum board, and then he wears a white button-down. Anyway, his emerald-green eyes really pop when he wears green, so I have no complaints.”
Her friends burst into giggles as she rambled.
Cami recovered first but her face still resembled the cherry-red tomatoes on the crostini. She refilled everyone’s glasses again with a new bottle of Riesling except for Annalise’s half-empty glass. “We’re not the girls who have frizz-free hair and perfect butts, and we usually don’t get lucky on the first date. Wouldn’t it be great, though, to be someone else for one day? Midnight-to-midnight. We’d finally look exactly the way we’ve always dreamed of.”
“I call BS.” Raven sat her glass down and crossed her arms.
“I’ll try it. What the hell. What do I have to lose?” Cami held the locket upright in her palm and waved her free hand over it. “Oh great and magical genie, I wish…” She trailed off and Annalise assumed Cami pictured someone beautiful in her mind.
In Annalise’s opinion, her friends were already beautiful, inside and out, and she knew they thought the same about her. They all struggled with personal demons and a lack of self-confidence, but knowing they had issues and doing something about it were two different things.
Tess snatched the locket from Cami’s hand and repeated the incantation Cami likely made up. Tess then handed the locket to Annalise and she felt it vibrate in her hand. The cameo also felt a little heavier as though from the weight of her friends’ wishes or from the pain in Annalise’s heart. She wanted to be beautiful, but her mistakes ruined her for any decent man. Hell, her mistakes ruined her for herself. She couldn’t stand to be in her own skin sometimes.
So maybe this new Cinderella body was exactly what she needed—if only for one day.
She closed her eyes and held the locket tight. I wish to look like Ava Gardner and Jane Russell—a beautiful, buxom brunette with long legs, a narrow waist with curvy hips and dimples in her cheeks when she laughs.
Okay, so she didn’t want Cinderella’s blonde hair—she tried to go blonde back in high school and the bleach-blonde look washed out her natural skin tone—but she’d love it if her mousy-brown hair resembled the color of a rich chocolate mousse from the finest bistro.
Annalise handed the locket to Raven and then her friend made her wish and handed it back to Cami.
Cami placed the locket in the middle of the coffee table. “Put your wine glasses around it, close your eyes and join hands. Think about your wish one more time.” Everyone did as Cami requested and then she continued. “Together, with the power of four, we strengthen our wishes to become what we want to see in the mirror.”
Annalise bit back a laugh. Cami’s line sounded like something out of a witchy movie. She opened her eyes and stared around at her friends. Everyone appeared the same but Cami had said the wish only worked from the start of midnight. They probably just needed to wait a few hours—if the idea wasn’t ludicrous.
“Do I look any different?” Cami asked.
Raven shook her head as though in resignation. “Nope. I told you it was BS.”
“Maybe we did something wrong. Why don’t you ask your grandma on your next visit? Then we can try it again,” Tess chimed in, always the optimist.
“Sounds like a plan. Maybe Grandma will stay awake to finish the story next time.” Disappointment laced Cami’s words. She yawned and Tess suggested they call it a night.
Four empty bottles cluttered the table but Annalise lost track of how much she drank, though she felt a good buzz. Her friends knew of her mother’s addiction, so Cami bypassed Annalise earlier as she topped off everyone’s glasses. Though Annalise liked to drink now and then, she tried to monitor her consumption and she always ate to stave off the effects. When she and her friends talked about love, however, they seemed to drink more than planned.
Annalise called the taxi company as her friends cleaned up the living room and then headed to the kitchen to wash out their glasses and plates. They all knew what happened on Wednesday nights, so they always took a taxi to the hostess’s home and then called for another to return to their own home. Better safe than sorry. She ordered three taxis for herself and two of her friends and they continued to chat in the kitchen until their bright yellow carriages arrived.
She hugged Cami goodbye, then Raven and Tess, and then she headed outside to greet her driver. Though they all lived close by, they’d calculated the cost of sharing a taxi to each riding in their own and determined they got off cheaper by calling for separate drivers. Annalise waved goodbye to her friends and a deep sigh left her lungs as her driver steered the taxi out of the neighborhood.
She didn’t really expect the magic locket to work but she couldn’t help herself and got her hopes up. With her hopes dashed, she’d go back to living her life one day at a time.
Chapter Two
“No frickin’ way!” Annalise gripped the sides of her sink the next morning and stared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Her hangover vanished. She’d just brushed her hair and, instead of a frizzy mass of light brown hair tumbling over her shoulders, locks of dark brown silk cascaded around her. She jerked off her pink T-shirt and gaped at her bare breasts, fuller than usual with pink little tips instead of the flat nipples she usually scowled at every morning. Her waist appeared smaller and her hips flared out like a salsa dancer’s.
“Bam!” She tilted her hips to the right and twirled in a circle just as her cell phone rang. Annalise hurried through her apartment with just her gray panties on and almost skidded on the rug in the hallway. She finally pulled her buzzing phone out of the purse she’d dropped on the sofa last night and flipped it open to hear Cami’s excited voice blare from the speaker.
“Did you see? Do you look different?”
“Hell, yeah. I’m a babe. You should see the size of my boobs. They’re big and perky but not too big to look like watermelons. They’re perfect. Every part of me is perfect.” She grasped her lower back and felt for her scar but she couldn’t find it. “My back scar is gone too.”
“I really didn’t think Grandma’s cameo would work, but wow. I already called the other girls and we agreed to meet at the usual coffee shop in about forty-five minutes.”
“I’ll be there.” She dropped the phone back in her purse and raced to her bedroom to stare at herself in her full-length mirror. Dimples highlighted her cheeks as she laughed. She didn’t wish for a firm butt to go with her perky breasts but she wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. She glanced at the clock and knew she’d be late to work if she met her friends at the coffee shop but she really didn’t care. She’d just blame it on traffic.
After a quick shower, she applied a soft liquid foundation to her face, heavier eye shadow than usual and doubled up on the mascara. Annalise felt ready to take on the world with blush on her cheeks and her lips darkened with a moisture blast burgundy lipstick, but then she pulled out a dozen blouses, sweaters and slacks from her closet only to realize she didn’t own anything sexy or vibrant. No, not true. She lowered her gaze to a well-preserved wooden trunk in the back of her closet and her heart pounded hard
er.
Damn it. What choice do I have?
She dragged the trunk to the foot of her unkempt bed and pushed up the curved top. Her high school yearbook, a few trinkets and old pictures cluttered the top but she pushed the items aside to pull out a short black skirt with huge safety pins holding up the bottom hem and a sexy V-neck red tank top with a little rhinestone skull emblazoned above the left breast. A pair of knee-length black boots rested at the bottom of the trunk. The sassy outfit always boosted her confidence but it also brought back bad memories. The clothes smelled good due to the little baggie of stress-reduction lavender in her trunk and she hoped the clothes still fit.
A little chunky back in high school, her body had matured and filled out since then, but she still carried extra flab on her stomach.
Well, she did until the wish transformed her into a sex kitten.
Annalise snapped on her only bra, surprised the gray fabric still halfway fit since her boobs were now bigger, and matched a pair of silver panties with it. She shimmied on the skirt, a pair of nude pantyhose and then the clingy tank top. She forced her feet into the boots, zipped up the leather and then turned back to her full-length mirror.
“Wow.” She trailed her hands down her waist and turned sideways to stare at her backside. She looked sexy and confident, and she wished she could look like this all the time.
Annalise grabbed a jacket out of her closet even though it didn’t match her outfit—she’d need something in case it rained today—and then she hurried out the door to meet her friends.
“Everything up to this point is exactly what Grandma said,” Cami announced after the waiter took their coffee order.
Annalise sat beside Raven at a little bistro table as Tess huddled close to Cami across from her. Their waiter returned with their drinks in less than a minute and Annalise couldn’t remember such prompt service when they’d stopped in before. “I never would’ve believed in junk like this before.” Annalise smiled at the handsome guy at the table beside theirs. “I have the sudden urge to flirt with every hot guy I see.”
Cami sipped her coffee and sighed as though it tasted like heaven. “We only have until midnight. Let’s make the most of this.”
“I look exactly like what I’d pictured in my mind as I held the cameo.” Tess ran her fingers through her new blonde hair. “I still look like me, but another version of me.”
“A sexier version.” Raven chuckled and pushed up her boobs.
Tess leaned over and whispered, “I love mine, too.”
Annalise giggled. She didn’t know which she preferred: her new and improved breasts or her missing scar.
“It stinks that it’s a work day. Why didn’t we make the wish on Saturday?” Cami pouted.
“Yeah…Dumb us.” Raven checked her wristwatch. “I have to go to work.”
Cami smiled at the guy Annalise had flirted with. “Hi. Will you take our picture? This is a crazy day for us and we’d love to remember it with a photo.” She handed the stranger her phone after he set down his cup of java.
The man smiled at the women. “Sure. Four beautiful ladies together in one place is better than coffee.” He counted down and took the shot. Cami thanked him as he winked at her and placed the phone back in her hand.
Annalise complimented her friends once again and then took her leave. She headed to the art gallery a few blocks away and the sales associate behind the counter whistled.
“Damn, Annalise. You look different today.” Jesse grinned at her as his eyes traveled down the front of her body. “Very artsy.”
Jesse, near her age of twenty-eight with a wife and two kids, always treated her like a friend but he’d never checked her out before.
“Thanks. I just thought I’d try something different, but it won’t last.”
Jesse pushed out his bottom lip. “If you say so.” He slid off his stool and walked around the counter. “It’s all yours.”
“Thanks for subbing for me. The traffic was brutal. Is the boss man here yet?”
Jesse shook his head. “Nah, you’re in the clear, but you owe me.”
“Put it on my tab.” She sat on her swivel stool and drummed her hands on the marble countertop. Jesse laughed and then walked toward a middle-aged couple who’d just entered the gallery. Jesse prided himself on customer service while Annalise worked the register, the computer and in the back when someone ordered a custom-made frame for a portrait or piece of artwork. She spent the next twenty minutes reorganizing her paperclips and various forms and folders—Jesse always left her work area a mess—and then she lowered the stool to better fit her new height. By the time she’d finished adjusting the lever, the stool appeared to be at the same height as usual but she didn’t have time to question it.
Jesse made a sale. Annalise gave the customers a pen and the right form to fill out while she wrapped a tacky painting in thick brown paper and tied it snug with twine. Several customers kept them busy throughout the morning but time dragged by after lunch.
“Is today the day?” Jesse approached Annalise from behind as she leaned against the storefront window.
She drew her gaze from the museum across the street. “Hmmm?”
Jesse’s lips stretched across his face. “Elijah. You’ve crushed on that tour guide for months now and, speaking from a man’s perspective, he’s either blind or an idiot if he doesn’t notice you today.”
“Really?” Annalise blushed scarlet but she rested her hands on her hips in a sassy manner. “You haven’t noticed me until today.”
He scoffed. “I’m happily married, but I’ve noticed you for years.” He then nodded toward the museum. “It’s almost three o’clock. Take the rest of the day off. I’ll just tell the boss man the hospital called you because your aunt was rushed to the ER―if he ever drags himself out of his office.”
She laughed. “I don’t have an aunt.”
“Boss man doesn’t know that.” Jesse quickly closed the distance between them and the counter and grabbed her purse from underneath the marble top. She’d left her jacket in the car and Annalise knew it would take her forever to clean up her work area tomorrow if she left Jesse in charge of it—not that she cared. “Now remember to shake your booty and accidently drop something out of your purse. Don’t kneel to pick it up. Hike up your skirt and bend over to get it. Show a little bit of ass.”
Annalise couldn’t stop the laugh in her throat. “You’re a perv.”
Jesse shrugged, unrepentant, shoved her purse into her arms and ushered her out the front door. Annalise headed across the street. Though a little early for Elijah’s last tour of the day to end—the tours started at nine o’clock and one o’clock, and lasted two hours each—she showed her membership card to the girl at the counter and waited in the Edwardian Gallery. Elijah always ended his tour in that particular room. A handful of people viewed the paintings on the pale blue walls but then left as a small crowd of tourists neared the open, arched doorway of the spacious gallery.
“We’re about to see the last of the travelling portrait collection the Quicken Museum has for the month.” Elijah led the group into the room and pointed at a beautiful painting of people standing along the quay in a coastal town. “Here’s one of my favorites. Home-Along: Evening by Stanhope Alexander Forbes, 1905, speaks to me on so many levels. Notice the soft, blended stroke lines and how all the colors seem to fade together. The buildings and boats are dark, the sunset bleak and the weary looks on the men’s faces conjure up images of drudgery for me.” He tilted his head to one side as he stared at the oil on canvas. “Then I see the way the man in the blue sweater pays rapt attention to the woman—she’s likely his wife or sweetheart—and then I start to see life from his point-of-view. He goes home to her at the end of a hard day’s work, so nothing else matters.”
Annalise smiled as she stood back and listened to Elijah co
mpare Forbes’s painting to another from the same time-period. His enthusiasm showed but his group seemed to care less, even though he asked for their opinion and insight as though to liven up the tour. Then he escorted them around the room, pointed out various paintings in the permanent exhibit and soon thanked the group for their time. An elderly couple hung behind as the crowd dispersed and asked him a few questions about a museum across town. Never a good sign, Annalise knew, but Elijah kept his cool and provided them with directions. The gray-haired couple then strolled through the gallery at their own leisure and Elijah tunneled his hand through his hair.
It’s now or never.
He stared up at a painting by Spencer Gore with an irritable look on his face and didn’t seem to notice her or even hear her boots click softly on the tile floor as she approached him.
“I find this one, Nude on Bed, intriguing. Spencer Gore focused mainly on landscapes and interior scenes. In his later years, however, he grew concerned with pictorial construction due to the influence of several Post-Impressionists of the time.” Annalise narrowed her gaze at the painting. A voluptuous brunette woman reclined on a bed, appeared deep in thought, and the orange wall along with the rusted metal headboard and footboard hinted at a shabby bedroom.
She felt Elijah’s gaze on her face and it took all her willpower not to glance down and run from the gallery.
“Very good.” Elijah glanced at the painting and then back to her. “What else can you tell me about it?”
She licked her lips. His deep voice curled her toes and her heart fluttered. “Well, Gore painted it in 1910 but not much is known about it. It’s usually on display in the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery but the Quicken struck a deal with the English museum to trade portraits for a few months. It’s an excellent piece.” She wanted to smack herself. He already knew about the trade—he worked for the Quicken after all—but she didn’t know what else to say unless Elijah wanted to hear a full biography on the painter. She assumed he already knew that as well.
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