by KD Robichaux
There are two women in the room, one sitting in a salon chair on the right while the other holds up a red cocktail dress, checking her reflection in the full-length mirror in the corner.
“Um… hi,” I greet nervously, because neither of these women are in the group that comes to barre. “I’m Astrid.”
The one in the chair turns her head to face me then looks me up and down. She doesn’t say hello or anything, and then she turns to talk to the other girl, who’s still looking at me.
“Hi, Astrid,” the one holding the dress says, and I shift from one foot to the other anxiously when she says nothing else.
“Sooo… it’s my first day. I’m not really sure where to go or where to start, but I assume here, since it’s the dressing room,” I tell her, and she tilts her head to the side, eyeing me closely.
“You look like a scared little rabbit. Ever stripped before?” she asks skeptically, and my eyes widen as I shake my head.
“Oh! No. I’m the new makeup artist. Crystal referred me?” It comes out as a question, because her eyebrows go up and she glances at the other girl, and I send up a silent prayer that Crystal hasn’t been playing some fucked-up, elaborate joke on me.
“Makeup artist.” The woman sounds surprised. “Nice. Crystal should be here any minute, but um… I mean, we’re already here, so you can get started on us if you want.”
I look at the woman in the chair, who is wearing a smirk on her lips but isn’t looking at me, then back to the other one. “Um… is there any paperwork to fill out? Like um… an application, tax stuff or whatever?”
She shakes her head. “Oh no, honey. You’ll probably be paid like the rest of us, in cash at the end of your shift.”
“That’s… convenient. I didn’t bring my kit because Crystal said everyone has all your own makeup, plus the last artist left hers when she moved?” The last bit comes out as a question as well, because that was super shocking when she told me. That’s an incredibly expensive thing just to leave behind. She must’ve made some serious cash if she didn’t bother coming to get her kit.
“Yep, that hooker just up and moved without even turning in a two-week notice, not giving us time to fill her spot before she left,” the one in the chair says, shaking her head.
I shrug. “Well, Astrid to the rescue then, I guess.” And I groan in embarrassment at their judgy looks. “That was incredibly dorky. Sorry, girls. This is my first job in like… forever,” I say vaguely, not wanting them to grill me about why I haven’t worked—like with real people outside of the internet—since I was in high school. “Anyway, I’m nervous as hell, so if I say lame shit like that, just ignore it and pretend it didn’t happen, and I swear I’ll make you look friggin’ amazing.”
The one standing smiles and finally introduces herself, “I’m Heather, and this is Tracy. The rest of the girls usually get here between six and six fifteen. Doors open at eight, but it’s not like, a line out the door that early, so you’ll have plenty of time to fit us in before we all have to be out there.”
“Oh, ummm… okay, so it’s not that I have two hours to get everyone finished,” I say, wording in a way that doesn’t sound like I’m disappointed I won’t actually be off at 8:00 every night like I told Neil. “I mean, I’m pretty fast. And since you all have your own makeup I’ll be using, I won’t have to waste time matching skin tones and such.” I shrug. “Anyway, I guess… let’s get started.” I finally move farther into the room, and Heather hangs her dress on the rack then takes a seat in the salon chair closest to Tracy’s.
“Is this your kit?” I ask, pointing to the black makeup case against the mirror, and when she nods, I open it and look through everything she has, forming a plan. “You’re wearing the red cocktail dress?”
“Yes,” she says as if she wasn’t decided until this very moment.
“Tracy was right. It will look great with your complexion and hair,” I say, glancing in the other woman’s direction and giving her a little smile, hoping that my agreeing with her will soften her toward me, because up until now, she’s put off a serious “You can’t sit with us” vibe.
“Told ya, bitch,” Tracy singsongs to Heather, and I grin as I pull out everything I’ll need in order to do a sultry smokey eye.
Fifteen minutes later, Heather has a full face of stage makeup, complete with a dramatic smokey eye and a matte nude lip, and when I spin her around to face the mirror, she gasps when she sees her transformation.
“Oh. My. God.” She lets out a squeal. “Giiirl, I’m gonna need you to come to my house every morning to do my makeup for the day.”
I giggle and then hear Tracy snort behind me. “What would be the point in that? Your ho ass sleeps all day.”
Heather sticks her tongue out at her in the mirror. “Well on my days off then, bitch.”
“Yeah, yeah. Okay, blondie. It’s my turn,” Tracy says, spinning her salon chair around for me. And I smile to myself, because if she’s urging me to do her makeup, then that must mean she’s impressed by what I did with Heather’s.
“What are you wearing tonight, Miss Tracy?” I ask, putting a hand on my hip and turning my head to look at the rack.
“Black. Always black. I don’t do color,” she replies, and I look at her, tilting my head to the side.
“Really? That’s a shame. Your eyes would look killer in something purple. Oo, that’s what I’ll do then. You can have your black, and I’ll just go super artsy with your shadow.” I give a little hop and clap twice, and she lifts an overplucked brow at me. I point at her. “We had a deal. Do not even acknowledge the dorky shit that happens when I’m doing makeup.”
“Just make me look as good as you made that ho, and I won’t say shit.” She pulls her hair back in a headband and flaps over her shoulder with her long nails. “That’s my makeup. Don’t know if I have purple or not, but you do you, boo.”
She does have purple. It’s in a pallet at the bottom of her box with an assortment of other bright colors I use to accent the look. I create her some amazing brows to frame her eyes, and I go high-shine gloss on her lips. When I spin her around for her to see, her expression loses all sense of badass attitude, and she turns full-on girly excitement. “Damn, Gina! Heather, can we keep her? Look at this shit!” She turns her head this way and that, batting her long falsies and pursing her lips, and I laugh and give another little hop.
“You both look amaaazing! And the perfect canvases for me. I can’t wait to see what all I can create for you every night,” I say, and the girls’ eyes meet in the mirror for a moment, seeming to have a silent conversation between them that I hope is saying they can’t wait either, but I don’t have time to really figure it out, because a group of women who are in a heated conversation come through the door.
“They found her—”
“Ashley!” Heather calls out, cutting into their discussion, and the woman who was talking turns toward us, her eyes then meeting mine. “Our new makeup artist, Astrid,” she introduces.
“I’ll tell you later,” Ashley tells the group behind her, and she strolls up to where Heather is still sitting in her chair while Tracy gets up and walks over to the rack and starts sifting through the dresses.
Ashley leans close to Heather’s face, and Heather tilts her head from side to side, showing off her makeup in different angles. “Daaang,” she drawls. “Looking good, girl. Can I be next?” She stands up straight and turns to look at me.
I smile wide with all my teeth, unable to hide the pride I feel that these women are impressed with my abilities. “By all means,” I say, gesturing toward the row of chairs, and she sets her purse down in the station to the right of Heather and takes a seat.
I spend the next three hours doing the makeup of eighteen girls, including Crystal, able to fit in more than I thought because a lot of them could at least get their foundation and blush on, so I only had to do their eyes, lips, and a little contouring. Several had eyelash extensions, so I didn’t need to do falsies for them, and
more than a few had their eyebrows dermabladed, saving me even more time. But just so Neil wouldn’t come storming inside demanding to know where his woman was, I sent him a text letting him know everything was going great but taking a little more time than I thought. He replied back saying he was parked and would wait for however long I needed.
When all the girls were finished—half of which had gone “out on the floor” when the clock struck eight—it was needless to say they were now Team Astrid. They said my work was better than any artists’ who had come through here—which made me wonder how many had before me.
I grab my purse and make my way to the foyer, keeping my eyes down, my face hot at the first glimpse of nipples in the big room across the way. I hurry to the window I’d seen earlier and hand the intimidating man behind the glass a piece of paper each girl signed her name to after Crystal got there a little after six thirty. He tallies up the eighteen names then counts out seven crisp hundred-dollar bills and a twenty and hands it to me like it’s my lunch money for the day, not even blinking at the fact that I made over seven hundred bucks in just three hours.
I don’t question it though. I thank him, and he gives me a nod, and I’m out the door without a backward glance as I go in search of Neil’s truck.
Chapter 18
Doc
“Hey, man,” Seth says after I answer his call, sitting in my truck while I’m waiting on Astrid to get done with work. I had gone to the club and gave him details about what I discovered—that the website I had him looking into turned out to be the place Brian had been surveilling, that it was actually a business and not someone’s home. He didn’t get very far into his search before I had to leave to get Astrid by eight. But then she texted me and said she was going to be later. I was already almost here, so I said fuck it and just parked and started listening to my audiobook.
“I finally had a chance to dig into this place. Nothing yet on the website. I have a few programs running to get in without leaving a trace instead of just creating a log-in and paying the fee. But I did search all the police databases within the state to see if anyone has ever mentioned A Secret in any report, and let me tell you—that was a fucking pain in the dick. Errbody and their freaking brother’s got a damn secret. But with a few tweaks and some keywords included, I was able to narrow it down to one report in the local department made by a girl who is an exotic dancer—'cause, ya know, they don’t like to be called strippers anymore—at Astrid’s new job.” He pauses. “B-T-Dubs. Can we talk about the fact that both our sweet and innocent Quill sisters ended up working at a sex shop and a strip club? What’s up with that?”
I swipe a hand down my beard and look to the heavens. “Seth, focus” is all I say.
“Right. Ummm… da, da, da, exotic dancer, missing friend… Oh! That’s it. Okay, so the original report was filed a week and a half ago saying that this exotic dancer’s bestie-slash-coworker just up and disappeared one night. She didn’t show up for work at A Secret, with no notice, and she realized she hadn’t talked to her all day, which wasn’t abnormal, because they sleep during the day and work all night. This girl was gone without a trace. Left all her shit at work and never even came home.” I hear papers shuffling on the other end of the line before he continues.
“But then, plot twist! She calls her bestie alive and well in another state, and the next day, all her shit from her apartment was picked up in a moving van. Some big opportunity she couldn’t pass up and was just going to come back for her belongings later, which apparently she did. Just not the stuff at work,” he finishes, and I lean my head back against the seat, looking out the front windshield as a valet hops into a golf cart to ride back to the mansion after dropping off another luxury vehicle in the lot surrounding me.
Suddenly, there’s a knock on my driver-side window, and my head whips around, startled, because I hadn’t been able to see whoever it is approach, because I have my phone up to my left ear.
I find Astrid’s grinning face peeking in at me, her hands cupped around her eyes, trying to see in through the dark tint. She must’ve at least been able to see my sharp movement, because she giggles and says, “Boo!” and I chuckle, shaking my head as I push the button to lower the window.
I put Seth on speakerphone, because I know he’ll want to tell my girl hi. “Astrid just got out, Seth. I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” I tell him.
“Sounds good, bro. Bro…. Bro! O-M-G, Doc, you realize when you marry Astrid, we’ll be married to sisters, so that’ll make us like… for real brothers then? Holy shit!” I shake my head, and Astrid’s eyes widen. “Hey, sis! Congrats on your first day at your first big-girl job! Proud of you, lady,” Seth tells her, and her face softens.
“Thanks, brother-in-love. Tell my sister I love her and that we’ll make plans to get together this coming week to catch up and so I can kiss the belly. This past one kind of got away from me,” she tells him, and her cheeks turn a pretty shade of pink as her eyes meet mine, telling me she’s thinking of the fact that we’ve spent every evening together enjoying each other’s company… and body.
“Will do! Goodnight, y’all,” he says and disconnects.
“I’d get out and open your door for you, but if you’re looking me in the eye right now, that means your perfect little body is precariously perched atop my running board. Get in, goddess. I can’t wait to hear about your night,” I tell her, and she grins and hops down then rounds the hood of the truck to get in.
When she’s all buckled in, purse in her lap, she pulls a wad of cash out and spreads it out like a fan. My eyebrows go up when I see they’re all hundreds except for one twenty. “Three hours, Neil. Three hours of playing dress up with a bunch of real-life Barbie dolls, and they hand me this.” She squeals, shoving it at me. “It can’t be real, right? This is too good to be true. Can you like, look at them and see if they’re fake? I mean, I’ve never actually seen these newer hundred-dollar bills in person before, so it could be Monopoly money for all I know, but it smells real. Surely they couldn’t fake that very distinct smell, right?”
She’s trembling with excitement and nervousness, and I flip on the overhead lights, holding the bills up one by one to take a good and close look. I hand them back to her, and she grips them tight while she waits for my verdict.
“That’s definitely not Monopoly money, goddess. Congratulations. You just earned your first paycheck—well, not paycheck. Payout. But you know what I mean,” I tell her, and she squeals again, flapping the cash in the air. I can’t help but laugh at her giddiness, some of the uneasiness I felt earlier calming a bit.
I turn off the lights inside the cab and put the truck in Drive, pulling out of the parking spot and making our way toward the gate. It opens automatically at the exit, and we pull onto the main road. “So tell me all about it,” I urge.
“Well, I showed up, and this place was crazy on the inside. Like, empty out a giant mansion and turn one of the big-ass great-rooms into a bar with a stage and like… the huge fancy formal dining room into a dance club with all the lights and DJ booth and all that. That’s really all I saw before I found where I was supposed to be. I suppose it was maybe the staff quarters or something that they turned into a humongous dressing room. But I’m not talking about some little changing area with a mirror and secondhand vanity. I’m saying this thing was a girly-girl’s dream. With an entire wall of clothes. Like, take all of Barbie’s different outfits, and hang them on a rack that reaches from one wall to the other. And then the mirrors with their perfect lighting and salon chairs,” she says dreamily, making me smile. “It was amazing.”
“Sounds like it was right up your alley, baby. What about the people?” I prompt.
She huffs out a laugh. “Well, when I first got there, there were only two girls so far, because I got there early. And they weren’t sure about me at first, because hello, I’m awkward A-F. But once we got down to it and they saw the work I did, it’s like they instantly accepted me. I just had to prove my worth a little,
and the mean girls attitude just disappeared. I suppose that’s what it’s like around women anyway. I wouldn’t know. I used to be top dog in high school, but I was never a bitch.”
“I don’t think you’d even know how to be a bitch, goddess,” I tell her, meaning she’s such a good person through and through, but when I look at her, she has her eyebrows raised.
“Oh, I know how to be a bitch. If anyone lifted one finger to fuck with my baby sister, I would ruin their fucking life. Bet.” And then her voice lowers. “Well, except for what happened with Brandon. Seth kind of had to deal with that one.” Her eyes meet her wringing hands in her lap, and for the first time, I sense a feeling of guilt radiating off her. My brows furrow, thinking that through.
“Astrid, surely you don’t feel like any of that was your fault? What happened to Twyla was because that fucker was a sadistic, obsessive motherfucker. You had nothing to do with that,” I tell her, and I see her shake her head out of my peripheral vision as I turn onto the road that’ll take us most of the way home.
“How can I not, Neil? I was the whole reason he was here in the first place,” she says, but when I go to counter that, she holds up her hand. “But I don’t want to get into that. This is a good night. A great one. And I don’t want to ruin it.”
I sigh, gripping my steering wheel tighter. After a moment, I reply low, “Fine, I’ll give you tonight. But only if you promise we can have another session in the study to talk this through.”
“Why not at your office, Doc?” she asks, and I can’t tell what emotion I hear in her voice. Sarcasm? Dread? Resignation?