by Karen Booth
The oven-hot heat crawled up her back, rolling over her shoulders, and flooding her face and neck. Sweat ran across her scalp and down her upper lip. This was going to ruin everything. No makeup, however good it was, would stay put if her face was like Lake Erie. No amount of Aqua-Net was going to hold her soggy hair.
“Find a fan,” Tammera suggested when Lela called her in a panic. “Every photographer has one.”
“Good idea.” Lela frantically scanned the studio. “The only one I see is huge. Like wind tunnel huge.”
“Any port in a storm.”
Lela glanced at the time on her phone. Echo was going to arrive at any minute and Lela did not want to look like a complete disaster. She already felt like one. “Okay. I’m going for it.” She casually sauntered across the room, holding her sweaty head high and smiling at anyone who made eye contact, until she reached the opposite corner where the fan sat.
“So is you-know-who coming to this thing?”
“Donovan? I don’t know, but I hope not. He’ll just make me more nervous.”
“Interesting.”
“What? Why is that interesting?”
“I’ve just never seen you nervous. So I’m wondering what sort of influence this mystery man has over you.”
“He’s not a mystery. It’s a pretty open-and-shut case.” I liked him. He didn’t like me back. Mystery solved.
“Maybe if I met him, I wouldn’t feel this way anymore.”
“Maybe. Some day.” Tammera had been angling for this ever since Lela had told her the whole crazy story about how she ended up at Echo Echo, working with her former-college-crush-two-time-one-night-stand. “In the meantime, thank you for listening to my neurotic ramblings.”
“It’s not like you don’t listen to mine.” Tammera had a lot going on in her career right now, too—a publishing deal for a cookbook and a licensing deal for a line of kitchen gadgets. They hardly saw each other. In fact, Tammera had to use the network’s makeup artists last week because their schedules were so incompatible. Lela felt incredibly guilty.
“Dinner soon?” Lela asked.
“Yes. Delia and I really want to see you.” There was an edge to her voice that made Lela thing something might be up, but she didn’t have time to dig for more info.
“Want to come over to my place?” Lela found the switch for the fan.
“Can we do takeout? I never get to order in. Delia always wants me to cook.”
“Sure.”
“Maybe you can invite Donovan.”
Lela grumbled. “I’ll think about it. I should go. I need to lower my body temperature by ten degrees.”
“Good luck, darling. You’re going to be awesome today.”
“Thank you. Love you.” Lela ended the call and tucked the phone into the pocket of her jeans. She flipped the switch. With an enormous whoosh, it was like a jet taking off. Everyone in the room stopped what they were doing and turned their head. Meanwhile, Lela’s tresses blew back like streamers on a kid’s handlebars. The blast of air plastered her clothes to her sweaty body. “Fuck it,” she mumbled to herself, gathering her hair, raising both arms, and resting her hands on top of her head. She closed her eyes and let out a sigh of relief. The air was cool. The sweat was drying. If everyone wanted to watch her be a weirdo, let them.
“Hey there, rock star,” Echo called.
Lela jumped, dropped her hair, and turned around. Echo was strolling toward her, and although her words had made her seem like her normal, chipper self, her face told another story. “Hey.” Lela flipped off the fan.
“Just cooling down?” Echo asked.
“Hot flash. You’ll learn all about it in twenty years.”
“Ah.” Echo nodded. “Are you ready to do this?”
Lela smiled like she was self-assured and at ease, even though she felt like nothing of the sort. “Of course.” She wasn’t sure if she should bring up the subject, but something told her she had to. “Is everything okay?”
“Do I look that bad?”
“No. You look amazing. I’m just sensing that something is wrong.”
Echo folded her arms across her chest. “You know I’m getting married in two weeks, right?”
“Yeah. Of course. I’ve heard both you and your dad talk about it.”
“Well, I got into a huge fight with my mom last night. She’s been so overbearing about the planning, and Dad told me that I should just tell her to back off, so I did, and it blew up in my face. She totally flew off the handle, calling me ungrateful, saying I was being a brat.” Echo’s face seemed to fall a little more with every word. Lela felt so bad for her. When Lela had planned her wedding to Mark, her mother had been nothing less than a godsend. She never complained. Never made a fuss. Never even expressed her opinion. “So there’s that, plus, the woman who was supposed to do my hair and makeup had an accident at freaking Cross Fit and broke both of her arms.”
“Yikes.” Lela wanted nothing more than to help. “I’m not a total whiz with hair, but I’m not bad, and I will gladly do your makeup. I can drive up that morning and get you all taken care of.”
“You’d do that for me?”
“Of course I would.” Lela reached for Echo’s arm. She’d never felt maternal about anyone in her whole life, but she was starting to wonder if this was what it felt like to be a mom. The thought of Echo unhappy was almost too much to bear. “Anything you need.”
“I don’t want to make you drive all the way up to Connecticut for that. My grandmother lives in the middle of nowhere.”
“Well, now I have to go. I’ve heard stories about the James family estate, but your dad never invited me.” Echo’s grandmother was the heiress to a silver fortune and had raised Donovan and his brother in what was reportedly a completely over-the-top mansion. Donovan had once said that when he was a kid, he’d figured out that he could hide from his mother for days in the house if he wanted to. And apparently, he often did. “I’m dying to see it. And get a chance to meet your grandmother, too.”
Echo rolled her eyes. “She’s a trip.”
“So I’ve heard.”
“This would be such a godsend. Thank you.” Echo’s eyes brightened, even as she slanted her head to one side and a curious look crossed her face. “But hold on. This is stupid. You should just come to the wedding. Dad will be there and you know my mom, so you’ll have people to hang out with.”
Lela was about to have another hot flash. “You don’t need to do that. I’ll be fine. And I’m sure it’s impossible to book a hotel this close to the date anyway.”
“Oh, no. There’s plenty of room at the house. We kept the invite list small. All of the guests are staying on the grounds.”
“Oh.”
“And you can ride up with Dad.”
“Well…”
“Lucius and I are going up with him, too. Seriously. Lela. I won’t take no for an answer.”
That was all she had to hear. She wasn’t about to state any more objections, no matter how much she was incredibly unsure about how this would go. “It sounds lovely. I sincerely appreciate the invitation. Thank you.”
Echo clapped her hands in gleeful fashion. “Awesome. Now let me show you the dress I think would be perfect for the shoot.”
The pair walked over to the clothing rack in the opposite corner of the studio. Echo pulled a garment from the middle—bright pink with tiny black polkadots, a fluttery hem, and a plunging neckline. It was exactly the sort of thing Mark would’ve criticized, telling her it was ridiculous or that she was dressing too young for her age.
“Do you think it’ll look good on me?”
“Are you kidding? It’s going to look freaking amazing. Go ahead and put it on.”
Lela disappeared behind a gray velvet curtain in a small dressing room and peeled off her clothes. Slipping both sleeves of the dress up over her shoulders, she held the bodice against her body with one arm, turning in the mirror. The horrors of the hot flash and subsequent sweat-fest faded. She not
only loved the way she looked in the dress, she loved the way she felt in it, like a glamorous superhero. She poked her head out of the fitting room and waved Echo over. “Can you help with the zipper?”
Echo stepped inside and cinched Lela into the dress, which fit like a glove. “It’s gorgeous. It pushes boundaries, but it also just looks flat-out incredible with your hair. I can’t wait to see how it photographs.”
Lela looked down at herself, surprised that she now found the prospect of this whole thing somewhat exciting. Why she’d spent any time at all stressing about it was beyond her. “Thank you so much for this. I really appreciate it.”
“Thank you for trusting my ideas, especially the ones that my dad thinks are harebrained. It’s so great to work with someone who understands what I’m going for.”
“I just feel lucky to have the chance to be around you and have any input at all.” Lela had to ask one question, if only to figure out precisely what level of nervousness was appropriate. “Speaking of your dad, is he coming today?”
She shook her head. “No. He thought you would do better if he wasn’t here. He said he’ll meet with us when it’s time to choose images.”
Lela couldn’t figure out exactly why this disappointed her at all. The truth was that Donovan was only going to make this more difficult. But she also looked kick-ass in this dress, and part of her wanted him to see her in it. She wanted to prove him wrong about the idea of her being the face behind the campaign. Hopefully she’d have her chance. “Got it.”
Echo’s beautiful smile graced her face. “Perfect. Now let’s get this show on the road.”
Lela quickly got to work on her makeup, Echo standing by for some of the process and asking questions. Once that was done, the hairstylist stepped in. As luck would have it, she liked the way Lela’s earlier sweaty episode had added some lift at the roots. All it needed was a curling iron and a metric ton of hairspray. With every step closer to the moment when she’d have to be in front of the camera, Lela was surprised to find her confidence growing. She looked good. Better than good. She looked amazing.
And for once in her life, she was ready to be the center of attention.
Chapter Twelve
It had been two days since Lela’s photo shoot, and Donovan was on pins and needles, anxious to see the pictures. Scratch that—he was dying to see them. It wasn’t helping that Echo and Lela had been talking about the shoot non-stop, Echo insisting that Lela had looked “too hot for words”, which only sent his brain on a fool’s errand of attempting to answer the impossible: exactly how hot could Lela get?
Even though Donovan had been unconvinced of the wisdom of the campaign, things were moving forward. Ad buys had been placed. Bus wraps had been booked. If Echo disliked the photos or if Lela didn’t feel good about the way she looked in them, it would be a fiscal disaster to postpone or cancel anything. He could see a scenario in which he would be partly to blame, either for the fact that the photographer was his friend, or perhaps because he had opted to not be there that day. He’d said it was because he didn’t want to make Lela nervous, but the truth was that he was the one on edge.
Echo and Lela planned to meet Donovan in Echo’s office so they could look over the photo proofs. But when he showed up, exactly on time, everyone in the room was several steps ahead of him. A handful of people from the marketing team were on hand, staring at the large computer monitor on Echo’s desk and spouting “ooh”s and “ahh”s—it was annoying, like listening to someone else describe fireworks. Meanwhile, Echo and Lela were a study in contrasts—the former ebullient, practically floating around the room, while the latter looked like she wanted to crawl under a rock.
“I take it you’ve already got the proofs?” Donovan asked. He was a little irked that no one had waited for him before they started.
“Dad, they are amazing.” Echo turned to the marketing folks. “Guys, can you clear out for a bit so my dad and Lela and I can go over these?”
Several members of the team grumbled, but they willingly departed, leaving him alone with Lela and Echo.
“Well? They’re good?” Donovan asked.
“Better than good,” Echo spouted, sitting at her desk and looking at the computer. “Come see.”
“I’d actually like to hear from the subject of said photographs before I look at them.” He directed his gaze to Lela, who was sitting on the couch, legs crossed, arms folded at her waist. “Because you don’t look like you feel that great about them.”
Lela gnawed on her lower lip, her eyes full of uncertainty. “They’re good, I think? I mean, I’m not really capable of being objective in this situation. More than anything, I would say that it’s weird to look at dozens and dozens of photos of myself. It’s cringeworthy.”
It was now clear that Donovan had to decide this for himself. “Okay. Let me see.” He plucked his reading glasses from his shirt pocket and dragged one of the chairs from Echo’s meeting area around behind her desk.
It only took a glimpse, a nanosecond of a look, before he knew that Echo was right—there were zero words. Lela looked drop-dead gorgeous, like a freaking sex kitten, a goddess, her skin glowing and her hair as lustrous and beautiful as ever. The dress she wore managed to distract him for a heartbeat or two, especially since the neckline plunged toward her belly button, revealing the most inexplicably alluring stretch of cleavage he’d ever seen. Lela was not full-chested, but she was working what she had with aplomb, and that made Donovan’s palms get antsy with the memory of what it was like to have her velvety breasts in his hands. The poses were somehow both raw and glamorous at the same time—Lela confronted the camera with her steely blue eyes, or she sat in a chair, toes pointed in like a little kid while the dress was hiked up and showing most of her thighs. One made him lose all train of thought, with Lela laughing, hands on her hips as she tossed her head back and her silvery locks trailed down her back. Maneater popped into his head. Not helpful, Hall & Oates.
His entire body started buzzing, but his dick and his brain were humming the loudest, having an extensive back-and-forth about the situation he found himself in. This could be great for business. You’re an idiot for leaving that night. We’ll make millions. Maybe you should’ve been smart enough to support this from the very beginning, asshole. And while you’re at it, have you thought about swallowing your pride and asking Lela out again? No? Oh, right, because you’re trying to build a real relationship with your daughter. Boo. Hoo.
He’d seen more than his fair share of photographs of beautiful women. Hell, he’d been married to a model for three years. But this was something entirely different. He saw Lela in these images, the good friend, the woman he’d known since they were in their late teens. And he also saw the woman she had since become. He could even see the woman he’d flirted with and taken to bed, the person whose bare skin he’d caressed and kissed. But beyond all of that was a new person, someone he felt lucky to have met—a supercharged indestructible version of Lela.
“Wow. These really are amazing. I am completely blown away. They totally exceed my expectations.”
Lela tutted out of frustration. “You didn’t want to do this in the first place, so I’d say your expectations were probably pretty low.”
Echo picked up the water glass that sat on her desk. “I’ll be right back. Need to get a refill.”
Donovan understood why Lela was angry with him, or at the very least, annoyed. Still, he hated it. She should be happy. This was a good day. For all of them. “Lela, are you okay?” he asked once Echo was gone, strolling over and taking a seat next to her on the couch.
She pulled her arms even tighter around her waist. “I’m great. I’m just in a bad mood. Maybe it’s hormones or low blood sugar.”
“I really don’t understand. You look incredible in the photos.”
She pointed in the direction of Echo’s desk. “This is what getting out of my comfort zone does to me. This feeling that I’m having right now is the whole reason I dragged my fee
t on starting Lela B in the first place. I don’t like it. I feel so damn anxious. That’s my face in those pictures and it’s going to be on the side of buses, Donovan. Goddamn buses.”
Donovan removed his reading glasses, sat forward and rested his elbows on his knees, turning his head so they could have at least a little bit of eye contact. “I get it. I do. You know, I think there’s something about getting older that makes it easier to take more chances, but it doesn’t always mean you feel comfortable the minute you jump out of the plane.”
“Yes. That is totally it.” She exhaled loudly through her nose. “I also think there’s too much midwestern politeness in me. I grew up thinking that you weren’t supposed to put yourself out there. Be quiet, and be a hard worker, and don’t make too much trouble. Those photos feel like trouble.”
“If it helps at all, I think that trouble is going to make Lela B a massive success.” How he wanted to take her hand to comfort her, but he knew it wouldn’t play well, especially if Echo were to walk in. He and Lela were colleagues now. That was it. Well, they were friends, too, but that wasn’t the central role he played in her life anymore. “Also, I want to apologize. I was wrong. You and Echo were right. This was absolutely the correct call, and I think the campaign is going to be a massive success. That’s all because of you.”
“You’re not helping me feel any less self-conscious, you know.” She picked at one of her fingernails, dropping her head so that her hair tumbled perfectly over her shoulder. “But thank you. I do like hearing you say that you were wrong. I like it a lot.”
Echo reappeared, waltzing into her office in what was honestly the best mood Donovan had ever seen her in. “Dad, did Lela tell you that she’s doing my makeup for the wedding?”