“Really?” An emotional client was always a nightmare. Tears and mascara didn’t mix. “Mr. O stepping out again?”
The butler raised one thick bushy black brow. “There are photos.”
That had to hurt. Natasha might be a grade A bitch, but no one should have to see their significant other getting their cheat on. Drea grabbed her bottle of Urban Decay makeup setter and put it next to the loose powder. She was going to need both tonight to keep the chic but high-end slutty look Natasha preferred for events like tonight’s gala. “Hell hath no fury…”
Fergus held out the lipstick to her, the silver tube shining against the soft white glove Natasha insisted her servants wear. “As if she needed an excuse.”
She took the tube—Natasha’s favorite shade—and put it in front of the other lipsticks. The last thing Drea wanted to deal with today was a client pissed off because she had to fumble around in her case for something. All Drea wanted was to finish this last job, go home, and binge-watch Supernatural until she could guarantee she’d have vivid dreams of Dean Winchester and all the things she’d do to him in the backseat of that shiny black Impala. It was the only thing that would keep her thinking about another, non-fictional hottie who acted first and thought later.
She was going to miss the two orgasms a night he guaranteed whenever she and Cam ended up in bed, or against the wall, or that one time in the restaurant bathroom.
The unmistakable click clack of stilettos against marble filtered into the room. Fast paced, unhesitating, and on a mission, no doubt echoing the owner’s mood. Drea took a deep breath and clipped her own professional mask into place. By the time she exhaled, she’d locked down her personal loose ends. She was cool, confident, and utterly unflappable—exactly what she wanted people to see.
“You’re late.” Natasha swept into the room, her Stepford-level assistant the perfect two steps behind her Christian Louboutin stilettos.
And poof! The spark of sympathy Drea had felt for her client fizzled out. She picked up an eyebrow pencil to give herself something to wrap her fingers around besides her client’s neck. “My calendar says four p.m., and it’s ten till.”
“Well, your calendar is wrong. Or do you question that as well?” Natasha glared down at her much shorter assistant, who managed to cringe and sidle closer to her boss at the same time. “I swear the incompetence is astounding, but it’s too late to hire someone who can keep their shit together, so you’ll have to do for tonight.”
The eyebrow pencil cracked in Drea’s hand.
Fergus stepped forward, drawing his employer’s attention. “Would you care for champagne, Mrs. Orton?”
“Lots of it,” she responded.
“Right away, ma’am.” He nodded his head in the perfect act of deference and strode out the door.
Natasha settled down into the chair and shook her head so her long blonde hair fell in a perfect wheat-colored waterfall behind her shoulders. “Julia, show her the dress.”
The assistant flipped her tablet around, revealing a floor-length black Alexander McQueen gown. The simple crepe material and straight strapless neckline increased the drama of the flared, ornate, gold-beaded peplum and the floor-sweeping hem. This wasn’t a dress for a twenty-something ingénue. This was a $7,000 badass dress for a grown woman who was about to cut her cheating husband off at the knees in public.
Natasha Orton was a giant pain in the butt, however, the challenge of making Natasha’s face go with the dress wasn’t one Drea could walk away from. The transformation from California blonde to Harbor City ice queen would be too much fun.
Drea looked from the tablet to Natasha. What could be the most dramatic options for a society event? Too much and Natasha would look attention hungry, a true no-no among the elite. Too little and she’d fade into the background, which would be a total disservice to the killer dress. The best options came down to a smoky eye or a femme fatale lip.
“Do you want to highlight your eyes or your mouth?”
“Which one says, ‘You’re a cheating asshole who should have insisted on a pre-nup?’”
Despite knowing better, Drea couldn’t help but like Natasha just a little bit more at that moment. “Definitely the eyes.”
Twenty-five minutes and two smoky eyes later, Drea was in the zone. She stroked the precision lip brush across the tip of Natasha’s preferred pale pink lipstick. The innocence of the color would balance out Natasha’s cut-a-bitch eye makeup.
She brushed the color across her client’s parted lips before handing her a tissue. “Blot, please.”
Natasha stared at the painted lips on the tissue. “My lips feel weird.”
“The lipstick’s infused with a lip plumper and sometimes has a tingling effect.” Drea applied the second coat and took several steps back to take in the effect of the finished makeup. The combination of dusky black with traces of gold smudges drew attention to Natasha’s hardened gaze. She’d taken her client from trophy wife to badass. Damn, she was good. “Perfect.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.” Natasha picked up the small mirror and held it in front of her. The heavy metal mirror shook in her tender grasp. Staring at her reflection, Natasha blinked slowly before the left side of her face slumped like deflated soufflé. The mirror slid from her hand and clanged against the teak floor. “I don’t feel well.”
She held her head between her palms and
rocked back and forth, emitting a sound that was too high pitched for a moan and too quiet to be keening. Her long blonde hair fell around her face like a curtain as tremors shook her long-limbed frame.
Heart hammering in her ears, Drea dropped her tools and rushed to Natasha’s side. Her fingers barely brushed the other woman’s chiffon blouse before Natasha slid out of the chair, landing in a heap on the floor.
“Call 911!” Drea knelt and brushed the long strands of blonde hair out of Natasha’s face.