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34
Annie
The makeup woman was a genius. I'd never known my eyes could look like that. Huddled in my fluffy robe, watching the elegant black woman transform my face, I actually enjoyed myself. Her name was Evie, which she winced as she told me, so it might have been her real name.
Too bad. She was the first one I didn't want to take revenge on.
After Evie came the hairdresser who designed a romance novel's cover art design out of my hair, leaving bits of it curling down and bits of it cascading from invisible pins. My average mousy dark curls had grown during my captivity and she made the most of them.
The sun was long gone, the November night full of rainstorms and thunder. Sourly I thought it was impressive that Cole was rich enough to force the weather to perform on command. There was no way I could try my luck in the desert in this weather.
The seamstress was back to take care of any last minute problems. I still hadn't seen the dress in its entirety. It had been locked into a closet since last I'd seen the nasty little gnome of a woman.
The dress was beautiful.
What there was of it.
The skirt was long and apricot colored, sweeping down from my waist to the floor, raised just enough in the front to show the peep of satin stiletto-heeled pumps dyed one shade darker.
The top of the dress was a halter, looping around my neck and coming down over my breasts, the back completely open.
The top of the dress was made of completely sheer material. I stared in horror at myself in the mirror the gnome had finally opened up. I'd look less naked if I was completely topless than with the gossamer fabric leading the eye.
The material bunched at the clasp in the back, spreading downwards to surround each breast, so little folds and pleats both hid and revealed, randomly, and would change as I moved, breathed. Seethed.
Panic filled me. Cole had told me there'd be five other couples attending the party. That meant ten people in the dining room with me, sitting at dinner, looking at me.
I couldn't do this. This wasn't my fear the first time I had sex with Jesse or the fear I had the first time I walked into a buy as an undercover narc.
This was humiliation and fear and panic and everything else all jumbled together and no time left to find something else, no time to tell them I couldn't do this, but the seamstress was right here, her eye critically running over me and the dress as a unit.
"I can't wear this," I said in a rush, bending down to talk directly into her face. "Please. I can't go out there like this, it's too embarrassing, please help me, if I – "
She finally looked up from surveying the fall of the dress and met my eye and I knew instantly what she would say.
"He wants you unmarked for tonight. We're all to track your behavior and report." Her dark eyes held no expression.
I tried again, to reach her, this time on a different track, no less frantic. "Please. Please. If you can't fix the dress, if you can't give me something to wear over it, then please, please don't tell him about this."
I didn't realize I'd grabbed both of her arms until she looked up again, this time from my hands to my face. What I saw this time wasn't a lack of emotion but a pleasure. "Every word," she said. "Every action. And you might want to let go of me."
I did. I let go and I stepped back. My hands went up to my chest, hovering, and then my arms crossed over it.
"Don't be stupid," she said. She took one last walk around me as if I were nothing more than a mannequin, then she nodded to herself, packed up her stuff, and left.
I sat waiting for Cole to come fetch me.
"You look beautiful tonight," he told me as he entered the cell.
I stood waiting, not daring to crush the back of the dress. My hands still hovered, uncertain what to do with themselves.
"I hear there's been some trouble."
I blew out a sigh, still keyed up, trembling.
"Not speaking? That's fine. You'll find you have little to say at the party." He surveyed me again. "If you cover up, you'll regret it."
I had no doubt as to what that meant.
