I laugh under my breath and look away. Gigi Collins, everyone. Chairwoman, socialite, and school board president.
She puffs my sleeves, and then presses a hand to my stomach. “Hmm.”
“What?”
She purses her lips and walks around me, inspecting. “I was going to have her take it down to a four, but a six is already a squeeze, isn’t it?”
Heat spreads down my skin, and I clench my jaw.
Her phone rings from her bag on the chair, and she heads for it, waving me off. “We’ll leave it, I guess.”
Picking up her bag, she digs out her phone and answers it, walking past me and leaving the room.
I rub my eyes, listening to her chatter out in the waiting area about whether or not we should have a crêpe station for my school’s Easter brunch in two months.
Looking up, I stare at my huge skirt in the mirror, bored with this entire look that’ll live forever and come back to haunt the shit out of me in years to come.
I don’t want my daughter to laugh when she sees pictures.
I lift up the skirt, cringing at the white stockings and fugly satin heels, and then I spin, taking in the back of my gown and the obnoxious corset lacing that should really be buttons instead.
God, I should’ve taken that Valium. Why the hell do I want to make her happy when she’s out to hurt my feelings like this?
But I know why. In a few months, I’ll be off to college. Away from everything. Graduating. Gone.
Everyone will be leaving. Everyone…
Standing straight and tall, I face the mirrors again, but then a door slams shut somewhere in the shop, and I freeze.
It wasn’t the front door. That door has a bell over it. This was the rear one—heavy and thick—the click of the latch so loud I can hear it from here.
My heart beats faster, and in a moment, her eyes on my back warm my skin.
Everyone…
I look up, meeting Olivia Jaeger’s eyes as she leans against the archway leading into the dressing room, staring at me.
And all of a sudden, my skin is too hot.
She holds canvas bags stuffed with tulle and ribbon, her aviators sitting on top of her head as she clearly struggles to hold back her amusement.
Her shift ended over an hour ago. I thought she was gone for the night.
“Come here,” I tell her.
She loses the bags and comes around my front, facing me. I gaze down at my classmate, my teammate, and the only thing I ever look forward to anymore.
“Pin the hem,” I order her. “It’s still dragging, so bring it up another quarter of an inch.”
Hands on her hips, she hesitates like it’s a choice, and then drops to her knees, pulling a pin off the cushion secured to her wrist.
But before she grabs the dress, I pull it away from her. “Wash your hands first.”
I shake my head as she shoots me a look. I mean, really. If she’s learned anything crossing the tracks into St. Carmen every day to attend one of the most prestigious schools in the state the past three-and-a-half years, it should be some common sense. They certainly teach that at Marymount.
Rising, she walks over to the round table and pulls a wipe out of the package, cleaning her fingers. The Jaegers were born with grease under their nails, so better to be safe than sorry.
In addition to mowing the lawns and trimming the hedges of St. Carmen, her brothers also partially own a dump of a restaurant in their neck of the woods, sell drugs, fix cars and motorcycles, and dabble in loan-sharking.
Okay, maybe the ‘sell drugs’ part is only a rumor. The whole family is sketchy, though. Especially with the power they wield as the unofficial patrons of Sanoa Bay, their hidden little community in the swamps.
Tryst Six, they’re called. There are six siblings, but I have no idea where the Tryst part comes from. They even have an adorable little logo. Insert eye roll.
Approaching me again, she drops down, blowing the lock of hair that came loose from her ponytail out of her face, and folds the hem, pinning it up.
The hair falls back in her face, and my fingers tap my leg, fighting the urge to move the lock behind her ear for her.
“Hurry up,” I tell her.
I tip my head back and smooth my own hair into a fist high on the top of my head, twirling it into a bun and holding it there.