Finally, Jane relaxed and let out a sigh.
Getting her makeup done was going to be a dream. She’d never had it done before and—
A second team arrived.
They all had white coats on.
A terrifying hush came over the room.
“She a virgin?” One asked in a cheerful voice.
All eyes fell to her.
“No,” Jane said in a quiet voice.
“Waxing virgin,” Another man clarified, eying her up and down with excitement.
“Waxing? What do you mean, waxing?”
Several people chuckled and then her real hell began.
She was waxed within an inch of her life; at one point tears welled in her eyes. When she complained the esthetician simply held her down and said, “You’ll be fine.”
“The hell I will!” she roared.
“We’ve got a screamer,” the esthetician said through clenched teeth as another woman entered the living room. She helped to hold down Jane’s legs.
“Is this legal?” Jane exclaimed.
“Don’t make us bring the duct tape. I’ve done it before. I don’t want to have to resort to it again.” The woman had a terrifying eyebrow arch that just wouldn’t quit.
And she was only half done.
The last thing she needed, Jane concluded, was to be hairy on one side of her body and smooth on the other.
The anticipation was the worst part. She jumped every time the sugar wax ball thingy was applied, mainly because every time it was spread on her skin it tugged hair and then tugged again.
Two tugs.
So help her God, she was going to die on the waxing table.
She shivered as another tug nearly sent her into a screaming fit. Women did this? And paid actual money for it?
“Don’t move unless you want the sculpting and shading to be off,” the woman doing her makeup snapped once she was off the waxing table and in the makeup chair.
Was everyone grumpy in the beauty industry? Was that a thing?
Just as she was relaxing again, a brush tugged at her head. “We’re running out of time. I need to start in on this…mess.”
The lady applying her makeup snorted. “Good luck with that.”
“Hey!” Jane said, and another hard tug had her eyes watering.
“It’s a lot of hair.” The man ran the brush from root to tip. “But silver lining, it’s really healthy.”
“I don’t dye it,” Jane said proudly.
“Oh honey, we know.” The makeup artist smiled. “It’s virgin hair. I can spot it a mile away.”
“Is—is that bad?” Jane self-consciously tugged a few strands.
The makeup artist laughed loudly. “No, it just means no hair stylist is going to want to be your first… Too much pressure.” She scrunched up her nose. “Now, slump your shoulders again and I’m putting you in the harness.”
“There’s a harness?” Jane squeaked.
The makeup artist nodded. “It’s in my trunk.”
“Okay, then.” Jane held as straight and still as she could, hardly breathing as the woman did her makeup and the mean, demon-possessed man brushed out her hair.
It was going to be a really long afternoon.
*
When Bentley said he’d pick her up at six, what he’d really meant was that he was going to arrive at her house around five-thirty, bring his own champagne, pour himself a glass or two, and then yell at the makeup artist for making her look too beautiful.
He was just being Bentley. Which was a thing in and of itself. The more time she spent with him the more he felt like a brother. A really good-looking annoying older brother who liked to drink and hit on every female he saw.
She had no way of even knowing what she looked like. The team had refused to let her see a mirror. Satan’s minions simply said that they were under strict instructions to keep her away from every shiny surface.
Which of course meant that she had three of the squad, the guy included, helping her into her dress.
Nothing about her body was left to the imagination.
Nothing.
Not one small bit.
Her shame was complete when Doug, the hairstylist, was pulling at the skirt of her dress and wanted to make sure that the lining was pulled tight enough so it didn’t wrinkle.
Why did it matter?
She’d actually asked that out loud and gained nothing but shocked silence.
They weren’t human, these people. They seemed to express emotion only toward inanimate objects: the curling iron, for example. Doug went on and on about its technology for at least a half hour while her makeup artist Leah gasped and moaned like she was…well, like she was having a sexual experience or something.
Doug was lucky to still have a head.
Considering it had been between her thighs about ten minutes earlier, inspecting.
When she’d said something about him looking in places he shouldn’t look he very loudly told her she had the wrong equipment to attract him.
“Not that I don’t appreciate the view.” He slapped her thigh, making her shame complete.