She went inside as I carefully placed my papers in a neat stack by the chair and stood, smoothing my hair and clothes. I opened the piazza door and was waiting on the steps as he approached, wondering what it was that was different about him. For once I wished I were wearing my glasses so I could read his expression instead of being left to wonder why his footsteps seemed to slow when he spotted me.
“Mellie,” he said, sounding more surprised than excited. He came up the steps to stand beside me, dropping his bag on the floor and sweeping me up in a tight embrace. “I missed you so much,” he said in my hair, almost making me forget the moment of worry I’d felt just seconds before.
“Me, too,” I said, relaxing into his arms and allowing the relief of him being back home to sweep through me.
He pulled back and looked at me, and I saw lines under his eyes I hadn’t noticed before. “You feeling all right?” I asked.
“Just tired. It’s been a long few days.”
“It has. Did you find out anything new from the housekeeper?”
He embraced me again and I had the stray thought that he did it to avoid meeting my eyes. “A little bit. She wanted to give Jayne the toaster and chair she took from the Pinckneys’ house after they abandoned it because she still feels guilty. I did my best to set her mind to rest. And no, Miami meant nothing to her.”
I pulled back to look into his eyes, but he was already reaching for his bag. “I’ll tell you all about it later. But first I really need a long, hot shower and something to eat.”
I watched him head toward the front door and then pause. “Is Jayne home?”
“Yes. Why?”
Jack smiled. “Because I wanted to know if it was safe to walk around naked after my shower. I don’t want to scare her.”
He bent down to give me one of his mind-emptying kisses that left me with a stupid smile on my face and only a vague memory of what we’d been talking about. I was still smiling as he made his way into the house, the door shutting behind him, my smile doing nothing to convince me that there wasn’t something Jack wasn’t telling me.
I sat in between my mother and Jayne at one of the makeup counters at Cos Bar on King Street, trying on makeup for the book-launch party the following evening. Jayne and I were, anyway. My mother was just trying on makeup for fun, much to the joy of the employee working with us. Ginette’s flawless skin was the perfect canvas for makeup, and her years as an opera singer had taught her not to be afraid of looking dramatic—something she was trying to share with Jayne and me with mixed results.
I hadn’t gone with my mother and Jayne to look for a dress, if only to prove that I wasn’t petty or jealous and didn’t care if they selected a dress that was prettier than mine. Jayne was the nanny and was going with Thomas Riley as her date. They actually made a very cute couple, and I thought they might even have a future together if Jayne could just learn to speak like a normal person when she was with him.
I hadn’t seen her dress, but I was sure it was lovely, since my mother had helped pick it out, which, if I was forced to admit, hurt a little. Maybe not having had a mother for most of my life made me feel a little possessive. Jayne had grown up without any parents, but at least she hadn’t known what she was missing. I had, and had known the pain of it being snatched away from me.
It was these guilty thoughts that made me agree to invite Jayne to pick out makeup for the big night, despite my protests that I shouldn’t wear anything except a thick green moisturizing mask to go with my hair that I was planning to wear in pink curlers.
“All three of you have the most amazing eyelashes,” Sultana, the beautiful woman with perfect skin and luminous eyes on the other side of the counter, said as she leaned in again with a mascara wand. “This one is a little more expensive, but it will give you the dramatic look you want with your smoky eye.”
“A smoky eye? Won’t that make them water?” Jayne asked. I shot her a look to see if she was serious. Apparently, she was.
“Let me show you,” my mother said, picking up the sample of eye shadows that Sultana had been playing with. With expert precision, Ginette began covering Jayne’s eyelids with color. “We’re so lucky to all have deep-set eyes—it makes eye shadow application so much easier and so much fun. We can do tons of things that other girls can’t because we have a much larger area to work with.”
Sultana handed her a wand of black liquid liner and I watched as my mother perfected a cat’s-eye on Jayne. Ginette picked up a hand mirror and showed her. “See? You almost look like someone else entirely—which is sort of the point of dressing up and going to a party, isn’t it? It’s like preparing for your part and your moment onstage.”
She smiled at Jayne, but there was something in her expression as she regarded the younger woman. “What’s your natural hair color, Jayne?”
“Dark brown,” Jayne said with a little hesitation. She looked around for something to compare it to, finally settling on my hair. “Like Melanie’s—but maybe a bit darker.”