That bounced right off him. “Do you care at all how you look?”
“Not much.”
He stopped punishing the bag and regarded her critically. “You’ve worn the same dress every time you’ve been in the club.”
“Said the man in cowboy boots.”
“It’s my trademark,” he retorted. “Go buy some new clothes. You’re making the place look bad.”
She watched a rivulet of sweat roll down his neck. He smelled like good sweat, the healthy smell of a guy who always wore clean clothes to the gym. Until this moment, she hadn’t realized there was such a thing as a good sweat smell. Now she knew, and she wished she didn’t because thinking about anything that had to do with his body was a distraction she couldn’t afford. “New clothes aren’t in my budget.”
He returned to the bag. “Send me the bill. You need to look like you fit in.”
He had a point, but still… “I’m not buying anything uncomfortable.”
“By that, I assume you mean anything that looks decent? Yeah, that’d be a real deal breaker.”
“Try being female for a while. Then you can talk.”
Coop couldn’t get used to it. No conversation was ever straightforward with her. Abandoning the bag, he grabbed a scuffed black iron kettlebell and crouched down, extending the weight in front of him and trying to ignore her. He felt the strain in his delts, the hard pull in his thighs. He’d always liked brutal workouts, but he’d never needed them like he did now, when he was trapped at Spiral night after night.
Not trapped. He loved the energy of the club, the challenge of once again proving himself. He just wasn’t used to spending so many hours inside.
He fought the urge to switch hands by glaring at Sherlock Holmes. She wasn’t so impervious to fashion that she’d done up the top button of her blouse. Too bad she hadn’t opened the next one.
His arm began to spasm. A bead of sweat dripped into his eye. He changed hands. “I’m going shopping with you.” He yelled it out, but the music blaring from the speaker over his head abruptly ended so that his voice echoed off the cinder block walls. A White Sox pitcher on the next mat looked over at him. So did Piper, staring at him with those big blue eyes that didn’t miss a thing. Had he really just volunteered to go clothes shopping with a woman?
“Goody,” she said, with a snide expression he’d make damn sure he never saw on her face once he got her naked. “Let’s get manis and pedis, while we’re at it. And invite our girlfriends.”
She killed him with that mouth of hers, but he roped in a smile and matched her sarcasm with cool. “I don’t trust your judgment.”
“But you trust your own?”
“I know what I like.”
“I’m sure you do, but pasties and a G-string don’t seem all that appropriate for work.”
She was killing him and doing it so gleefully.
He came up with a sneer. “I’m busy until next week. Try to keep it together until then. I’ll meet your wise ass at BellaLana. It’s on Oak Street.”
That got a satisfying rile out of her. “I’m not shopping on Oak Street! Do you have any idea what clothes cost in those stores?”
“Pocket change.”
That made her blood boil, as he’d known it would. He lowered the kettlebell. “Get the hell out of here so I can finish my workout.” And smack himself in the head a couple of times for letting her get to him.
Still, his offer wasn’t entirely irrational. Sherlock had a habit of being everywhere at once when she was in the club, and he liked knowing another set of eyes was looking out for his interests-a set of eyes he could absolutely trust. You could say a lot of negative things about Sherlock-lack of deference to her employer being number one-but that woman was serious about her ethics.
Not that he intended to tell her how valuable she was proving to be. Just as he didn’t intend to tell her what he was going to do to her once he got her in bed.
The next night, Piper spotted Dell, one of the bouncers, near the bar. He was a blond surfer type with a tat of a jaguar running up the side of his neck. He’d had a short-lived career with the Bears and was especially popular with the female customers-so popular that he seemed oblivious to anything else that might be happening in the club.
She couldn’t stand it any longer. She pulled him away from his admirers with the excuse that she wanted to interview him for a Web site profile. Instead, she pointed out a group crowding Coop on the other side of the room. “Those women with Coop are drunk and getting obnoxious. That redhead especially. She’s hanging all over him. Maybe you could go over and distract her so he has some room?”
Dell looked down at her as if she were a gnat to be crushed. “You telling me how to do my job?”
“Yeah, she’s getting good at that.” Jonah had come up behind them, and the two men, all bulging muscle and sour belligerence, formed a wall between her and the rest of the room.
“Look, guys, I’m just suggesting you watch Coop a little more closely.”
Jonah smirked. “And I’m suggesting you mind your own fucking business. What is that, anyway? Sending out cute little tweets and posting pretty pictures?”
The bouncers weren’t her responsibility, and she should have kept her mouth shut, but when had she ever? “Thanks for the reminder. I’ve got a sweet one of you making kissy-faces in the mirror.”
Yep, she knew how to get along with her coworkers, all right.
Over the next few days, she drove the minor princesses and their servants shopping as part of a five-car, sometimes six-car motorcade that included at least two vans to transport their mountain of purchases back to the hotel, everything paid for in cash. But instead of envy, Piper began to feel pity, especially for the teenage miniprincesses. Sometimes she saw the identical yearning in their eyes that she’d seen in Faiza’s, a yearning that couldn’t be satisfied with a dozen trips to the Apple store. A yearning to walk unaccompanied along the sidewalk with the same carefree strides as the American girls they watched through the darkened windows of their SUVs.
On the day of her dreaded dress-shopping appointment, Princess K’s sister took forever at her facialist, which made Piper ten minutes late arriving at BellaLana, where Coop was leaning against a jewelry case and chatting comfortably with the female staff. If Piper had been prone to hives, one look at the racks of expensive clothes on display would have given them to her.
The black, white, and silver decor gave the place an industrial, op art, fin de siècle vibe-both luxurious and somehow condescending, as if daring its customers not to find it chic. Of all the things she didn’t want to be wearing right now, her chauffeur’s uniform was at the top of her list, especially since she’d sweated out the armpits under her suit jacket as she’d run from the parking lot.
Coop looked up. His lips formed a smile, but his eyes told her he’d noted the fact that she’d once again kept him waiting. The saleswomen regarded her with various degrees of incredulity, unable to believe someone so odd-looking could be with Chicago’s most eligible bachelor.
“Ladies, this is Piper,” Coop said. “She’s given up her career as a mortician, but she’s having a hard time breaking old fashion habits.”
Piper reined in a laugh.
“You’ve come to the right place,” an überstylish redhead said. “Working as a mortician must have been super depressing.”
“Not so much as you’d think,” Piper said. “That’s how I met Coop. Burying the ashes of his career.”
Coop snorted. The redheaded saleswoman clearly recognized she was in over her head and hustled Piper toward a dressing room.
“Nothing too crazy,” Coop called out. “She’s got enough of that going on in her head.”