She would rather be in a roomful of snakes. “No problem,” she said tightly. “I’ll be fine.” She’d been alone on mountaintops in hostile territory and survived. She could do this. Of course, on the mountaintop she’d had a gun.
She pressed her lips together when Zach actually smiled at her and walked away, leaving her in the torture house of beads and baubles. Damn him.
She fought against a feeling of helplessness. She didn’t know what to do or what to buy. She didn’t even know exactly what size she would wear in this expensive boutique. Were designer clothes bigger or smaller or the same? She vaguely recalled overhearing a conversation on the subject once, years before, but she couldn’t remember the details. She hadn’t been interested.
She circled one of the larger racks, trying to gather her courage. Thousands, millions, of women bought clothes every day. How hard could it be?
She focused on the clothing. There were mostly dresses. She saw a couple of pants outfits but didn’t think that was what Zach had in mind. She stared at the different fabrics, some soft, some beaded, some sequined, some smooth. There were too many choices.
Finally she thrust her hand in and grabbed a dress. It looked short, maybe too short. It had broad, padded shoulders, a deep neckline and lots of hanging beads. What she liked most was the color. A pale cream at the top, darkening to the color of fire at the bottom, as if the garment were a flicker of flame. She walked to the three-way mirror and held the dress up to herself.
Her eyes changed to a muddy shade of gray. All the color left her face, and her mouth looked small and pinched. She stared in astonishment, then put the dress out to one side. The color returned to her face, and her eyes were once again a pleasing shade of hazel. With the dress close to her face, she looked as if she were coming down with malaria. Without it she was fine.
“Obviously not my best color,” she said softly, and put the dress back. She felt oddly pleased, as if she’d just made an amazing discovery.
She reached for another garment. This was a two-piece outfit, a tapestry jacket with a long, soft, flowing purple skirt. Pretty, just as Zach had requested.
She returned to the mirror and held it up to her face. Her eyes deepened to blue, and her skin took on a luminous sheen. “Perfect,” she said, and glanced around for a dressing room.
Several gilded doors stood at the far end of the room. Jamie approached them cautiously, bending over to make sure one was empty before pulling on the handle.
The dressing room was nearly as large as their bedroom back at the hotel. There were mirrors on three walls, a small vanity, a wing chair and a long rod for the clothing. She hung her single dress there and tried not to think about having to go out and find something else. Surely this was going to work. Then she could pay for it and leave.
She quickly stripped down to her bra and panties. The plain cotton undergarments looked out of place in the elegant surroundings. She reached for the skirt and stepped into it. The button at her waist was a little loose. Maybe she needed a smaller size. She glanced in the mirror and smiled.
The filmy skirt fluttered around her legs like Monet’s water lilies come to life. The beautiful fabric made her feel special, feminine even. She looked at the hem falling halfway down her calves. What kind of shoes would she wear with this?
She didn’t have a clue, so she pushed the question aside and shrugged into the tapestry jacket. It was also too loose. She buttoned it up the front and stared at her reflection. She looked boxy and formless in the thick jacket. Her head seemed to shrink, and she felt old.
“It’s the fit,” she said, frustrated that something so pretty on the hanger would look so ugly on her. She reached behind her and grabbed a handful of fabric, pulling the jacket tighter in front. It still looked bad.
She sank into the chair and dropped her head into her hands. She couldn’t do this. She just couldn’t do it. She didn’t know how to shop or buy. She could spot jeans that would fit from halfway across a store, but real clothes were beyond her. She would have to tell Zach she was hopeless.
Her eyes began to burn, but she blinked the sensation away. This was a really stupid thing to cry about.
There was a knock at the door. “Jamie, it’s Monique. Your young man suggested I check on you. How is everything?”
She opened her mouth to lie but instead blurted out the truth. “Horrible. I look like a geek.”
Monique opened the door and stepped inside with a surprisingly kind smile. “No geeks are allowed in the store. Didn’t you see the sign? Only beautiful women. If they aren’t beautiful when they come in, they’re beautiful when they leave.”
She motioned for Jamie to stand up, then walked around her in a slow circle. “This is all wrong for you.”
“I know.”
Monique wasn’t listening. “Very nice color, but the style, the shape. It hides what you should flaunt. This-” she touched the thick sleeve “-this is for the romantic type. The woman who is all soft lines and ruffles. Not you. Take off the dress and let me see what we’re working with.”
Jamie undressed quickly. Monique studied her for a second and sighed. “You work out, don’t you? You’re in fabulous shape. Flaunt it while you still have it.” She patted her own narrow hips. “Time and gravity are not our friends. Stay right here.”
She threw the tapestry jacket and filmy skirt over her arm and disappeared. Less than a minute later, she was back with a little black dress-little being the key word. It didn’t look big enough to fit a dress-up doll, let alone a grown woman.
“It’s too small,” Jamie said.
“It stretches,” Monique told her. “Trust me.”
She set the dress on the hook, then tossed Jamie a black teddy in silk. “The key to a good fit is the right foundation.”
Jamie stared at the teddy. It had an underwire bra built in that looked more like scraps of silk cloth than actual support. But Monique was the expert.
Jamie put on the teddy. It was a low cut, as she expected. The silk came up over her nipples and stopped. The design was different than she was used to, forcing her breasts together and up, giving her more cleavage than was legal. So much for not having support. The rest of the undergarment slipped over her torso like a lover’s touch.
“Are you sure about this?” Jamie stroked the soft fabric. It felt positively decadent. She loved it!
Monique just smiled.
Next came the dress. She pulled it on over her head. The stretch material clung to her like a wet shower curtain. She pulled the hem down and found it ended a good eight inches above her knees.
Monique stepped behind her and pulled up the zipper, then smoothed her hair down the center of her back. “You see. It’s perfect.”
Jamie stared at her reflection, not quite willing to believe what she saw.
The dress hugged every curve. She looked like a model, all long legs and cleavage. Her breasts threatened to spill out of the heart-shaped neckline. The black lace was see-through on her arms, but lined everywhere else. She looked like someone other people would turn to stare at.
“I’ll take it,” she said without thinking, then giggled.
“I thought you might. Do you have shoes?”
Jamie shook her head. “I don’t have stockings, either.”
Monique asked her shoe size and disappeared for a few minutes. Jamie stared at her reflection some more, unable to believe she’d actually found a dress she liked and that liked her. She turned around, admiring herself from every angle. She looked great and she couldn’t stop grinning like a fool.
When Monique returned, she had several packages of panty hose and three boxes of shoes. She set them in the chair. “These are what I would usually give customers to wear,” she said, pulling out black lace pumps with four-inch heels.
“No way.”
“That’s what I thought.” She opened the second box. These were also lace, but a two-inch heel. “Could you survive in these?”