“You going to answer that?”’ Ruby asked. She was wiping the glass counter, bringing it to the mirror shine that Reid’s required.
Marley stared at her screen. “It’s Jacqueline.”
Ruby raised a brow. “So?”
She hesitated another second. Jacqueline had barely said a word to Marley since she’d reluctantly approved her time off. And now the surgery was a few days away. Maybe she discovered Marley was having breast surgery and was angry that it was a nonessential procedure. Even though she was having a mastectomy, not a breast augmentation.
Or was Jacqueline going to yell at Marley for Nikhil’s celery-colored suit?
She finally accepted the call. “Marley Kamal speaking.”
“Marley, you are needed at the Ironis press junket in the morning. Bring some men’s shirts in the client’s size… They are asking for jewel tones and pastels.” Jacqueline named a downtown hotel.
Marley frowned. Why was she being summoned back to Nikhil? “I have a few customer appointments tomorrow. Can we send the shirts by courier?”
“No. They are asking for you all day. We’ll pay your average daily commission; plus, they’re including a generous per diem. Another consultant can help your customers here.” Jaqueline’s tone was crystal clear. Marley didn’t have a choice—shehadto go to this press junket.
“Okay. I’ll pick out some pieces.”
Marley took an Uber to the hotel in the morning, laying the garment bag of clothes on the seat next to her. She wasn’t sure how she felt about this change of plans. She’d assumed that she wouldn’t ever see Nikhil again. That the fact that she’d styled him for his big announcement would be a short anecdote she’d bring up years from now when she saw one of his movies or saw pictures of him on the Met Gala red carpet.
She’d given in to temptation and looked him up on social media last night, and apparently, the reaction to his announcement was… not good. As expected, many blamed “political correctness” for the decision to cast a nonwhite actor as Simon DeSouza, but the biggest surprise was that he was called grumpy, surly, and completely uncharismatic. The green suit was a hit, at least.
It didn’t make sense. Nikhil was, and always had been, one of the most charismatic people Marley knew. He wasfunny. He could be incredibly charming. He had a boyish appeal, as well as a trusting, down-to-earth vibe. At least he used to be all those things. Marley knew he was going through a rough time now, but she assumed he’d be able to put on the charm again when necessary. Hell, she knew he was more than capable ofpretendingto be charming.
When Marley got to the King Street hotel, she asked for Lydia at the front desk and was sent to the ninth floor. A white man met her outside the elevator.
“Ms. Kamal?” he asked. She nodded, so he took her to a room a few doors away. Marley clutched the Reid’s garment bag in one hand and her leather tote in the other. She was in her heels again, and it was hard to walk on this plush hotel carpeting. The room she was guided to looked like a regular hotel suite, only with no beds and some extra chairs. It was filled with people, some on phones, some talking to each other. No one looked at Marley when she walked in.
Eventually, a white woman with long blond hair noticed her. Marley remembered her—Kaelyn, the publicist. “Lydia, that shop girl is here,” she said loudly, then pointed to the Reid’s bag in Marley’s hand. “There’s an ironing board near the window. I assume the shirts will need to be pressed?”
Marley nodded. She could press a shirt, of course. But she expected someone would pick one for Nikhil to wear first. She maneuvered toward the ironing board and picked what she thought would look best on him—a deep-teal shirt covered with tiny magenta flowers—and started pressing the creases out of it.
“He cannot wear that,” a woman behind Marley said. Marley turned to see another white woman, this one wearing an impeccably tailored tweed suit—either a Ralph Lauren or Max Mara. She looked over to someone on the other side of the room. “I thought we said gray or black.”
Lydia came in then from an open door. Finally, a familiar face. Not friendly, but familiar.
“The public responded well to the softer look yesterday,” Lydia said.
“The public also thought he was a mute diversity hire,” the woman responded.
Marley did not like this tweed woman. She continued to press the shirt. It had an extremely high thread count, was softer than butter, and would bring out the green in Nikhil’s brown eyes.
“Why is Mahreen ironing?” That was Nikhil. Finally. Not that she’d been aching to see the man or anything, but as a hired stylist, she shouldseethe person she’d been hired to style, right?
Marley turned to look at him. Which may have been a mistake. Nikhil wasn’t topless, but he might as well have been. He was in a black sleeveless undershirt. It was… snug. Stretched over chiseled pectoral muscles. The outline of a six-pack was visible. And his arms… goodness. There was even a tattoo on his warm brown skin… a vaguely Indian design that looked a bit like a lotus. Marley’s mouth went dry, and she nearly dropped the iron. She quickly looked back at the shirt and focused on pressing out a crease on the sleeve.
“It’s Marley!” she reminded him. “And I’m ironing because you can’t wear a wrinkled shirt.”
He made a sound that resembled a growl. No wonder the media had called him a grump. Did he reallygrowlat his team? He was clean-shaven, like the pictures she’d seen from Comicon. She preferred this to the mountain-man look from a couple of weeks ago.
“The wardrobe assistant can iron, can’t they?” Nikhil asked.
There was a wardrobe assistant? Why was Marley here, then? A man Marley hadn’t seen before suddenly appeared and took the iron out of her hand. “I’ll take over from here.” He motioned Marley away from the ironing board.
A few people gathered around them to analyze the shirts Marley brought, while someone else grabbed Nikhil and started spraying his hair with something. These people were… a lot. No wonder Nikhil was having a nervous breakdown.Not my circus, not my monkeys, Marley reminded herself.
The mystery ironing man made quick work of the flowered shirt and handed it to Nikhil. Nikhil took Marley’s hand. “Come on, stylist.Styleme.” He pulled her into the adjoining room through the open door.
