“Did I or did I not tell you to keep out of this unless I was with you?” His normally-husky voice had dropped into growl territory.
Shame made me defensive. “I went to a fuckinghair salon. Come on, man, no one’s gonna ice me in a place like that.”
He stood abruptly, kicking his chair back so hard I thought it would fall over, and then he paced away from me to stare out the one window in the whole place. Hands on his hips, he stayed there with his back to me.
“This isn’t gonna work,” he muttered at last. “If you can’t even follow a simple instruction like that—”
“I had an idea, I followed it up,” I argued. “It’s aWest Hollywood salonfor fuck’s sake. Nothing was gonna happen. Nothingdidhappen.”
He whirled around. “What happened was, you went in there like a fucking greenhorn, blabbing about your business and pushing for info. If those people working there are as happy to give up intel to anyone who asks as they were withyou, then all of LA is about to know you were there. Did you stop to think about how it might affect your sister? No, you didn’t,” he went on over the top of my confused stammer. “Ifsomeone’s holding her, andifthey hear that the brother’s started asking questions, they might think it’s time to cut their losses. Get rid of her.”
I felt all the blood drain out of my face, a receding tide running out of my cheeks, followed by a wave of cold all over that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
“I’m sorry,” Jack muttered after a moment, running his hands through his hair. “Sorry, kid, I didn’t—”
“Forget it.” I staggered to my feet, feeling the ground rock underneath me—or maybe it was my legs that weren’t working right. “I’ll…” I jerked my head toward the door, but I only got halfway there before Jack grabbed me and hugged me close.
“I shouldn’t have said that,” he said gruffly, pulling my head into his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
I only realized my eyes were streaming when his white shirt turned translucent. I wasn’t even reallycrying; my eyes were just two fucking faucets that had turned on of their own accord. But I wrapped my arms around his neck and let him hold me until the river ran dry.
I was more worried about Annie than I’d been willing to admit, even to myself. And hearing my worst fears put into blunt words had tipped me over the edge. Jack put me back in the seat and poured me out a cup of black coffee. I usually couldn’t drink coffee plain black, but I sucked it down greedily. It wasn’t anything like the high-end stuff from High Society Hair, but I needed the jolt.
I wasn’t astogetheras I’d thought I was, that much was clear.
Jack sat opposite, sipping at the coffee he’d poured for himself. He’d pushed up his sleeves and I couldn’t help staring at his forearms as they flexed with his movements. His shirt had a big wet patch on one side where I’d dripped all over him.
“I won’t do it again,” I snuffled. My nose was still stuffy. “I won’t go asking questions without letting you know.”
I expected him to keep pushing the point, but he just said, “Okay, Trouble. See that you don’t.”
“Iswear.”
“Moving on,” he said, putting his mug aside and pulling over his laptop. “Go over it again. I was getting way too mad at you there to listen for parts of it.”
He typed as I talked. “Okay,” he said in the end. “So Rochford was sniffing around asking questions, according to this hairdresser.”
“Stylist.”
“Yeah. Is this salon even the one Rochford goes to?”
“No,” I said slowly. “No, Roxy has her own stylist, paid for by the show, who does her hair at the studio.”
Jack shook his head. “Lotta bother over hair,” he said, typing in some more notes.
“But Roxy is Annie’s best friend,” I said weakly. “There’s no way…” Something else struck me. “But you know what? The weirdest thing about this whole conversation was the idea of Annie going blonde. Or really, changing her hair color at all.”
Jack quirked an eyebrow. “That’sthe weirdest thing?”
“Annie built hercareeron her hair. It’d be like if Marilyn Monroe suddenly went brunette. If Annie was talking about a change like that, either she had a role in mind, or something else was going on. Something big.Seriously,” I added, when Jack looked like he was trying not to smile. “You don’t get it, JJ. It’s a big deal.”
“If you say so.” He sat back in his chair and tapped a finger against the tabletop. “Let’s say the hair changewasfor a role,” he said after a minute. “Who’d know what role? Her agent?”
“Her manager,” I said at once. “Craig Wyatt.”
“Would he take your call?”
I blinked. “I mean, I guess? He used to rep me back in the day, too.”
