“Boss.” Bolton walks towards me. “The foster mother is inside with Fawn, Jasmine, and the twins.”
“And?” I ask.
Bolton frowns. “I don’t like that bitch one bit, Boss.”
I almost smile. “Explain.”
Then I hear an unfamiliar female voice coming from the dressing room. “Oh, Fawn, no. Nothing attractive about an underdeveloped woman. You don’t have the curves for a dress like this, Fawn. You look like a waif.”
Heat pulses through a vein along my forehead—I almost feel it protruding as I check my cuffs and stare at the closed door.
“Mr Butcher, can I get you?—”
I lift my finger to silence the saleslady, catching her long figure in my peripherals. Ignoring her, I take a step closer to the closed door. Listening.
“But…” Fawn’s soft, hesitant tone boils my Butcher blood. “This is f-from Paris. I’ve been wait?—”
“Well, you wasted your time.” There is a pause, and I can almost feel my little deer’s heart deflating. “Oh, honey. If you’d come to me earlier, you could have avoided wasting that man’s money. A woman knows these things, Fawn. A woman knows.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
fawn
Eleanor is shakingher head at the dress, but she’s really shaking her head at me.
This was such a bad idea.
She always said my pretty looks couldn’t fix what’s broken. That I’m nothing without them. Now, I’m not even pretty, but homely. What am I? Can she please fucking decide? I suppose what she sees, then and now, is just trash. Pretty. Not pretty. Homely. Unacceptable.
Disappointing.
Trash.
That’s all I’ll ever be to her.
She stares at me. Her mouth is a straight cut across her face, her hands waving in the air like she wants to swipe left on my dress, wipe it from her vision.
“Let’s be honest with ourselves, Fawn.” Her tone is flat—ugh—designed to make me feel like a disappointment before she even explains why.
She cups her chin with one poorly manicured hand, thenlets it drop. Her brows furrow in a way that’s supposed to display some kind of maternal concern but reminds me of Disgust, the character from Inside Out, looking at broccoli.
In the reflection, Jasmine sits behind me and appears ready to swing.
But I just stand there, eyelids fluttering as I look at my dress, forcing myself to stay strong. This is a test. I can show her I’m different, that I can be the right woman for a man like Clay Butcher. If I can’t convince her—her—of all people, who is cheering for me? Right? Isn’t that what the note said? Then what chance do I have of convincing the Family! Mafia bosses and their wives, born in pearls and chauffeured around in gold-plated carriages?
“You’re a homely girl,” she says.
Okey dokey…
I draw a shaky breath.
“The kind that looks best in simple material,” she adds. Her gaze travels up and down my body. “I think you should present what you are.”
Whatyou are.
Notwhoyou are.
“This—” Her hand flicks at my white hem, as if maybe she can adjust my DNA with a snap of her fingers— “this is a lie. You’re not this girl.”
