‘Roan,’ Chastity scoffs. ‘The man is ginger. An ugly carrot-top.’
‘With a fiery crotch to match.’ I snigger, covering my mouth with my hand.
‘The only thing outstanding about the area,’ she affirms with a quirk of her brow.
So I might’ve told her about that over wine. Okay, crying angry tears and drunk off my ass. Let’s just say that average, as a description, is an overstatement.
‘You deserve better thanis it in yet,so coming back to the topic of hard... You need hard loving, and that’s what you get from me. But you also need the other kind of hard. The kind I can’t give you.’
‘Is that some kind of riddle? Because I don’t really—’
‘Dick, darling,’ she says, cutting in. ‘You need a man with a hard dick. An alpha—the absolute opposite of the kind of man you fell for.’ While I might suggest she’s overstepping, I don’t. Because she already did that when she gifted me a dildo.
Patting my hand, she rises from the bed and makes her way back to her dressing table mirror. ‘The reason we’re going tonight is that a wedding hookup is the perfect scenario. It’s practically a singles tradition.’
‘You have the weirdest ideas.’
Turning her head over her shoulder with the poise of a debutant, she asks, ‘Like starting a porn company?’
‘Women-centric adult entertainment, thank you very much. And no, that seems to have been a fantastic idea.’ Financially, at least.
‘And I’m full of them,’ she replies, twirling to face me again. ‘And this one is much better than my first.’
‘The look on your face has me worried. Should I be worried?’
‘Well, my original plan was—and still possibly is, especially if you’re absolutely against tonight—that I could set you up with one of the boys.’
‘Boys?’ I repeat, frowning back at her. ‘You mean, with one of the p—adult actors?’ I ask, quickly catching my mistake.
‘The men who work for me all seem to know what they’re doing in that department. And I’ve seen the way one or two of them look at you.’ She shrugs lightly, as though this conversation is nothing. As though she was offering me a selection of bonbons and not men. ‘And why wouldn’t they?’ she asks the room at large. ‘You’re a total babe even if you have become a bit of a slob.’
‘A slob!’ I repeat, incredulous.
‘Did that hit a nerve?’ she asks with a slight wince.
‘Well, yes!’
‘Good,’ she adds in a firmer tone. ‘You are a bit of a mess. You used to be obsessed with makeup, and now you barely even moisturise.’
‘So you thought you’d ask a porn star to pity fuck me?’ I whisper-hiss. I might shout but for the fact that Max is downstairs, and I could do without his input.
‘How ridiculous,’ she retorts. ‘You’re being deliberately obtuse. You are gorgeous, makeup or not. I’m just worried you’ve lost a littlejoie de vivre. Your mojo.’
‘I know whatjoie de vivremeans!’ Sort of. And I’m still not banging a porn star. ‘My God, this wedding is looking more and more attractive by the second.’
‘Good—perfect, in fact.’
‘Going to a wedding doesn’t mean I’m agreeing to anything else.’
‘Darling, think about it. If you visit a bad restaurant, it doesn’t put you off food forever. You just choose another.’ Jumping up from her stool, she pulls my reluctant form from the bed and leads me to the seat she just vacated. ‘What is it you Americans say? You need to get back on the horse that threw you?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Well, tonight, you’re getting a whole new ride.’
I wonder if I was ever as brave as she is. Ever as sure about anything,I think, as I open my makeup bag when, leaning over my shoulder, Chas swipes the Charlotte Tilbury lipstick out of my hand.
‘Bond Girl,’ she murmurs, reading from the base of the golden tube. ‘There’s an idea. Let’s give you a pseudonym tonight... one with a Bond girl theme. You can be Holly Goodhead. That is, assuming you give good—’
