After breakfast, Rosie called Melissa the corporate lawyer across the hall and yanked me to her door, chatting me up and making me laugh. Rosie was the best.
She knocked on Melissa’s door a few times and quicker than I would have thought, Melissa pulled the door open with flourish.
“Welcome!” she said, making way for us to pass.
“Melissa,” Rosie said, dragging me through the foyer and main hall to the main living room, “this is Jupiter!”
I took the hand Melissa stuck out to me. “Hello!” she said. “So nice to meet you.”
“It’s a pleasure,” I told her, returning the pleasantry.
Melissa was my height with gold hair cut at the shoulder. She wore it wavy and ultra chic. It made me want to bolt out the door to the nearest hairstylist.
“I hear Kai, and I quote, left you up the creek with no paddle?”
I laughed. “Yes, he did.”
“Come on,” she said playfully.
She and Rosie walked into the main hall and I followed. Melissa’s house was similar to the Brandons’ floor plan, but she decorated it so eclectically it felt different. I followed her into the master and around a corner, through a kick-ass bathroom that would have been my favorite room in the house, if it had been mine, and into a giant walk-in closet.
My eyes followed rows and rows of expensive-looking clothing and shoes and suddenly I wondered what the hell cases Melissa fought. She didn’t look any older than twenty-eight or so, and I thought she must have come out swinging after college. It damn near made me whoop with pride. She awakened a rivalry in me, a healthy kind of contest. Success looks good on women, I thought.
“You like clothes?” Melissa asked.
“I like clothes just fine,” I admitted, “but you know what really tickles my pickle?”
“What’s that?” Rosie asked, rummaging through Melissa’s closet.
“Textures. I’m a touchy-feely kinda gal.”
“Oh my God!” Melissa yelled. My eyes blew wide. “I know the perfect outfit for you then.” She ran to one corner of her closet. “I bought it about a month ago in New York while arguing a case. No, after I won a case.” She pulled out a zippered bag and hung it on a hook to unzip it. As she did, she said, “It’s by Max Gengos. It’s so unconventional I knew I couldn’t really wear it anywhere often, but I couldn’t help myself.”
She took a silky, creamy white skirt and top from the bag and held them up in front of me, shoving me in front of her floor-length mirror. Rosie and Melissa stood beside me, trying to imagine what I would look like in it, I guessed.
“Oh my God, it’s perfect,” Melissa said.
I dragged the fabric through my hands and resisted the urge to moan. It was a heavenly feeling. My fingers caught a tag at the end of a sleeve.
“Melissa, you haven’t worn this yet?”
“Oh not yet, hadn’t found an occasion to. Why?” she said, cocking her head to look at the tag.
It was a seventeen-hundred-dollar outfit.
“Melissa, I can’t wear this! Don’t get me wrong, it’s beautiful, really beautiful, but I can’t wear something this expensive, especially if you haven’t worn it yet.”
I started to push the top and skirt back at her, but she only scoffed at me. “I don’t care about that kind of stuff, Jupiter. Trust me when I say I bought this so it would be worn, and if you take it on its maiden voyage then I would be honored.”
“Oh my gosh, I don’t know,” I said. “Why don’t you wear it tonight?” I asked.
She sighed. “I would have but I forgot about it and bought something else. I have my heart set on my newer dress. Just wear the Max Gengos, Jupiter. I really don’t mind.”
She’d convinced me. “Are you sure?”
“Very,” she said, smiling wide. “Here, go try it on in the bathroom while Rosie and I pick out shoes for you. What size are you?”
I gulped. “Um, an eight.”
“I’m an eight and half, but it’ll work.”
I left the women in the closet and undressed in that kind stranger’s bathroom. I looked at the inside tag of the top. Fifty-one percent silk, forty-nine percent wool body. One hundred percent silk charmeuse lining with silk organza tipping. I ran my hands over the top of the fabric. It was without a doubt probably the highest quality garment I would ever put on.
The skirt was tight fitting and came to about three inches above the knee, but there was a high slit over the left thigh. Despite it’s mature fabric, the style was very young looking. They were so well made you couldn’t even see the zipper closure. The top was fitted and long sleeved, and slightly cropped, with two peekaboo squares under each shoulder that left an inch or two of fabric between the collarbones.
I felt dizzy remembering Ezra kissing me at the dip between my collarbones earlier that morning. My face flushed a bright red, my skin growing hot. It felt very appropriate for a piece of fabric to cover that part of my body, as if it belonged to Ezra now and I wanted to keep it that way.
When I gained a little bit of my self-control back, I opened the closet door and stepped inside. Both women gasped.
“Is that a good sign?” I asked, a little embarrassed.
“It is a very good sign.” Rosie giggled. Her hands went to her face. “Jupiter, Ezra is going to keel over when he sees you.” That burning in my cheeks returned. Rosie laughed at me sweetly. “Oh, please, child, nothing gets past a mama. Nothing.”
“Here,” Melissa said, gesturing for me to sit at a vanity chair in the corner of her closet. “Try these on,” she said, and handed me a pair of simple black, closed-toe, ankle-strap stilettos.
I shoved them on and stood, walking to the mirror. The effect was a little dramatic. I almost didn’t recognize myself. Rosie took the bulk of my hair and pinned it all to the side. Melissa pretended to lick her finger then placed it on my shoulder. “Tsst!” she teased.
I laughed and smiled at her. “You’re very kind to lend this to me.”
“Think nothing of it, Jupiter. Thanks for doing it justice.”
I looked back at my reflection again and noticed I no longer just felt like an adult woman, I looked like one too.