Page 120 of Play Fast (Brooklyn Dawn 2)

I grinned. “Hey, I’ve got a bodyguard, right?”

Then I thought of Noah. I kind of wanted to talk to him too, without this whole episode becoming too Lifetime movie of the week. I mean, Daisy wasn’t being sent off to war.

If this didn’t work, we’d both be fucked up, but we’d live. We’d get over it.

I opened up my wallet and gazed at that picture of us. No, I wouldn’t get over it. I’d never gotten over her in five years, even if I hadn’t been smart enough to realize I’d fallen in the first place.

“It has to work. If it doesn’t, she’s going to leave the tour, and she’ll never give me another chance.” I looked out the window at the blur of traffic. All those strangers rushing by, going home to someone.

I wanted that life. I wanted a home and a family. My family.

I wanted Daisy.

I could only hope she still wanted me too.

Twenty-Three

This wasn’t going to work.

Monday afternoon, I juggled the phone against my ear as I tried in vain to search through the literal tower of post-it notes my predecessor at Lou’s Beauty Emporium had used to keep notes on her customers. Most inefficient system ever, but who was I to judge? I’d just started here. Maybe it would all make sense in time.

Maybe I needed a lot more coffee.

“Mrs. Jensen, I swear, your hair had your typical rinse. I can go through percentages if you’d feel better. I followed Dee’s numbers exactly.”

“Dee always made sure the blue looked more silver. I don’t want to look like a grandmother.”

“Of course not.” Then skip the blue rinse.

“Unfortunately, I have a number of customers right now, but I’d be happy to help you with those percentages once I, um, service them.”

“Miss Daisy, I’m very displeased. Let me talk to your supervisor.”

Wow, there was the way to start a new job.

“I’d be happy to let you speak to her, but she’s currently unavailable. Can I have her call you back?” I didn’t say Stacy was out back smoking and gossiping with the only other stylist currently working, leaving me to man the phones and deal with customers as they came in.

I wasn’t elitist at all. A job was a job. But boy, it was a serious knock in the keister to come from working on the tour of a world-famous rock band to being dressed down at a place where I was basically scrambling for tips—scraps of tips at that.

Why had I threatened to give my notice again? Oh, right, because Osmond Taylor had used his massive penis like a mallet on that pesky organ in my chest.

“Surely there’s someone I can speak to. I’m not happy at all with your attitude.”

I gritted my teeth around a smile. She couldn’t see me, but facial expressions conveyed over the line. Mine was wholly insincere, but I could only do so much. “I’m so sorry. I know this must be a very trying time,” two of our other lines lit up and I fumbled around the desk, looking for a plain pad of paper, not a freaking post-it note I’d have to keep track of, “but at Lou’s Beauty Empire, we always stand by our work.” Accidentally, I bumped the coffee cup by my elbow—Stacy’s, not mine—and hot coffee sloshed over my lap, drenching my bare legs. So much for wearing a skort on my first day. “Motherfucker!”

That was the end of my brief, colorful employment at Lou’s Beauty Emporium. Which I only fully remembered the name of when I got my pink slip.

That was actually yellow, since post-its ruled the world.

I stomped back to the apartment, calling my sister on the way. She didn’t answer. Well, actually, she did, in the form of a changed voicemail greeting that made me frown, hang up, and immediately call back.

I’m not home, but once you are, walk seven steps from the door, take a left, then another left, and look down. You know where to go.

I picked up the pace. Luckily, I’d chosen this salon for its closeness to Ever’s place, so I didn’t have far to go.

What the hell? It wasn’t my birthday. She didn’t know I’d gotten fired. Hell, Lila didn’t even know officially that I was quitting, so I was just going to…not do that. There was no reason at all to be celebrating, other than I wasn’t going to let Oz drive me away.

I’d lived without him for five years. I could live without him again. I had a whole soundtrack of women’s anthems on my iPhone that proved men were only good for one thing.

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