Susan Andersen - Coming Undone

"Are you kidding me?" P.J. pushed up in the next bed. "That would be a wonderful break. And this is L.A., baby. There's gotta be all kinds of great shopping in this town."

An edge of panic niggled her stomach. "I'm not talking about Rodeo Drive or anything."

"No foolin'. I may have graduated from Wal-Mart, but I still can't bring myself to pay three hundred dollars for a little T-shirt or six hundred dollars for a pair of shoes. Maybe next year."

"That's the attitude we like to hear." She grinned in the lessening dark. "Now that you're a big hotshot Digital Gold performer and all."

P.J. made a rude noise. Then she suddenly went very still. "Oh, man," she whispered. "This is too good."

"What is?"

"Well, it just occurred to me. You heard Jared this morning. He insists on attaching himself to me as my own personal bodyguard." She flopped onto her back, kicking her legs in the air and laughing like a loon. Even after she had finally settled down, her teeth were a light beacon in the dim room. "How you think he's gonna like spending the day shopping and hitting the salons with the girls?"

IT WAS GOING TO BE A long day.

Jared sprawled on the trendy pink love seat that dominated the waiting area of the Mane Event salon. Stretching across the small couch at an angle, he extended one foot out onto the floor, his opposite knee drawn up and deliberately positioned spread-eagle across the seat to discourage any of the black-kimono-wearing clientele surrounding him from getting the wrong idea. Sharing his space was not an option.

Rock music pounded out of the overhead speakers, which P.J. insisted was a good thing. She claimed that anyone who tuned in heavy metal as their normal listening preference was unlikely to be familiar with the country music world-let alone its gossip. And that, she asserted, made her anonymous-which in turn gave her a heaven-sent opportunity to be just like any other woman in the place.

God knew the salon was packed to the rafters with the species. There were tall women, short women, skinny women, fat women and every size and shape in between. There were women who had hip down pat, women who looked as if they spent every spare minute taking lessons from country club pros and matronly women-although there were a damn sight fewer of those.

The joint was awash in estrogen, and female voices wove over and under the thumping music as they chatted about stuff both more mundane and way more intimate than any snippet of conversation he'd ever overheard Esme or his sister have with their friends. It was like being in a foreign country-one where the air was ripe with the scents of shampoo, hairspray and a witch's brew of chemicals.

He was tempted to hook a finger beneath the collar of his shirt and tug it away from his throat. He resisted because one, with its two top buttons unfastened, his collar wasn't the least bit constrictive and two, the gesture would be too revealing. But man, did he feel out of his element.

Two women, one seated to his right and the other three chairs down, talked on their cell phones. Everyone else either flipped with varying degrees of interest through magazines dedicated to hairstyles, movie stars or fashion-and-beauty tip stuff or visited with each other. In many cases they did both.

He was coming in for his share of curious looks, as well, probably because he was the only appreciably straight guy in Girlyville. For the most part it was nothing more than a quick peek over the top of a magazine or a new client faltering briefly when she turned from the reception desk and saw him sitting there. One of the cell phone talkers, however, and a brunette facing him on an Eames-style chair down against the other wall, subjected him to slow, bold, up-and-down inspections. The phone chatterer was checking out his package and the brunette, catching him glance her way, opened her lips, gave them a lascivious circle with her tongue and pantomimed a kiss.

Now, Jared wasn't a shy guy and ordinarily he'd welcome a little female attention. But not only was he badly outnumbered by the gentler sex, he was on the job. Plus the tenor of some of the attention focused on him was a helluva lot more predatory than that of an admiring woman catching his eye in a bar. For the first time he fully appreciated how women walking the gauntlet of whistling construction workers must feel. Sexual aggression wasn't appealing in either gender.

Coolly he returned Phone Chick and Miss Kissy-face's comprehensive appraisals, letting his own gaze conduct a leisurely assessment from head to toe before pointedly turning his attention elsewhere. And if he started to suffer a persistent little get-me-out-of-here itch, well, he'd just keep that to himself.

He hoped.

No. His face went stony. There was no "hope" about it-he would.You're a trained professional, he reminded himself grimly.There hasn't been a sissified beauty palace built that has the chops to take that away from you.

But it was sure as hell a different world in here.

He looked past the reception desk into the heart of the pink and black salon. The rituals practiced back there were a mystery to him. He could see Nell seated at a station down near the end of the room. A girl with black and fuchsia hair had whacked the tour manager's braid off at the nape, secured its cut end with a pink ribbon and set it like a trophy on the counter in front of her. Miss Two-tone had then snipped up a storm until he'd swear more hair lay on the floor around Nell's chair than was still attached to her head. He didn't know squat about this stuff, of course, so he had to assume she'd look great when the stylist was finished. Right now, however, what hair was left bristled with layers of aluminum foil. He saw at least two other patrons sporting a similar look, making the lot of them appear for all the world like alien invaders from a fifties-era B movie.

A stylist had already trimmed P.J.'s hair and tamed her usual tumble of curls into a sleek, straight waterfall that cascaded over her shoulders. Currently seated on an elevated chair over in the alcove, the long skirt of her red dress rucked up between her thighs, she sipped something from a delicate china cup and carried on a rapid-fire conversation with the technician painting her toes. He couldn't make out what she was saying, but if her frequent laughter was any indication she was having the time of her life. A slight smile curved his lips. It was good to see her enjoying herself. It had been a tense couple of days.

She shuffled his way a short while later. Glancing down, he took note of disposable green and yellow Hawaiian-print flip-flops on her feet and rainbow-colored separators that spread her red-tipped toes. With a bemused shake of his head, he shifted to make room for her on the love seat.

"Shades, J?" she demanded, dropping down next to him, only to immediately hitch up one bun. "Ow. What's this thing made of, bricks?"

"I was thinking poured concrete, myself."

Her lips quirked up, but almost in the same instant she went all stern on him. "Don't change the subject. What's with the Ray-Bans? Could yoube any more conspicuous? Everyone probably thinks you're FBI."

He slid the sunglasses in question down his nose and peered over their black rims at her. "Hey, it's blinding in here." And that was true as far as it went; sunshine did pour through the window onto the left side of his face.

It just wasn't the real reason he'd donned them.

She apparently knew it, too. "Uh-huh." She gave him a swift elbow to the ribs. "More like you're hiding out from all the babes wanting to jump your bones."

"Yeah, right," he scoffed. Nodding his head toward two particularly aggressive blondes who'd replaced Phone Chick and Kissy-face, he said, "I was thinking of asking those two to join me in a little menage a trois." God knows they'd been staring holes through him for the past several minutes and hadn't bothered to keep their voices down when they'd exchanged the increasingly raunchy methods they'd like to use to wear him out.

Then he broke like a cheap china plate. "Jesus, Peej," he said in a low voice. "Is there a sign over my head that says Fresh Meat, Come and Get It or something? You shouldhear some of the trash they've been talking. If a guy said half the shit they've suggested he'd be sued for sexual harassment."

She laughed. But leaning into him, she also butted her head against his chest like a kitten seeking attention. "Poor baby."

With no conscious decision on his part he found himself threading his fingers into her shiny chestnut hair to hold her in place.

Peering around him at the two women under discussion, she finger-walked her way down his row of shirt buttons until she reached his stomach, which she proceeded to pet. "Back off, ladies," she told them in a low but firm voice. "He's mine."

The blonde with the more impressive implants made a rude sound. "There's nothing to you," she said, subjecting P.J. to an insolent up-and-down appraisal. "Maybe the big guy's ready for something a little more exciting."

"Thereis nothing more exciting than what she gives me," Jared said flatly. Then awareness burned through him at the feel of P.J.'s delicately curved breast pressed against his side and he turned his head to look down at her. "Is there, baby?" he demanded softly. And he lowered his head to kiss her.