Jaine Austen 4 - Shoes to Die For Read Online Free PDF

you up.”
    “Unsign me.”
    “I can’t. I already paid, and there are no refunds.”
    We argued about it all through dinner, until our waiter brought out a lovely flan for dessert and I finally gave in.
    “Okay,” I sighed. “I’ll go.”
    I only agreed to do it because I was feeling guilty about the money Kandi had laid out. That, and because she refused to give me my dessert fork until I said yes.

Chapter 5

    I didn’t get much sleep that night. I spent most of the wee hours lying stiffly on my back, trying not to mess up my hair. Finally I managed to doze off, but I guess I must’ve tossed and turned because I woke up the next morning with a cowlick the size of a small boomerang. Oh, well, I’d batten it down somehow.
    But first, I needed my morning caffeine fix. I stumbled to the kitchen, Prozac yowling at my heels for her breakfast. I tossed her some Fancy Mackerel Guts and grabbed the instant coffee. For a minute I felt like skipping the hot water and just spooning the stuff into my mouth. But good sense prevailed, and I made my coffee the gourmet way, waiting until the tap water got really hot before adding it to my mug.
    After a few sips, I felt my snoozing corpuscles spring to life. I sat down at my computer for the next hour or so, updating my resume, trying not to use the word “Toiletmasters” too much.
    When I’d polished my resume as much as it could be polished, I wrapped my hair in a towel and headed for the shower. What I really wanted was to lie back in a nice hot bath, but I couldn’t risk any bath-induced frizzies.
    After my shower, I padded back to the bedroom, where I stopped dead in my tracks and screamed bloody murder. There was Prozac, sound asleep on my three-thousand-dollar Prada suit! Like a fool I’d laid it out on the bed before stepping into the shower. And now the jacket was covered with cat hairs.
    “Prozac, how could you?” I wailed, scooping her up from the bed.
    She just yawned in my face, sending a refreshing whiff of mackerel guts my way.
    I told myself not to panic. All I needed to do was wrap some packing tape around my hand, and voila! Instant cat hair remover. I hurried to the kitchen only to discover that, voila! I was all out of packing tape. And Scotch tape. Damn. I spent the next fifteen minutes picking cat hairs off my suit with the sticky end of Post-its.
    Eventually the suit was Prozac-free, and I put it on. Then I threw on some lipstick and blush and flattened my cowlick with industrial strength hair spray. Finally, I filled in the V of my suit jacket with a crystal necklace Lance had picked out from Barneys’ jewelry department (another $200 on my credit card).
    My toilette complete, I surveyed myself in the full-length mirror on my closet door. I liked what I saw. I was cool. I was chic. I was the new, improved Jaine Austen.
    There was only one thing I didn’t like. The price tag dangling from the sleeve of my suit jacket. How the heck was I going to keep that thing from popping out? Then I had a brainstorm, or what passed for a brainstorm in my sleep-deprived state. I put a rubber band around my forearm, and anchored the price tag underneath it. It seemed to do the trick. I just had to remember not to move my arm too much.
    After a final spritz of hair spray, I grabbed my resume and headed for the door.
    “Wish me luck, sweetie,” I called out to Prozac, who was in the kitchen napping on a clean dish towel.
    She gazed up at me and meowed.
    Don’t take too long, she seemed to be saying. I may want a snack.

    When I showed up at Passions, Becky was the only salesperson on the floor.
    “Hi, Jaine,” she chirped as I walked in the door, her orange hair practically blinding me in the morning sun. “Grace is on the phone with a New York designer, but she’ll see you as soon as she’s through.”
    “Fine,” I said, trying not to stare at the single gold hoop Becky wore in one ear. Was this some sort of new fashion fad? The Pirates-of-the-Caribbean