Skinnydipping Read Online Free PDF

beyond the people right in front of me. I pushed my way to the bar and caught the bartender’s eye. He asked me what I wanted. “Vodka and soda with a twist,” I shouted over the noise and music. He winked at me and grabbed a bottle of Stoli. I really wanted a margarita, but I knew where that would lead—I’d be fatter tomorrow. Maybe this time I could be good. I knew my pattern. I would start with the virtuous drinks, but the drunker I got, the more I’d lose my resolve, until I was swilling cosmopolitans and apple martinis and margaritas with sugar on the rim.
    I turned and surveyed the room. All the round booths were full of people, and people on people—women sitting on laps or lounging behind and draped over the men. In one dark corner, a thin, dark-haired rocker type chopped a mound of cocaine on the glass table,then handed a rolled-up bill to the girl beside him. Another girl with long blonde hair, tanned skin, and great legs had her shirt off and was dancing on top of a table in her bra. Then I saw them—Chloe and Isabel from Hollywood & Highland ! Maybe this was a sign from the universe that Larry Todd was getting ready to call me back.
    The bartender handed me my vodka soda, and I squeezed over closer to Chloe and Isabel—their real names, of course, were not Chloe and Isabel—what an embarrassment if I actually called them the names of their TV characters! Susan Terence and Donna Shannon , I reminded myself. Their names are Susan and Donna.
    I was almost able to get myself next to them and in hearing distance of their conversation. Chloe/Susan was rail thin with platinum blonde hair and big brown eyes. Her red lip gloss was slightly smeared at the side of her mouth and she had a silky, wispy little lavender dress that hung on her skeletal shoulders. Isabel/Donna was raven haired with full pouty lips, jet-black eyeliner, a sprinkle of girl-next-door freckles, and curves to die for. She wore high-heeled patent-leather stilettos and a tight black dress with a scoop neck that showed off the efforts of her push-up bra.
    I cleared my throat. I would befriend them by telling them I was waiting for a callback from Larry Todd about a job. Or maybe I should say I’m a friend of Larry Todd’s. Or something more casual? “Excuse me,” I said as loudly as I could without sounding like I was yelling. Neither of them turned.
    “Excuse me, Susan?” I tried again. “I thought you might want to know your lipstick is a little smeared there in the corner.” I smiled in a friendly, confidential, girlfriend way, but the bitch didn’t even look at me. She did, however, daintily wipe the corner of her mouth.
    Maybe Donna would be more receptive. I moved in closer. “Excuse me, Donna?”
    Donna did turn to look at me, but her eyes were like ice. She checked me out, up and down, exactly the way the flight attendant had evaluated my human worth with a cursory glance on my way to L.A. She began to turn away again, so I reached out and lightlytouched her forearm. “No, wait! I don’t mean to bother you, but I just wanted to say hello because I’m a friend of Larry Todd’s, and …”
    “Did you just touch me?”
    “What?” I was taken aback by her tone and the way she recoiled from me, like I was some venomous creature she wanted to crush with her spike heel.
    She looked at me with pure disdain. “I said, did you just touch me? Don’t you ever touch me again. What’s wrong with you?”
    She didn’t wait for an answer, but turned her back to me. Out of nowhere, a huge, muscle-bound man in a tight black T-shirt stepped between us and crossed his arms. Susan giggled and rolled her eyes, and they resumed their conversation.
    I was humiliated. I felt ridiculous standing there in my cheap red dress with some lame TV star’s personal bodyguard staring me down. I turned away and plunged into the crowd. This was going to ruin my entire week. I’d been smacked down and I wanted to get as far away from those two bitches as