The Wrong Sister Read Online Free PDF Page B

business district if they felt like leaving their expensive cars garaged.  
    On the crescents of golden beach, the young and beautiful displayed themselves to each other. You didn’t need money to share the sand, Fiona thought with amusement—a brief swimsuit and a one-section bus-fare was all it took.
      She drove on into the city proper. She’d shopped with Jan about a year earlier. There’d been a nice store on a corner somewhere. She navigated through the busy streets—yes, there it was. She found a parking space not too far distant and was soon browsing the racks.
    “Anything in particular you’re looking for?”  
    Fiona grinned at the hopeful sales-lady. “Something colorful and casual. Not cream, not black, not beige. I really want a change of image.”
    The woman eyed Fiona’s tailored black trousers and camel-colored tunic-top. “Your current colors suit you very well, but...let’s think. We had some very different silk-mix summer knitwear arrive this morning. Not even priced yet. I’ll see what I can show you.” She bustled off to the stockroom to search.  
    Fiona unhooked a short electric-blue linen skirt and tossed it over her arm. And some lime-green loose-legged trousers in a sensuous shiny fabric. Not her usual look at all...her workmates on the ship would do a double-take for sure. And Christian would no longer be reminded quite so achingly of his lovely lost Jan.
    By the time her hair was due for restyling, she was the owner of the skirt, the trousers, two vivid sleeveless tops, two outrageous pairs of earrings, and some darling multi-colored plaited sandals.  
    She enjoyed a latte in the sun and bought three hefty paperbacks that promised plenty of distraction from her current situation. Suddenly she wasn’t the least bit worried about losing most of her hair. She’d had it long for years. It was time to have it short. Big pieces of her current life had changed—her hair could follow.
    “Really short?” the young stylist asked, hefting a handful of Fiona’s thick mane.
    She smiled at the boy’s doubtful expression. “Spiky, maybe. Totally different from what it is now. Let’s have some fun.”
    She watched him in the big mirror as he let her hair slide down through his fingers. He inspected her intently as he turned her head from side to side, studying the angles of her face, pushing at her hair with his fingers.  
    How young he seemed. She hoped she wasn’t making a huge mistake. Perhaps she should have waited a day or two until one of the senior staff was available?  
    Too late now , she thought, flinching as the glittering scissors started to shear away long strands.  
    “Is it for a special occasion? Like—are you going to the big vineyard concert this weekend?” the snake-hipped boy enquired.
    Fiona shook her head. “No—I just want a new look so...someone else sees me differently.”  
    The stylist nodded. “Image is everything,” he said with huge conviction. Fiona cast her eyes down and tried not to grin. He couldn’t be more than eighteen. At that age image probably was everything.
    “I’m just doing a rough cut,” he added, possibly misconstruing her expression. “I’m not taking it too short to start with. You’ve got some natural wave, and all this weight is pulling it out. I want to see what it does. Once I’ve got the color through it I’ll complete the final shaping. I thought…a lot of pale highlights and some about mid-way between that and your current shade?” He waited for her reaction.
    “Great. As long as I don’t look like me any more.”
    And as long as Christian doesn’t remember Jan every time he sees me.  
    She wondered where her desirable brother-in-law was. Still at the beach with Nicola? Maybe he’d stretched his long body out in the sun so his little daughter could play at shoveling sand over his legs and no-doubt impressive torso until he was half-buried...she found it easy to picture the scene, and imagined it with