All That Really Matters Page 6

  If not for my respect for her brother and the ministry partners he’d sent our way over the years, I would have canceled our interview right then and escorted her out of the house.

  My vetting system might be rigorous and maybe even extreme at times, but I’d never apologize for protecting my residents or their privacy.

  A crescendo of footsteps peppered their way toward my office, and I rounded my desk to prop my hip against the inside of the doorjamb, preparing myself for Molly McKenzie round two. In my experience, when it came to people who enjoyed the sound of their own voice, more time to think often equaled more fuel to speak it. And Miss McKenzie, with all her impressive accolades and shiny accomplishments, was not short on words or on show.

  Though I remained obscured from her view, waiting in the shadow of the doorway, her pace slowed considerably as she neared. Perhaps she could sense my presence the same way I could sense hers. A hint of her flowery perfume wafted in my direction, and for the briefest of moments, I fought the urge to take a deeper breath.

  What exactly was she waiting for out there?

  The instant before I stepped out to give her directions back to the lobby, those heels started up their engines again. But this time as she strutted down the hallway past my door, she balanced her purse on her right shoulder . . . as if . . . as if she were a 1980s rapper sporting a boombox. I barely managed to bite back a laugh, half expecting her to moonwalk her way to the stairs.

  As a youth advocate and advisor for the last several years, I’d seen my fair share of dramatic displays, but this stunt rivaled for the most amusing of them all—a grown woman using her duffle-sized handbag like an invisibility cloak.

  I stepped out of my concealed spot in the doorway. “I don’t advise taking that spiral staircase without full use of your peripheral.”

  She lowered her purse and seemed to take an extra beat to fill her lungs with whatever dragon fire was about to be spewed in my direction. Yet the instant she faced me, something in my chest opened and cracked. Stripped of her superficial charm and practiced pretense, she was absolutely . . . stunning.

  “I was wrong,” she said, jabbing a sparkly pink-tipped finger in my direction. “I do know what Wren needs.”

  “I highly doubt that.” There were few things I tolerated less than a stranger telling me what I didn’t know about the kids I’d served for years. Especially someone more in touch with the two-dimensional world of social media fans than the connected world I’d worked so hard to create at The Bridge.

  “She’s sharp—at least, she’s a lot sharper than her insecurity lets on. She told me she wants to learn how to talk to people.” She shook her head. “I didn’t get that at first, thinking it was a comment about words or vocabulary. But I actually think it has very little to do with that and everything to do with having the courage to speak up for herself. To speak her mind when she feels belittled and overshadowed.” She paused, her eyes turning more intense. “And don’t even think about telling me that’s not a critical life skill. Because that might just be the most critical life skill she could possess as a female living in our world today.”

  Heat flared in my gut. Who did this woman think she was, telling me about Wren’s true needs? I’d been the one to refer her to The Bridge after she’d aged out last winter. I’d been the one to ensure her younger sibling remained in-state with a foster family I’d personally referred. And I’d been the one to arrange transport for her weekly grief counsel after school. “And who do you suppose is belittling her? Because if you’re going to start throwing around accusations based off the assumptions you made from a four-minute conversation with her, I hope you have evidence to back them up.”

  Her laugh was an enraged cackle. “Assumptions? You’re one to talk about assumptions. Though your website certainly makes a huge deal about your program being a”—she framed her fingers around her face with air quotes as she spoke—“‘judgment-free zone,’ you’ve done nothing but judge me from the moment I told you my name. I’d be willing to bet you made your mind up about me before I stepped on campus. And still, for some insane reason, you decided to waste both of our time by continuing with an interview I never had a chance of passing no matter what my answers were.” She held her arms out, her purse swinging back and forth. “So why don’t you tell me the real reason, Silas? And don’t bother holding back, because there’s honestly nothing you can say that could be worse than what my online trolls post on the daily. So what is it . . . am I too blond? Too mouthy? Too strong-willed for a female?”

  “Don’t insult me,” I gritted out.

  “Then don’t insult me by saying I’m not the right fit to work with your young women and then offer me zero reason to back it up.”

  “I don’t trust you.”

  Her lips parted in an inaudible gasp, and I felt an odd sensation, like knuckles digging into my ribcage, as I glimpsed beyond her carefully constructed facade.

  I took one step closer to her, only one, and yet it felt too close. “I have little respect for social media or for those who make a profit from its false realities. But I would have been willing to overlook that for the sake of my residents if I hadn’t caught you breaking our privacy policy in your first ten minutes inside our lobby without a second thought.”

  “I . . . what?” All the tightness in her face relaxed as my words hit their intended mark. “But that was just an Instagram story, not even eight seconds long. And it was mostly just of my face.”

  “You were videoing inside a private residence where many of our young adults have chosen to reside because it’s the only place they can find solace from their dysfunctional family ties. The Bridge is a safe harbor, one that provides security and confidentiality for those who wish their location to remain anonymous during their time here.”

  Her gaze drifted to the floor, and I wondered if she was calculating her next comeback or her next dramatic exit. But after a full ten seconds of silence, she simply reached into her bag, took out her phone, and swiped and tapped several times on the screen. “Okay, it’s gone.”

  “What is?”

  “The video. I deleted it.” She pulled on an expression yet to be determined—perhaps the kind of face that could cry on camera without ever losing composure? I wasn’t sure, yet it was impossible to look away from her nonetheless. “I wasn’t aware of your privacy policy or your rules regarding social media, but I apologize if my actions put the house or any of its residents at risk. That certainly wasn’t my intention. I’m sorry.” For the briefest of moments, her voice strained with a sincerity I would have doubted her capable of during our interview.

  She swallowed, recovered, and then retreated a full step back, gripping the wooden handle of her purse with both hands. “I appreciate you telling it to me straight, though. I value learning from my mistakes.” She stopped suddenly and studied the intersection at the end of the hallway. “I’d also value you telling me how I might find my way out of this maze before my brother reports me as a missing person.”

  “Two lefts and a right. The staircase will take you to the lobby. Glo can let you out, or . . . I actually have a minute now. I can walk you out.” I started toward her when she shook her head and waved me back.

  “That’s okay. I got it.” Her smile left no doubt in my mind of how she’d attracted over half a million followers. It was worth that much, maybe more. “I’ll make sure to tell Miles you said hello.”

  “Thanks,” I said, unsure of what else to say but positive I should be saying more than a monosyllabic word. Yet I couldn’t seem to wrap my mind around what had just happened. I’d prepared for a defensive outburst, a vent of frustration at the very least. But not an apology. Not remorse.

  A familiar tug of intuition surfaced as she walked away, one that had no right to be there. Not when I’d already crossed her name off as a mentor candidate.

  Yet my disquiet persisted.

  There was nothing inherently dangerous about the woman, unless one could count the level of di
straction she would cause for the hormone-crazed males living on our premises. But even still, my decision to dismiss her was valid.

  The instant I was back in my office, I opened my laptop and scanned my waiting emails without actually reading a word. Then I picked up the phone on my desk and punched in Glo’s extension. I would ask her to pull up the other background-checked women we had on file and schedule interviews for early next week, seeing as our summer program was officially as short on instructors as it was on time.

  Glo answered without so much as a hello. “Ms. McKenzie just left.”

  “Yes, I’m aware.”

  “And . . . ?”

  I clenched my jaw, released, and clenched again. “She’s not right for us.”

  “Huh. That’s too bad. I liked her.”

  “Liking her is not the issue. A lot of people like her.” Over half a million, in fact.

  “Shall I add a new requirement to our application forms, then? ‘Must be unlikable.’”

  “Glo.” I rubbed my left temple. “She’d be a constant migraine to manage.”

  “Then don’t manage her. I will.”

  A humorous remark, considering Glo’s responsibilities were already at maximum capacity, like the majority of our staff. “I’d rather focus on who we have on file already. Let’s make some follow-up calls, okay?”

  “Alrighty.”

  I set the receiver back in its cradle and closed my laptop with a heavy sigh. Rolling back in my chair, the toe of my shoe bumped the wastebasket housing Molly’s folder. And then, before I could stop myself, I reached down and lifted it out of the trash and placed it in the bottom drawer of my file cabinet.

  6

  Molly

  A cascade of silky fabric shimmered over my hips as my hands reached for the sash at my natural waist. My fingers stilled on the knot as my mind added yet another class idea to a syllabus I’d never be allowed to write, much less teach from: Multifunctional Fashion—How to Get the Most Bang for Your Buck When Purchasing an Outfit. Most people struggled with how to take a simple article of clothing and either pair it down for a casual ensemble or, on the flip side, add a few meaningful accessories to dress it up a notch or two. One piece could easily serve multiple purposes. Surely not even Silas would criticize such a budget-friendly notion. Clothing one’s body could easily be categorized as both a critical need and a life skill, depending on the occasion.

  “Molly? You there? Can you still hear me? Did we lose audio again?”

  I fumbled to locate my phone, hidden under the last outfit I’d tried on in the tiny dressing room I currently found myself in. When I unearthed it, my assistant’s smiling face stared back at me. This was our standard practice, Val waking up early to hop on a video call with me while I tried on clothing options in a space suited for Polly Pocket.

  “Sorry, yeah. I’m still here.” At least, physically I was. Mentally I was back in that too-giant manor again wishing I could tell myself not to start a livestream from the lobby. I raised my phone to the mirror to show Val the second jumpsuit from today’s shoot collection. “What do you think about this one?”

  “Hmm.” She tilted her head to the side and leaned close to her laptop screen. “It’s beautiful and unique, but I still prefer the pale pink over that chartreuse. I think it’s better for your complexion overall.”

  One of the biggest myths in the beauty industry was that photo shoots were the mountaintop of a career in fashion. Lies. Don’t get me wrong—I was grateful for any and all opportunities to further the reach of my brand, but the constant pinching, tweaking, waxing, plucking, and comments to “suck in” while trying to hold an unnatural pose and not look constipated while doing it . . . well, it was all less than glamorous. As was the 4:00 a.m. wake-up call to catch my flight to Seattle, especially after I’d been awake most of the night rehashing a certain conversation with a certain highbrow director.

  “Great. Decision made. I’ll wear the pink.” Awkwardly, I pinched the phone under my chin and worked the zipper down the side of my jumpsuit, slipping it off easily.

  “Decision made? Really?” She laughed. “I think that might be the quickest you’ve ever decided on an outfit in your life. Much less while at a shoot. You still have a pile of options there from the stylist. Are you sure you don’t want to try on a few others just to make sure?”

  “I’m sure. I trust you.” The instant those three little words came out of my mouth I was transported back to that hallway outside Silas’s office, back to when he looked me dead in the eyes and said, “I don’t trust you.”

  It had been those words that had kept me awake, those words that had rattled inside my brain since the moment I drove away from Fir Crest Manor. How could he not trust me? Hadn’t I made a living earning the trust of strangers worldwide? Hadn’t I become an expert in the art of connecting with people? My word alone had become a profitable stamp of credibility in my industry, and yet astoundingly, someone who had sat with me in person while I shared an honest piece of myself had deemed me untrustworthy due to an eight-second mistake.

  His swift and candid assessment of me had stung far worse than the vilest of comments left by an online troll.

  But try as I might, I still hadn’t found a delete option for real-life rejection. And I’d been searching for one for twenty-seven years.

  “Okay, Molly, what is going on with you today? Wait, before you answer that, you might want to flip the camera the other direction, unless you feel like answering a nine-year-old’s questions regarding female anatomy. Tucker will be waking up any minute now.”

  I quickly flipped the camera so it was no longer pointing at my silicone pasties. “Good call.”

  “So? What is it? You seem . . . I don’t know, unusually distracted this morning.”

  “I’m just tired.” I hadn’t told Val what had happened at The Bridge. I hadn’t even told Miles yet. How could I, when I was still so confused by it all myself? Molly McKenzie didn’t fail interviews; she didn’t fail at anything. “Nothing some caffeine won’t fix as soon as I’m done here.” I smiled bigger, hoping the internal shadow lurking within wasn’t as obvious to an onlooker. While my makeup artist had been fantastic, masking the dark moons under my eyes and giving me just the right amount of color to lift my cheekbones, she wasn’t a magician.

  “I’m sorry the delivery service got your order wrong this morning. I even double-checked it all before I submitted the address. I’m still not sure how a triple shot unsweetened coconut milk latte with one pump vanilla translated to an extra hot Americano. If I could deliver the right drink to you myself, I would.”

  “It wasn’t your fault. Besides, technically, according to the anti-inflammatory cleanse I’m on, I’m not supposed to have anything but hot water or green tea until after the shoot. But if you ever decide to personally deliver me a drink, I’d drink whatever you bring me. Promise.” She laughed at this, though she had to know I meant it by now. I’d been hinting around for a reason for Val to visit the lower forty-eight—as she called it—since she became my assistant full-time nearly three years ago. But apparently when you’re four generations deep in Skagway, Alaska, a single parent to the only grandchild her parents have, and have a crippling fear of flying, there isn’t a lot of motivation to leave home. Which is exactly why I’d been promising her I’d take a trip there to Alaska for . . . well, awhile now. I really needed to get that on my calendar. Again.

  Thankfully, though, Val was as savvy with technology as she was with current fashion trends, and we rarely went a day without speaking, much less video chatting. Bottom line: I never wanted to do Makeup Matters without her by my side.

  “You know what I was thinking about yesterday?” she asked. “That first tinted lip balm company that reached out to us. Remember? We were absolutely giddy at the thought of your lips being on a sponsored campaign ad.”

  I laughed, and the action seemed to loosen some of the tightness in my chest. That call felt like ages ago. A different lifetime, really, b
ack when I was paying Val an hourly wage I could barely afford. “I never knew how badly lips could hurt from practicing a pout hold for days on end. But at least I didn’t have to do a cleanse.” My stomach grumbled at the thought of the burrito Ethan was picking up for me later.

  “True, but look where you are now. The Fashion Emporium.” Val said it with the awe and wonder of a tour guide showing the Grand Canyon to people who’d just regained their sight. “The opportunities you’ve had this last year since signing on with the Cobalt Group have been nothing short of incredible. And I couldn’t be more excited about what’s to come.”

  “The opportunities we’ve had, you mean.” One of my stipulations for signing with Ethan was making sure Val was taken care of—and she had been. She was still my assistant, but she was on Cobalt’s payroll, since they were able to offer her the benefit package she needed as a single mom. It had been a perfect union in every way.

  “Right,” she said. “Yes.” Her voice wavered, though—enough to make my eyes flick back to her face.

  “What?” I asked, scrutinizing her uneasy expression in my phone. “What’s that look for?”

  By the sound of her sigh, I knew whatever it was, it wasn’t something flippant. Val didn’t have time to worry about frivolous things. Nor was she prone to creating drama. Quite the opposite, actually.

  “I’ve been debating mentioning something to you all morning, but I certainly didn’t want to bring it up before your shoot. It can wait.”

  “Which means you absolutely should mention it and that it can’t wait. Now is as good a time as any. What’s up?” I bent down to buckle the ankle strap of my heels, then began collecting the empty hangers.