Page 4

4

ANNA

I gaze in the mirror, not registering my reflection, while Serge works on my hair. Adam Miller . What a cute guy! So laid back. He doesn’t have a problem with being here, getting primped for an event, or anything really.

Adam was a boring computer electronics guy, Janus said, so I was expecting a beard and sandals, not some good-looking tousled man in a sharp suit. Was that Serge and Julio’s doing?

Serge flicks a glance at me. “He’s nice, eh? I could ravish him myself if he swung both ways.”

I laugh. Serge and Julio are a blast. “Did he turn up with a beard and sandals?”

Serge frowns. “Not at all! He came in the suit, and I added a bit of va-va-voom to his hair. But that body is all his own work.” He winks at me in the mirror, then leans forward. “I think Julio decided to change his shirt color just so he could admire him shirtless.”

He’s wiry, certainly. But there’s something attractive about that. Not my usual type at all.

“Oh God! Please don’t tell me that. I need plausible deniability for anything even vaguely inappropriate. ”

He bites his lip, then grins. “Me? Inappropriate?” He gestures down his torso. “He had lovely blond chest hair, and a very sexy trail.” He winks.

Christ, he needs to stop talking about Adam’s body. Adam’s a total stranger, doing me a favor.

“He’s like a small powerful animal,” I say. Am I making this any better?

“Like a dung beetle?”

I lean forward with a snort, bending my head toward my knees as I struggle to breathe, wheezing as I straighten up.

“What?” he says, grinning wildly at me in the mirror. “They are nature’s strongest animal! They can move balls of poop 1,141 times their own weight.”

“I don’t think he’d thank you for being compared to a dung beetle,” I choke out. “Anyway, how do you know all this stuff?”

“I studied Animal Science in college.”

“You did what ?”

He waves his hand. “It’s a long story. But suffice to say, gay men are a bit of an exception on those types of courses in certain parts of this wonderful country.” He gestures down his body again. “Especially ones dressed like me. It’s like spotting a leopard in the Serengeti.”

My eyes meet his. “I’m calling him DB from now on.”

He snorts into my hair. “Don’t you dare, missy.”

“I was actually thinking of something sleeker, more fast-moving.”

“Like a ferret.” He sticks his top teeth over his bottom lip and screws up his face.

And I can’t hold my laughter back now. Serge grins and shakes his head as I tip my head back and tears stream down my face.

“Okay then, a cheetah,” he says.

I gulp in a few sharp breaths. “That’s much better,” I gasp out.

He hums as he parts a strand of my hair and runs a flattening iron down it. “Hmmm, yes. A cheetah. All high-speed grace and long soft fur,” Serge says, running his fingers through my hair.

“Stop talking about fur!”

He giggles and waves a hand over my head. “It is literally my job, darling! I am paid to notice hair of all kinds, no matter where it is on the body.” He winks at me in the mirror. “Let’s make you look amazing, so DB falls head over heels for you.”

“Don’t call him that!”

And some guy falling head over heels for me? That’s something that’s never happened. They discover the tennis schedule and run for the hills. Plus, I’ve just wriggled out of Arty’s clutches, although whether I’ve actually escaped him or not remains to be seen … and Pietr … God, how little I understood when I was with him. I need to message Mila and warn her that Arty spotted her account name on the video she sent me.

“Oh, but you’re dating that sexy downhill skier, Arty Maroz, aren’t you? Where’s he tonight?”

“We split up. Today actually. But please don’t say anything until I’ve had a chance to agree all the media announcements with his PR person.”

“I am the soul of discretion,” Serge says, placing a hand over his heart, and I laugh again. “I’m sorry you broke up, darling. You were a cute couple. All that wonderful dark hair, yours and his.” He flourishes a hand over my head.

“Don’t be sorry. He cheated.”

“He what ? He cheated on you ? Honestly, men are so fucking useless. They don’t know when they’ve got it good.”

“Tell me about it. You want to see?” I shouldn’t show him the video, but sometimes you want someone to have your back and Serge loves the gossip.

He peers over my shoulder as I pull up the clip.

“Wow.” He purses his lips as it gets to the part with Arty on the couch. “Jesus, look at them go. You’ve got the right kind of friends watching out for you like that.”

Mila’s small face peering out of her bunk bed in tennis camp swims in front of my face. We were always stuck in some place miles from anywhere and terrified. Terrified of not making it; terrified of not hitting the standards required by the men who ran the camps and getting sent back home; terrified of not escaping what our lives would otherwise have been.

As Serge starts twisting my hair into tendrils with a heated brush, my phone vibrates on my desk. I stretch forward and pick it up. It’s a message from Arty.

Check your inbox, bitch.

Oh, Jesus. Maybe I spoke too soon about being free from him.

I open the app and don’t spot anything, but there is an email from a legal firm. When I scan through it, it’s a deposition concerning the ownership of Pepper, bought by a Mr. Artyom Maroz.

He’s suing me for custody of Pepper?

She was a birthday present! He doesn’t even want a dog: He never bothered to walk her or even play with her. He just wants revenge, the asshole. And, goddammit, I can’t respond because it will all be used in evidence against me, no doubt. I type back:

I’ve forwarded it to my lawyer.

See you in court.

His reply is followed by a string of celebration emojis. Shit. I close my eyes. I love tennis, but this is a huge pile of crap. I’d do well to remember that, no matter how cute men are, there’s always some sting in the tail. I know nothing about Adam. As a friend of Janus’s, he’s probably okay, but I’ve always known I can’t trust people, and that’s only gotten worse over the last couple of years as my profile has grown. I’m like a matryoshka doll: shell after shell until I don’t know who the person is inside anymore. It’s as lonely as hell.

Perhaps I’m always going to be asking myself that question now: Are they with me for me, or for Anna Talanova, tennis player?