Page 55 of Pink

Love.

She lived it for the public but hoped that someday she might truly find it.

• • •

“Almost there,” Kayla said to Gigi’s right in the back of the town car. The car and driver, provided by the agency to keep her safe and allow her to travel within the city while she was there for the next couple of months, was just another thing she had learned to deal with. Rarely was she given the opportunity or ability to do things alone now. Even driving, whether it was for work or pleasure, was a task given to someone else. “Another five minutes.”

“Perfect.”

But it wasn’t.

She hadn’t even bothered to open her eyes at Kayla’s declaration to see where they currently were in New York City. Manhattan, that was for certain. But where, exactly, she couldn’t say because she just didn’t give a shit. That, and the pounding headache starting to form behind her eyes because Riccardo Delavange, owner and designer of the largest lingerie brand in the world, decided his entire office building needed to have the brightest white walls she had ever seen. Complimented, of course, by floor-to-ceiling windows in every fucking room.

Lights, Gigi could deal with.

She learned how.

“They were pleased with your measurements for the fitting—one good thing.”

Gigi hummed a noise under her breath, daring to crack open her eyes. The bright daylight was made slightly more bearable by the dark, tinted windows in the rear of the car. It did nothing for the glare coming in from the front, though. She much preferred for her driver to use the SUV with the divider between the front and back seats so that she could pretend like she was alone. Even if she wasn’t.

Too much natural light and white color, however, was something her brain just couldn’t seem to handle without giving her a raging fucking migraine. But she kept her mouth shut over the period of the two-hour fitting at the Delavange offices because she was the model headlining the show, and if her waist deviated more than an inch, according to the asshole in charge, then it would throw off the balance of the huge angel wings she would be wearing to open and then close the show.

A back piece that weighed thirty pounds and was three feet taller than she was in the six-inch heels she would be wearing down the runway for Fashion Week. While the wings would go on over her arms and shoulders, a belt had also been made to fit around her waist, too. But to not take away from the fantasy, according to the team, she couldn’t afford to put on weight because then they would have to add to the belt.

A bunch of bullshit, really.

It was also her life in a nutshell.

“You okay?” Kayla asked. “This next appointment is just … are you sure you don’t want me to get you something? I can get it by—”

“No, I’m good.”

“Gigi, don’t be a hero.”

“Kayla, I’m fine.”

To prove it, she even opened her eyes and turned her head on the leather headrest to look her assistant in the face as she smiled. Gigi dared anyone to see her smile and tell her it was fake. She could sell the lie like nobody knew.

“You sure?” her pixie-like, red-headed assistant asked.

Gigi shrugged. “Does it matter? Another normal day in paradise, babe.”

Kayla sighed. “Yeah, I know, Gi.”

A normal day in Gigi’s life didn’t look very normal at all. She could easily go straight from a four-hour flight to a six-hour shoot or a fitting for some upcoming event, and from there, an interview or a meeting with any number of people. She had quickly learned that despite the fact everything revolved around her being there for those events, she was just a piece of the puzzle that other people moved from point A to point B to make it all work.

Her presence made money.

Simple as that.

To make it easier, she just followed directions. She accepted that her assistant had a better grasp of her daily schedule than she did. Time was cash but also, the only way she could covet any of that time for herself was to get through the mountain of responsibilities that came with her career as efficiently—and always with a smile—as possible.

It was exhausting.

In the business, it didn’t take very long for a model to realize there were plenty of people waiting in the shadows to step forward and provide whatever was needed to keep someone at the top of their game. Cocaine was a favorite of a lot of models—it kept them way up but also thin as fuck which was a must. Except the drug use didn’t just stop at keeping someone awake and smiling for shoots and runways in their world.

No, it was everywhere. At the parties. In to-go tumblers full of iced coffee. Backstage between outfit changes.