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Maybe she had oversold her crush on Tristan, but only because she knew she had no shot with him. It was supposed to be like having a crush on Zak Efron—no one really took that seriously. The prediction had even said she had to do something with her looks in order to get a man to notice her. Which was crap. Why was what she looked like the thing that would tip the scales? It shouldn’t be. And honestly, she was kind of mad about it.
Instead of trying to dance around the whole thing, this was a chance to get her sisters on the same page, namely that the prediction was the worst sort of objectification.
“You know how you said you knew Caleb was the one because you could be yourself?” she asked but didn’t wait for Havana’s nod. “My prediction says I have to get a makeover to find love. How is that a recipe for being myself?”
“Wait.” Havana shook her head and plopped down on the bed next to Ember. “Serenity told you to get a makeover to meet your soul mate? That’s too good. I’ve got some pictures I saved on my phone of hair styles that would—”
“No.” She could not cut off that thinking at the pass fast enough. “You’re not listening. I don’t want a makeover. How will that lead me to true love? It’s false advertising.”
Ember and Havana glanced at each other. The pause got longer and Aria’s gaze got narrower. What was that look for? Because she was silly and naïve about men? So? That was better than putting all your faith in someone who couldn’t be bothered to stick around. She’d had enough of being left behind by her own family. How much worse would it be if she actually fell in love with someone who could rightly be labeled her soul mate—only to be crushed when he took off?
She couldn’t give a man that kind of power. It was unthinkable. And if she couldn’t trust a man in the first place, there was no way a makeover would help that.
“It’s not false advertising,” Havana said, as Ember threw in, “Exactly. It’s a way to give yourself confidence so that you can be the best Aria possible. Then you meet someone who likes your confidence.”
Aria made a face. “Why? Because eyeshadow is the only way to land a man? That cannot be true. I don’t even want a
man on those terms.”
Ember cocked a brow at her. “What terms do you want a man on then?”
The spotlight that had just shifted onto Aria upped the temperature about a thousand degrees. Maybe she yearned to have someone who looked at her like Caleb looked at Havana. It wasn’t a crime. He was really in love with her, you could tell. And he was solid, a keeper, as evidenced by the ring on her sister’s third finger and Caleb’s new job as the mayor of Superstition Springs.
A part of her figured his military buddies were cut from the same cloth, which might be why she’d formed the Tristan Fan Club. Didn’t hurt that the man had a killer smile to match his silver tongue. Sure, he flirted with everyone but he did it so smoothly that you kind of wanted to believe he meant what he said to you. No man had ever flirted with her. It was a bit of a rush. No makeup required.
But that didn’t mean she wanted Tristan, per se. Maybe more like the idea of him.
“I want a man who sees me,” she blurted out. “Not the clothes I’m wearing. I don’t want to have to think about my hair and whether I picked the right color of lipstick to match my outfit. Lipstick fades anyway and then I’m left with just me anyway. Why not start out that way?”
That’s what she wanted. But since that wasn’t going to happen for her, she could moon over Tristan Marchande and never worry about having her heart crushed.
“I hear you.” Havana shrugged. “Then prove the prediction wrong. Get Tristan to take you out on a date without a makeover.”
Ember nodded eagerly. “I can respect a woman who has so much natural confidence that she doesn’t even worry about how she looks. That’s not me, not by a long shot. I’d kind of like to see how that’s done.”
Her sisters’ words unfolded like a lovely little bouquet inside, warming her instantly. They believed in her. Had totally bought what she’d sold. They both thought she could land a man like Tristan, no questions asked.
And best of all, if she was successful, she not only got a beautiful man to pay attention to her as her reward, she’d have done something worthy of her sisters’ belief in her. Then maybe they’d think twice about leaving her behind again.
“What, like a bet?” she ventured cautiously, still weighing out the craziness of the idea in her head versus the lovely thought of actually winning.
“Sure.” Ember shrugged with a glance at Havana. “I’ll take your shift at the diner for the night if you get him to ask you out and if you don’t, you babysit on your off night sometime. Havana will…what’ll you put up?”
They both glanced at their sister as she contemplated. “I’ll get Caleb to loan him the SUV for the date so he can take you anyplace you like. No dice and you have to come work for me for a day on town stuff.”
That was all easy stuff, but the bet part was incidental. It was the principle of the thing. There was no way she could refuse the challenge of proving she could garner a man’s attention without a makeover. But how in the world was she going to get Tristan to notice her like that? She needed help. Not from Mary Kay or Paul Mitchell but from someone who could stack the deck until it would be impossible for her to fail.
She knew exactly who to hit up.
Four
The barn renovation project team had almost finished nailing up the exterior siding. Isaiah stepped back from the area he’d been working on, pleased with his progress. No one could accuse him of slacking when Marchande’s side had nearly the same coverage.
He might have taken advantage of being alone for a few minutes while Marchande went for Powerade, or whatever passed for the least vile thirst quencher Mavis J had in stock at the grocery store in town. Normally he’d have used the down time to practice breathing or walking on his hands, but instead he’d gotten caught up with his appointed task.
Serenity’s rooftop chat had straightened him out pretty good. If he was head down at the barn, sweating through an honest day’s work to get this renovation done ASAP, he couldn’t be scouting around for the future Mrs. West. Which he wouldn’t have been anyway. Not really. Better safe than sorry.
Okay, he could admit a healthy curiosity about who might be the one Serenity thought he’d already met. Not because he planned to do anything about it if he did figure out who the prediction had in mind to heal and nurture his soul. Still.
