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“Not so much as you’d think,” Piper said. “That’s how I met Coop. Burying the ashes of his career.”
Coop snorted. The redheaded saleswoman clearly recognized she was in over her head and hustled Piper toward a dressing room.
“Nothing too crazy,” Coop called out. “She’s got enough of that going on in her head.”
The first dress was a drab forest green, but there was nothing drab about the skintight fit or the hemline, which barely cleared her butt. Thankfully, she’d shaved her legs, but still . . . “This isn’t exactly my style.”
“No fly?” Coop said from the other side of the dressing room door.
Okay, Piper had to laugh at that.
The saleswoman, whose name was Louise, looked mystified. “It’s really fashion forward.”
Piper winced at her reflection. An eternity stretched between the bottom of the dress and her bare feet. “I think I need to go a few steps fashion backward.” Or take a fast trip to H&M, which was where she really belonged.
“Lemme see,” Coop said.
The saleswoman pushed the dressing room door open. Coop sat on one of the big square silver-and-black ottomans not far from the mirrors. Piper tried to tug down the hem. “I look like a pine tree.”
“With really good legs,” Heath Champion said from the front entrance. He wandered into the store and sprawled on the ottoman next to Coop’s. “I like it.”
“I don’t,” Coop said, his eyes on her thighs. “Too conservative.”
She gaped at him. “In what universe is this conservative?”
He shook his head sadly. “You have to remember you’re not a mortician any longer.”
Heath grinned.
She gestured toward the sports agent. “What’s he doing here, Coop? Not that it isn’t a pleasure to see you, Mr. Champion, but why here?”
“Coop told me to show up, and what could I do? I’ve made millions off the guy.”
“I needed another opinion,” Coop said. “He’s more used to buying women clothes than I am.”
Louise appeared with another armload of dresses and hustled Piper back into the dressing room. In the next half hour, Piper modeled a slinky red number missing a middle, a dark blue number missing a front, and a gold thingy that made her look like a Little League trophy. “I’m an investigator,” she hissed at both men, “not a pitcher for the Peewee Penguins.”
Heath grinned. “I like this woman.”
“No mystery why,” Coop retorted.
It was a mystery to Piper, but she had something more pressing on her mind. “This is clearly not working,” she declared as Louise went off to gather up more dresses Piper didn’t want to wear. “I’d freeze to death in every one of these. Not to mention that I can’t do my job if I’m worrying the whole time about my . . . my cooter hanging out!”
That cracked them both up, clearly signaling that it was time for Piper to take charge. “Louise, you and I need to talk . . .”
8
After much wrangling, Piper ended up with a mulberry knit that had long, tight sleeves and a hem that nearly made it to her knees. The dress was high in the front but had enough dip in the back to be nightclub appropriate. Coop also insisted on a minuscule cobalt-blue bodycon dress that was only saved from sluttery by a longer, sheer black overlay. One glance at the final tab and she got light-headed. “I could have bought fifteen dresses at H&M for what one of these cost.”
“Your big mistake was not making him buy a couple more,” Heath said as they stepped into the sunny early-October afternoon.
A middle-aged man coming out of Starbucks spotted Coop and called out to him. “Hey, Coop! You’re the best!”
Coop waved at the guy.
“Piper’s gonna need shoes,” Champion said.
“She’ll have to put it on my bill, because I can’t stand listening to any more of her complaining.” Coop acted as if she weren’t standing right next to him. “I never met a woman so averse to spending my money.”
