Crazy About Cameron: The Winslow Brothers #3 (The Blueberry Lane Series -The Winslow Brothers) (23 page)

(Excerpt from Campaigning for Christopher, The Winslow Brothers #4 by Katy Regnery. All rights reserved.)

Julianne Crow’s feet hurt.

No, not hurt.

Burned like they were on fire.

And no wonder…she’d been on them for almost six straight hours, out in the middle of nowhere at some vineyard, waitressing at a wedding for a bunch of entitled, elitist asses. Speaking of the
gluteus maximus
, hers had been pinched about three dozen times, she’d been leered at fairly consistently since her arrival and twice she’d been propositioned outright about having a “quickie.”

But worst of all was the blonde moron in the Brooks Brothers suit and fraternity tie who’d had the gall to ask her “Dot or feather?” after staring at her face with narrowed eyes and licking his lips suggestively.

“Excuse me?” she’d responded, dumbstruck that he’d be so glibly insulting.

“Dot or feather?” he’d asked again, grinning at his cohort, who took his scotch on the rocks and cocktail napkin from her proffered hand.

His friend sipped his drink, having the decency to look embarrassed.
Though not enough decency, apparently, to intervene,
she thought acidly.

“I’m sorry,” she’d said, barely able to keep from snarling at his overtly racist inquiry and determined not to entertain it, “but I don’t understand the question.”

“What kind of Indian are you?” Brooks Brothers snickered, his blue eyes sharp, his smile mean. When she didn’t answer, he shrugged. “Dot would’ve at least gotten the joke. Feather it is.”

Her eyes blazed with fury and embarrassment and frankly, if she had a feather with her, she would’ve liked to shove it up his ass. Instead, with all the dignity she could muster, she offered him a brittle smile and turned to walk away. She refused to sink to his level, but he had inadvertently made her mission tonight that much easier.

As she walked back to the bar inside the massive tasting room of The Five Sisters vineyard, she reviewed the instructions she’d been given before the reception: find the youngest of the bride’s four brothers—a tall, blonde man named Christopher Winslow—slip the Rohypnol in his drink, and then she’d have about twenty minutes to get him somewhere private before the drug kicked in completely.

Still upset about the mean-spirited joke courtesy of Brooks Brothers, she slammed her empty silver tray down on the copper wine bar, making it clatter loudly.

“Whoa,” said Joe, the gray-haired bartender whom Julianne knew from previous waitressing gigs. “That bad?”

“Worse,” she said. “These guys are total assholes. White, rich, entitled, arrogant assholes.”

“You just gotta shake it off.” Joe chuckled softly, setting two shot glasses on the bar and pouring two whiskeys. He nudged one over to her and picked up the other, holding it at eye level between them. “To you, Jules. Remember me when you make it big, huh, kid?”

She huffed softly, her anger slowly ebbing away as she picked up the other shot glass and rolled her eyes at Joe. “Yeah, right.”

He knocked back the shot and placed the glass directly in the soapy sink before him, washing it out and rinsing it quickly. “You don’t have enough faith in yourself. You’re a beautiful girl, Jules. Young and smart, too. You’re gonna go all the way.”

Julianne lifted her glass in a short salute, then leaned back and pressed the cool glass to her lips, letting the whiskey burn a trail down her throat before placing the shot glass back on the copper bar gently. “Thanks, Joe.”

“Alrighty now. What can I get you?”

“Two vodka martinis straight up, a Seven and Seven on the rocks, and…” She thought about Christopher Winslow, whom she’d been watching steadily, yet covertly, throughout the evening. “…a Dewar’s. Neat.”

“You got it, kid.”

He shuffled down the bar, grabbing a bottle of Seagram’s, and Julianne turned around, slipping out of her torturous black heels and leaning back against the bar for a few moments. Reaching up, she grabbed her long, straight black hair in her fist and lifted it from her neck, sighing as the cool evening air touched on her damp skin.

She frowned at the pretty barn-like room before her. Overhead rafters were wrapped with white tulle and twinkle lights, which gave the entire space a soft, romantic glow. Over three hundred white chairs in mostly-neat rows sat forgotten as wedding guests ate, drank and danced at the tented reception outdoors.

Joe was wrong. Julianne
did
have faith in herself.

She wouldn’t have left her home in South Dakota and traveled all the way to Philadelphia if she didn’t faith in herself. She wouldn’t have signed a contract with Reingold if she didn’t have faith in herself. She wouldn’t be working these godawful catering gigs to make ends meet if she didn’t have faith in herself. She
absolutely
had faith in herself. She just didn’t have much faith in the rest of the world.

“You wanted that Dewar’s neat, right? No ice?”

Julianne let her thick hair fall onto her neck and turned back to Joe, wincing as she slipped her feet into the tight, hot heels, making every blister scream in protest.

“Neat,” she confirmed, thinking about Christopher Winslow sipping the amber liquid with no ice and hoping it was Dewar’s and not something fancier. By now, however, at his fourth or fifth drink, perhaps he wouldn’t be able to tell the difference anyway.

Joe poured two shots into an old-fashioned glass and added it to the tray, then took out two frosted martini glasses from a freezer under the bar and added them to Julianne’s tray.

“Say…how’d that job go? The one in New York?”

Julianne sighed. “Okay. But they didn’t end up using my pictures. They used another girl instead.”

Joe clucked softly, pouring vodka carefully into the glasses. “Your day’s coming, Jules. I know it.”

Her lips twitched. After four months in Philadelphia during which she’d waitressed far more than she’d modeled, her “day” was sure taking it’s time coming.

Frances Watson, from Reingold Talent, had called Julianne several months ago out of the blue, asking if she’d ever considered a modeling career. At first Julianne was sure it was a joke—one of her half-sisters or cousins putting on a posh voice and trying to make a fool of her. She’s said a few choice words to “Frances” and hung up the phone, only to have it ring again a moment later.

“Miss Crow, it’s Frances Watson again. My phone number is 717-555-4895, and our website is www.reingoldtalent.com. Why don’t you look us up and call me back. I saw the promotional video you narrated on the Oglala Lakota College website and I’d like to talk to you about a possible modeling contract.”

Julianne’s mouth had dropped open as she stared down at the dirty kitchen floor in her mother’s double-wide trailer in shocked surprise. None of her family members could have cooked up such an intricate rouse. This had to be for real.

She’d apologized for calling the woman a
kaga
, which meant “demon” in Julianne’s native Lakota, and listened to what Frances Watson had to say. Apparently, Reingold Talent didn’t feel they had enough minority models in their agency portfolio and they were anxious to sign several girls who had a more unique or exotic look in anticipation of upcoming trends. Julianne had scoffed at this, fingering her lush hips and telling Frances Watson she had the wrong girl.

“I’m no model,” she explained without shame. She was fit and healthy, but a far cry from the willowy women she noticed in fashion magazines. “I’m not a small woman.”

“That’s fine,” said Frances Watson in a warm, cultured voice, like the white ladies used in the soap operas her
unci
, or grandmother, watched faithfully every afternoon. “I’m not looking for typical models. In fact, we would be delighted to sign some plus-size girls to our roster. What size do you wear, Julianne?”

“Fourteen,” she said, feeling her cheeks grow hot from her lie. “Or sixteen.”

“Perfect,” said Frances Watson distractedly, like she was writing down this information. “Would you be willing to come to Philadelphia next weekend? All expenses paid, of course. We could take some photos, talk about a contract, maybe even—”

Julianne hadn’t waited to hear the rest of the sales pitch. She didn’t need to. Opportunities like this one didn’t land on her scuffed-up doorstep every day and she wasn’t about to let this one pass her by.

“Yes. I’ll come.”

“Uh. Oh. Well, wonderful!” said Frances Watson, her voice surprised and pleased at the same time. “I didn’t expect—I mean, that’s terrific.”

They traded contact information and Frances Watson said her assistant would call Julianne the next day to make the arrangements. That was just over five months ago. Five months in which she’d appeared in the print and on-line catalogues for Land’s End and Soft Surroundings, and gone to a lot of go-sees. She’d booked a few more paying jobs, too, for which she’d been compensated, but plus-sized, taller-than-average Indian girls didn’t appear to be on the top of anyone’s list right now, despite Frances Watson’s continued encouragement. She felt it was just a matter of time until she was a hot commodity—she was unwavering in the opinion that Julianne “had something.”

Yeah,
she thought,
I have something, all right: bills piling up.

Moving from her home on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southern South Dakota to  Philadelphia had been a culture-shock in every possible way, but the worst of it had been the cost of everything. She wasn’t prepared for her $750 per month rent, or the fact that her groceries, which she considered modest, cost over $200 per month. She had to keep her skin moisturized and hair conditioned, and though Reinhold had paid for her headshots, portfolio and business cards, Julianne needed clothes for her auditions and appointments and those weren’t cheap either.

She’d expected to be on her feet by now—making regular money from frequent jobs—but it hadn’t happened yet, and things felt tighter and tighter every month.

Which was why, when she’d been approached by the man in the black hat earlier this evening, she’d listened to what he had to say regardless of his shady and unexplained appearance at the back of the tasting room where she was throwing out a bag of garbage in the dumpster for Joe.

“Hey,” he’d whispered, catching her attention. “You waitressing here tonight?”

Tamping down her fierce desire to make some quip about how much she just liked wearing waitressing outfits for fun, she’d turned to him and nodded.

“You want to make a quick $500?”

She’d sneered at him, taking a step away, back toward the door to the tasting room. Julianne wasn’t exactly a stranger to smarmy come-ons, but she certainly didn’t entertain them.

“Wait. Wait,” he’d said. “Not like that. Just take some pictures for me. $500 for some pictures.”

At that point, she’d turned around, fixing him with her almost-black eyes before dropping them to the smart phone in his outstretched hand.

“What kind of…pictures?”

“Not of you. Of someone else. Someone attending this wedding.”

“Show me the money,” she’d said suspiciously, looking over her shoulder to be sure the catering manager wasn’t nearby. As much as she didn’t love waitressing, she couldn’t afford to lose these jobs either.

He’d quickly pulled out his wallet and shown her the neat row of $100 bills.

“Pictures of who?” she’d asked.

“There’s a man coming here tonight. Brother of the bride. Man by the name of Christopher Winslow. You heard of him?”

Julianne shrugged. Sure, she’d heard his name on the radio or TV, maybe. He was in politics or running for office or something. He was white and blonde and though he was about the handsomest man she’d ever seen, he also looked posh and superior—like someone who’d barely give an Indian like her the time of day.

“He’s not a good man,” black-hat had continued, sweeping his beady eyes over Julianne’s face. “He’s…he’s, um, he’s racist!”

Julianne had stiffened as though on command, her eyes blazing.

From an early age she’d witnessed the racial struggle between the Indians on her reservation and the white men and women in the border towns. Black-hat had hit a nerve and she took a step closer to him, her blood boiling at the thought of a closet racist being elected to any position of power or authority.

“What do you need?” she asked through clenched teeth.

The man had scrambled in his pocket for something, pulling out a small, clear, plastic baggie and passing it to Julianne who shoved it quickly in her pocket.

“That’s Rohypnol. Put two tablets in his drink. It’ll knock him out completely in a little less than half an hour, which means you’ll have twenty minutes to take him somewhere quiet.”

“I’m not going to—”

“No. You don’t have to do anything with him. In fact, you don’t even have to get your face in the pictures. Just take some compromising shots, you know? His hand on your leg, a couple bottles of booze surrounding him. Loosen up his tie and mess up his hair. Lipstick on his collar. He’s rich, you know? And good-looking. He’s been able to present himself as this paragon of virtue, but he’s not. He’s not a good man. Just make him look…you know—”

“Bad.”

“Bad,” confirmed the man with a satisfied smirk.