Once Upon Stilettos (Enchanted Inc #2) (19 page)

“You should have it, just in case. Now go try it on. Shoo!”

She followed me to the fitting room, then waited outside when it came my turn to go inside. The dress fit beautifully, clinging to my waist, skimming over my hips, and then flowing almost to my knees, and I could already imagine wowing Ethan with it on a date. As guilty as I felt about letting my mom buy me things, I couldn’t let this go. “Come on out, honey, I want to see you in it,” she called from outside the fitting room.

I came out and gave her a catwalk turn. She nodded. “Yep, we’re getting it, and your dad can lump it. Tells me I’m seeing things, ha!”

After she paid for the dress, I got a burst of inspiration. “Come on, there’s something I want to show you,” I said, leading her to the escalators. This was a sight she’d appreciate more than almost any tourist attraction in the city: the designer shoe department. I didn’t expect the worship Gemma gave the place, but Mom would be suitably impressed, I was sure.

“This is the designer department,” I said in a hushed voice as we stepped off the escalator and walked past all the high-end boutiques.

“Your Aunt Sally would think she’d died and gone right to heaven if she saw this,” she said in an equally hushed voice.

“And here are the shoes. Some of these are amazing.”

She didn’t hold any to her breast in rapture like Gemma did, but she did gawk. I’d been right about her considering this as good as visiting a museum.

I squeezed her hand. “There’s one pair of shoes I really want you to see. Gemma and I found these a couple of weeks ago.” I led her to the boutique where the red stiletto pump was on display.

The moment I saw it again, I knew those shoes were meant to be mine.

“I
’m going to get those,” I said softly, more to myself than to Mom. “Aren’t they gorgeous?”

“They’re beautiful,” she agreed. “But aren’t they a little flashy for you?”

“You were just saying I needed to be more sophisticated and glamorous.”

A salesman approached and said, “May I help you?”

I picked up the red shoe. “I’d like to try this in a seven medium, please.”

“One moment, miss.”

Mom took the sample shoe away from me and turned it over to look at the price tag. Then she gasped. “Katie Beth, did you see how expensive these are? You could buy a whole outfit for that much.”

“I just want to try them on,” I said, flopping into a nearby chair and slipping out of my loafers. “And they’re not that expensive for good shoes. They’re half the price of a pair of Manolos or Jimmy Choos.”

The salesman returned with a box, then knelt at my feet. As he slid the shiny red pump onto my foot, I knew exactly how Cinderella must have felt. I felt a surge of power, like I could take on the world and have any man I wanted. “Wow,” I breathed, more sigh than actual speech.

“How do those feel?” the salesman asked, sitting back on his heels. I thought I saw a flicker of desire in his eyes. Maybe he had a foot fetish and had found his dream job of putting gorgeous shoes on women’s feet all day.

I gingerly stood up, wobbling for a second in the unfamiliar high, narrow heels. Once I got my balance, I took a few tentative steps that flowed into a supermodel strut. I felt like every head in the entire department had turned to watch me, and I loved the feeling. I’d never felt more alluring.

“I am definitely getting these,” I said, when I returned to Mom and the salesman.

“But what would you wear them with?” Mom asked. “You couldn’t wear red with them because it would either clash or be too much.”

“These shoes would be the outfit. I’d wear something basic and simple as a backdrop,” I argued, using Gemma’s reasoning. Now I understood what Gemma had meant. I should have listened to her and bought these shoes the first time I saw them. Everything would have worked out so much better if I had, I was sure.

Mom picked up the same style of pump, but in basic black. “If you want to get those shoes, why not these? They’re more versatile. You could wear these with everything, but without drawing so much attention. You don’t want people saying, ‘Oh, here comes Katie in her red shoes again.’”

“Why not?” I challenged. “They could be my signature item.”

She shook her head. “But they’re not you. You’d be wearing someone else’s signature.”

I put my hands on my hips. “Why aren’t they me? They might be me, but you don’t know me anymore. Or I could grow into them.” I whirled to look at the salesman, who’d shrunk back and was pretending to mind his own business. I had a feeling this wasn’t the first shoe department dispute he’d ever heard.

“They do look lovely on you,” he said, “and those shoes are very popular. I can show you a pair in another color, if you like.”

“No thank you,” I said. “I want these.” I walked over to a mirror and admired myself. I’d wear these shoes on my next date with Ethan. He wouldn’t be able to resist me. I could already see how the date would go: everything would be perfect, with absolutely no weirdness; we’d go back to his place, drink that bottle of wine, and then I might have the first sex I’d had in longer than I cared to think—since my last serious college boyfriend.

But I couldn’t use that reasoning on Mom, who still thought her little girl was a virgin. I might as well have been, considering I’d been with only one guy a couple of times more than five years ago. It was almost embarrassing how inexperienced I was for someone my age. Part of it was that I couldn’t bring myself to treat sex as casually as most people my age seemed to. Part of it was that most men acted as though they thought touching me would be like defiling their baby sister.

That was all going to change. I was ready, and it was high time, too. I sat down and reluctantly slid my feet out of the shoes, then put my old loafers on again. “You’re really going to buy those?” Mom asked, her voice heavy with disapproval.

“Yep, and it’s my money, so I can get them if I want to. They’ll go great with that black velvet dress.” Before she could stop me, and before I could change my mind, I handed my credit card over to the salesman. If I didn’t eat out for a month and stayed away from the bookstore, I could probably pay the shoes off in a couple of months. By then, I was sure I’d have worn them several times and my life would have changed completely.

Once I’d signed the credit card slip and had the shoes packed carefully into a big shopping bag, I had to resist the temptation to peek in the bag repeatedly on the way down the escalators and out of the store.

“I don’t know what’s gotten into you, Katie,” Mom said. “You were always so practical.”

“But Mom, practical is boring. I want to do something different. It’ll be good for me to get a little wild and crazy. I’m only twenty-six, and I act and dress like a middle-aged woman. This is my chance to get out of my rut and shake things up.”

She looked at me with wry amusement. “And you think those shoes are the key?”

“I think it’s the attitude the shoes give me. They’re like Dorothy’s ruby slippers, only they get me away from home instead of taking me home.”

“I’m sure you know what’s best for you.”

I thought I did. But then I was hit by a wave of buyer’s remorse. I looked into the bag again, wondering if I should turn around and return the shoes. Who was I kidding? They were totally impractical, and me wearing those shoes would be like a Halloween costume. Nobody would believe it. They’d just think it was sweet little Katie, trying to act all grown-up and sexy. They’d laugh at me instead of being impressed.

“Maybe you’re right,” I said with a deep sigh. “Where am I going to wear these, anyway?”

“Thank goodness. I knew you’d see reason eventually.”

We turned around to head back to Bloomingdale’s, but we must have caught the surveillance detail off-guard, for they didn’t have time to get out of sight—and since I doubted they yet knew about Mom’s immunity, they probably weren’t concerned about staying out of sight. We nearly came face-to-face with a hovering gargoyle.

I grabbed Mom’s shoulder and spun her around to walk in the opposite direction. “On second thought, they’ll think I’m crazy if I go right back. Let’s window-shop a while longer and then we can return the shoes.”

As we walked away, I glanced back over my shoulder, trying silently to signal the gargoyle that it had to stay well out of sight, but it was gone.

“Did you see that?” Mom asked, also looking over her shoulder.

I tried to keep her moving forward. “See what?”

“There was this thing, flying right at us.”

“I think a little kid had a helium balloon. The street vendors are really out today. Want to buy a designer knockoff purse?”

She glanced over her shoulder again. “No, I don’t think it’s on a string.”

I looked behind us, but the gargoyle must have finally caught a clue and ducked out of sight. I’d have to have a word with Sam about his people. This one seemed a bit slow. “Well, there’s nothing there now,” I said, steering Mom around the corner.

“Why don’t you return the shoes now, and then we won’t have to worry about coming back.”

I peered into my shopping bag and even opened the shoe box lid a crack so I could admire the red stilettos. “On second thought, I’ve changed my mind. I want to keep them. They’re the most beautiful shoes I’ve ever owned.”

She shook her head wearily. “Well, if you say so. But I’m not letting you spend anymore money today.”

“There’s nothing more I want to buy.”

“Then we can get lunch. I want to go to a deli, like in the movies.”

This part of town wasn’t my usual stomping grounds, but you can’t swing a dead cat in Manhattan without hitting a deli, so finding a place for lunch wasn’t too difficult. I doubted that the fact that there was an available table at the first deli we found on a day like today was a good sign of quality food, but I didn’t feel like looking for anything else, so we settled in for lunch. It’s pretty hard to mess up a corned-beef sandwich. I pondered trying on my new shoes again while Mom studied the menu.

“I guess I’ll just get a sandwich at these prices,” she said. “But will that be enough?”

“It should be more than enough. We could probably even share one sandwich. They make really big sandwiches around here.”

“Hmm. Or maybe I could try matzo ball soup. I’ve never had that before. What’s it like?”

“It’s like chicken soup with big, round dumplings in it.”

“Oh.” She frowned at the menu some more, then looked up and blinked. “Isn’t that your friend over there?”

I turned to see where she was pointing. “Over where?”

“Leaning against that wall.”

The entrance to the deli was crowded enough that it was difficult to make out if anyone leaning against the wall was someone I ought to know, but then a tall, thin man emerged from the crowd and walked toward us, a smug smirk on his face—I mean, even more smug than normal, which was pretty smug. “Oh, that friend,” I said. “And he’s not really a friend.”

It appeared that Owen had been wrong about one thing—which might have been a first. Idris wasn’t after him. He appeared to be focusing on me. If Idris had been targeting Owen, he’d be up in some village on the Hudson, disrupting Owen’s weekend with his foster parents. And from what little Owen had said about his foster family, I got the distinct impression that he’d welcome the distraction. I, however, would have preferred to skip the intrusion.

My glower didn’t appear to bother Idris in the least, though. He walked up to our table, pulled out a chair, and plunked himself into it. “Mind if I join you?” he asked rhetorically. “It could take forever before I get a seat on my own.”

It was a situation Emily Post didn’t cover: What do you do if your sworn enemy invites himself to join you and your mother for lunch, and you don’t want your mother to know you even have sworn enemies? The only answer I could think of was to act like it was no big deal. That would probably drive him crazier than anything else I could do. And it wasn’t as if he could use magic to harm either of us or do anything else to us in that crowd.

“Please, join us,” I said with a cyanide-laced saccharine smile. “Mom, this is Phelan Idris. You probably remember him from the other night, when he left before I could introduce you. I know him from work.” Which was true enough. “Mr. Idris, this is my mother, Mrs. Chandler.”

I had to fight back any signs of triumph at how intensely uncomfortable he looked with formal manners. “Um, hi,” he said, fidgeting in his seat. I wished now that we’d gone to some froufrou ladies-who-lunch restaurant where he’d have been even more out of place. Mom narrowed her eyes at him. Clearly, she thought he couldn’t come from good people to be so lacking in manners.

I continued acting like I was hosting a tea party. I might not be able to zap him the way Owen did, but I could Southern-belle him to death. “What brings you out today? Getting a start on your Christmas shopping?” I asked with fake cheer.

He fidgeted some more, looking like a six-year-old his first time at the grown-up table. “Um, well, uh,” he said, quite eloquently. It was hard to believe that this was the guy who had all of MSI up in arms, the reason Merlin had been brought back to lead the company. He was nothing more than a geek with delusions of grandeur.