Chapter 221
Natalie admired herself in the mirror. God, this dress fit her curves just right.
“Make sure you leave the costume on the rack,” said one of the wardrobe attendants on set.
“Sure. No problem,” Natalle said, and went back to checking herself out.
In her current production, Natalie played the part of one of the leads inner circle of friends. It was a romcom, a Cinderella adaptation with a twist, where the lead is a well–to–do woman who falls for a down on his luck guy, mistreated by his family.
Natalie only cared about the plot enough to memorize her lines. What she loved, however, were the fancy dresses and jewelry that she got to wear on set every day.
This was the lifestyle she deserved for herself. The one she almost had, if that bastard Logan had made good and married her for real. She still fumed thinking back on how badly she fumbled that.
Logan was handsome. More importantly, he was rich. For those few brief weeks, she lived like an absolute queen.
Ug, if only she could have that back. Have him back. Well… have his money back, anyway. She could take or leave the rest of him. This content is © NôvelDrama.Org.
She’d be out there, visiting the expensive stores and treated like she belonged. She’d be invited to those high society parties and rub elbows with those more deserving of her time.
Suddenly, an idea struck her.
She was supposed to return her costume to wardrobe at the end of the day, but what if today she just… didn’t. She could borrow it for a while and return it later. Live the life of a high society woman for a while before she had to revert to her doldrums life.
It was unethical. Possibly immoral. The wardrobe attendant’s job could be on the line.
But to hell with it. How often did Natalie get to really live it up?
Her mind made up, she carefully sneaked out of the wardrobe trailer. She’d spent so long admiring herself in the mirror that most of the crew had already left for the day. It really wasn’t difficult to slink toward the exit and sneak off the set.
For the rest of the afternoon, Natalie felt like the queen she deserved to be as she went to the street with the most exclusive stores in town. Her credit card would decline if she tried to purchase anything, but no one needed to know that.
Besides, she had her most recent date’s credit card that she’d swiped from his wallet after they’d had sex last night. Surely he could afford to buy her a thing or two. She hoped he wouldn’t embarrass her by being someone poor.
Natalie had been very clear before the date that she would not be dating anyone without six figures in their bank account. Though seven or more was ideal.
Natalie heads into an expensive jewelry store, the kind that needed to buzz you in before the front door would unlock.
This was a true test to Natalie’s fancy dress and her haughty attitude. She pressed the bell to alert the attendant in charge of the door. When it took too long, Natalie rapped her knuckles on the window and gave her most displeased glare to the camera.
“I don’t have all day to be standing here on the street,” she snapped.
The door buzzed and the lock unlatched, Pleased, Natalie pulled it open and entered.
There were another few women already in the store, looking through the glass cases to the glittering jewelry beneath. A salesman was helping another woman. Someone from the backroom called, “Be right with you, Miss!”
Natalie ignored him and perused the jewelry. She stopped at a particularly beautiful, sparkling necklace with diamonds placed in flower shapes. Connected to a long chain, the diamonds would sparkle from between Natalie’s breasts.
She wanted it at once.
So distracted by the necklace, Natalie didn’t immediate notice when another woman came to stand
beside her.
“Good craftsmanship on that one,” the woman said.
“Yes,” Natalie said, immediately annoyed by this other woman moving in on her necklace. But then Natalie looked up into a familiar face.
Tina St. Louis. They’d never met, but Natalie recognized her from the tabloids and the high society news channels. In a world of elites, Tina was one of the highest. Her family owned stock in the oil industry. Her sister married an honest–to–goodness prince!
Few people in the world had more wealth than her family. If Tina St. Louis said this necklace was good, it was good.
Natalie’s eyes practically shined with money signs. If she could befriend Tina, maybe this was her way into a better life….
“You have such a good eye,” Natalie said, knowing compliments eased the way into any friendship. She held out her hand. “I’m Natalie.”
Tina seemed pleased. She shook Natalie’s hand. “Tina
I called the number for Tina provided by Logan’s grandfather. A man picked up and introduced himself as a St. Louis assistant. Was there one assistant for the family? Or was this man one of many instead? The latter seemed more likely.
“Yes, hello. My name is Hazel, I am an assistant to Logan Hatfield,” I said quickly, naming dropping Logan before I could be hung up on. I felt the assistant’s reservation over the phone as I spoke, but with the drop of Logan’s name, the tension eased.
“Hello, Hazel. How can I help Mr. Hatfield today?” the assistant asked.
This happened sometimes when talking through assistants. We weren’t ever really able to acknowledge each other. It was only our bosses that we were supposed to care about, like we were more servants than employees. Some didn’t even see us as people.
But I’d been playing this game for long enough now that I knew the rules. It didn’t bother me as much as it used to, though it would be nice to be acknowledged as my own person with my own value now and
again.
No matter. I wasn’t looking for or going to find any validation on this phone call, that much I knew for sure. Better to stick to the script.
“Mr. Logan Hatfield would like to take Miss Tina St. Louis out on a date,” I said. “Would that be amenable to Miss St. Louis?”
“Miss Tina St. Louis is out shopping right now,” the assistant said. “But I am confident that her answer will be yes.”
I paused, startled by that. As assistants, we were ever conduits for our employers to work through. Logan might have trusted me to handle matters on my own, but most were not like him.
For this assistant to accept a date request on Tina’s behalf meant either he deeply respected Logan and knew Tina would too… or the opposite was true. The assistant might not care about Logan at all, and therefore not care if Tina decided to cancel the date after the fact, effectively wasting Logan’s time and Exeffort.
I needed to know which. Like Logan cared for me, allowing me to flex my own judgement, I cared for him and his time. He had little enough to share with me as it was. I wasn’t going to let anyone waste it.
“The Hatfield name is prestigious,” I said,
The assistant hummed. “Logan is handsome, correct?”
I was shocked again. “Yes?”
“Then Tina will say yes,” he said. “Should we set a time?”