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  “Nothing brassy,” he said. “We’ll have the stylist put in several shades, so it will look natural.”

  For someone who had never even put a temporary rinse on her hair, bleaching her hair to several shades of blond seemed at least as difficult as putting a man on the moon. “H-how long would that take?”

  “Oh, several hours, I’d think. Your hair will have to be double-processed.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Your own pigment will have to be bleached out, then blond pigment streaked in to replace it.”

  Well, at least that made sense. She didn’t know if she’d ever have the nerve to do anything that drastic, but it was an option she could consider. “I’ll think about it,” she said dubiously.

  “Think hard,” he said. “What else?”

  She sighed. “My clothes. I have no sense of style.”

  He looked at the skirt and blouse she wore. She had changed out of her pants as soon as she got home, because she couldn’t stand another minute of worrying about whether or not people were looking at her butt. “Actually, you do,” he drawled. “Unfortunately, it’s all bad.”

  Her cheeks turned red, and he laughed. “Don’t worry,” he said kindly, extending a hand to help her to her feet. “You just never learned how to make the most of yourself. You have a lot of potential.”

  “I do?”

  “You do.” He made a circling motion with his finger. “Turn around. Slowly.”

  Self-consciously she did so.

  “You have a good figure,” he said. “You should show it, instead of hiding it inside those old-lady clothes. Your skin is excellent, you have good teeth, and I like those odd eyes you have. I’ll bet you’ve been embarrassed by your eyes all your life, haven’t you?”

  She almost squirmed, because as a child she’d been hideously aware of her different-colored eyes and always tried to blend into the background so no one would notice them. “For God’s sake, play them up,” Todd said. “They’re different, special. It isn’t as if you have one brown eye and one blue, which would really look weird, and I don’t know if it’s genetically possible anyway. You’ll never be a ravishing beauty, but you can definitely be very, very nice to look at.”

  “That’s all I want, anyway,” she said. “I don’t think I could handle ravishing.”

  “I’ve heard it’s a burden,” he said, smiling at her. “The best light is in my bathroom. So step into my boudoir, if you dare, and let’s get started on this transformation.”

  Daisy extracted a small bag from her purse. “I brought my makeup.”

  “Let’s see what you have.” He took the bag from her and opened it. He didn’t make a tsking sound, but she got the feeling he barely refrained. “That will do for a start,” he said with kind forbearance.

  He lead the way through his bedroom to the bath, and if Daisy had ever harbored any doubts about Todd’s sexual affiliation, his bedroom settled it. It was exquisitely furnished in Chippendale, with a huge four-poster bed that was swathed in graceful swags of netting, and with huge, lush potted plants artistically arranged around the room. She wished her own bedroom looked half as good.

  My goodness, even his bathroom was decorated. He’d done it in green and white, with touches of peach and dusty blues. She’d never been in a man’s bathroom before, she realized. She was faintly disappointed to see an ordinary toilet, though of course there was no reason for him to have a urinal hanging on the wall. Besides, it wouldn’t have gone with the decor.

  “I don’t have a vanity chair, sorry,” he said, smiling again. “Men don’t sit down to shave.”

  She’d never thought of it before, but he was right; shaving was something else men didn’t sit down to do.

  “Okay, first get your hair away from your face. Do you have a headband or anything?”

  She shook her head.

  “Then tuck it behind your ears and brush it away from your forehead.”

  She did as he said. That awful self-conscious feeling was back; her fingers were clumsy, unable to manage the simple act of tucking her hair behind her ears without fumbling. She suspected she’d stumble over her own feet if she had to walk anywhere right now.

  He opened a drawer in the built-in vanity and took out a box, about ten inches wide and five inches thick. He flicked the clasp, raised the lid, and trays unfolded—trays filled with all sorts of brushes and lipsticks, arrays of colors for the eyes and cheeks all displayed in little containers. “My goodness,” she blurted. “You have more makeup than Wal-Mart.”

  He laughed. “Not quite. This box brings back memories, though. I was on Broadway for a while, and you have to slather on layers of makeup to keep from looking like a ghost when the lights hit you.”

  “That sounds like fun. I’ve never been to New York. I’ve never done much of anything.”

  “It was fun.”

  “Why did you come back?”

  “It wasn’t home,” he said simply “Besides, Mother needed someone to take care of her. That’s the way it works: they take care of you when you’re young, you take care of them when they’re old.”

  “Family,” she said, smiling, because her own was so close.

  “Exactly. Now,” he said, his tone turning brisk, “let’s get started.”

  Less than an hour later, entranced, Daisy stared into the mirror. Her lips parted in wonder. Oh, she wasn’t a raving beauty, but the woman in the mirror was attractive, and she looked confident, lively. She didn’t fade into the wallpaper. And most important, men would notice her!

  The process hadn’t been painless. First Todd had insisted she pluck her eyebrows: “You don’t want Joan Crawford eyebrows, dear. She had one brow hair that grew to about three inches long, and she named it Oscar, or something like that.” But thankfully he hadn’t wanted her to have Bette Davis eyes, either, so she’d been able to limit the tweezing to a few stragglers.

  Then he had walked her through the application of a full makeup job, and, to her relief, it wasn’t very complicated. The main thing was not to use too much, and to always have a tissue and cotton tip at hand to repair any mistakes or wipe off excess. Even mascara was easy, once she had used the tissue to blot most of the goop off the little brush before applying it to her lashes.

  “Heathens,” she had muttered, surveying her lovely dark lashes in the mirror. There wasn’t a caterpillar in sight.

  “Beg pardon?”

  “Mascara makers. They’re heathens. Why don’t they just tell you to blot most of the mascara off the brush before you start?”

  “Honey, they have enough to worry about warning people not to poke it in their eyes, or eat it. I guess they figure if you really want to wear mascara, you’ll learn how.”

  Well, she had wanted, and she had learned.

  “I did it,” she said numbly, staring at her reflection. Her complexion was smooth and bright, her cheeks softly flushed, her eyes mysterious and larger, her lips full and moist. It hadn’t been difficult at all.

  “Well, honey, of course you did. There’s nothing to it; just practice and don’t go overboard with the color. Now, let’s think about style. Which would you rather shoot for: nature girl, old money, or sex kitten?”

  Todd stood in his open front door and cheerfully waved a good-bye to Daisy. He couldn’t help smiling. This was the first time he’d ever spent any time with her, though of course he’d known who she was, and he really liked her. She was touchingly naive for someone her age, but fresh and bright and honest, without a jaded bone in her body. She had absolutely no idea how to make the most of her looks, but, thank God, he did. When he was finished with her, she was going to be a knockout.

  He strode to the phone and dialed a number. As soon as the call was answered on the other end, he said, “I have a candidate. Daisy Minor.”

  SEVEN

  Glenn Sykes was a professional. He was careful, he paid attention to details, and he didn’t let himself get emotionally involved. He’d never spent a day in jail; in fact, he