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A knock at the hotel room door interrupted Mel’s reminiscence.

“Yes?” she said, through the door.  She was in her bathrobe, just getting ready to do her makeup.  She hadn’t ordered room service.  Who could this be?

“It’s Michel.  From Salon Dupre.  I’m here to do your makeup.”

What the…?  Melody opened the door.  Standing before her was the oddest man she had ever seen.  He looked like a pixie – a pixie in orange velour trousers and a see-through black shirt.  He had multiple earrings in both ears and a tattoo of an elephant head on his neck.  His hair was – well, avant-garde didn’t begin to describe it.  He had a large suitcase at his feet.

“I can do my own makeup.  Thanks, anyway.” 

Melody moved to close the door, but Michel swished by her into the room.  “No can do, mademoiselle.  Monsieur Ariando was very specific.”  He grinned at her.  “He said you’d refuse.”

“But…”  Melody was not leaving this room looking like a clown, no matter what Rafe wanted.

Michel held up his hand.  “He also said to tell you that I am the master of subtlety.  Your makeup will be so understated as to almost not exist.”

“Then why bother?” asked Melody.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk,” clucked Michel.  “Non-believers.” 

He looked around the room.  Hotel lighting was always so bad.  He opened his bag and pulled out a lamp, a student’s-desk lamp with a flexible coil neck.  Before Melody could protest further, he dropped to the floor and peered under the desk.  Then he crawled under it on all fours and plugged in the lamp.  He re-emerged and went to the window where he began heaving on an armchair.  Melody helped him position it in front of the desk.  He waved her into it.

Michel applied powders and creams, eye shadow, blush and assorted other products.  Melody couldn’t see how this much of anything could be called subtle.  And while Michel worked, he talked.  Melody’s one attempt to join in the conversation was cut off with a “No, no.  Keep still, please.”

So she just listened.  And she got the idea that she was not the first of Rafe’s “girls” to get this treatment.  She wondered if Michel thought she was a whore, or a mistress or a…she really wasn’t sure what.

“There!” announced Michel with satisfaction, standing back and clapping his hands.  “Voila!”  He gestured to the mirror. 

Melody turned and looked.  Omigod, she looked fantastic!  She looked back at Michel.  “Wow!” she said.

“Am I not a genius?” he said.  “An artiste!”

“I look great,” she admitted.

“More than great.  Divine!  Put on the dress!”  Michel plopped himself down on the end of the bed.  “Oh come on, I want to see the whole package.”

Melody slipped the dress from the hanger and disappeared into the bathroom.  She returned a minute later.

“Shoes!” said Michel.

Melody slipped on the heels.

“Turn!”

Melody obeyed.

Michel rummaged in his bag.  “Monsieur Rafe sent this too.” 

He pulled out a velvet box and opened it to reveal a silver chain.  It had a loop at one end and a two-inch long thin, black onyx cylinder on the other. The cylinder went through the loop and hung down at the base of her throat.  Like an arrow pointing to my breasts, thought Melody.

“Well?” she said.

“It’s wonderful,” said Michel.  “Except for the hair.”

Melody raised a hand self-consciously to her hair and took a step backward.

“No, no, don’t worry.  We’re not allowed to touch the hair.  Monsieur Rafe’s orders.  ‘Don’t touch the hair.’”

Melody laughed.  Yes indeed, Rafe!  If she was supposed to schmooze all her associates, she guessed it would be good if they could recognize her!

Michel looked at his watch.  “Okay, Cherie, it’s time to go.  Monsieur Rafe said to have you in the lobby by 8:00.”

Melody wondered what she should do for a purse.  She looked around.

“Purse?” asked Michel, succinctly.

Melody nodded.

“Are you on your period?”

Melody shook her head, somewhat taken aback.

“Then you don’t need one.”

“My room key…”  Melody held up the plastic card.

“Leave it at the front desk.  Put it in an envelope and have them keep it for you.”  Michel rummaged through the desk drawer and came up with some hotel stationery.

“I guess I could ask Rafe to put it in his pocket,” mused Melody.

“This is a better idea,” instructed Michel.  “It is not my experience that one always comes home from these affairs with the person one went with.”

“Good advice, Michel,” said Melody, “but highly unnecessary tonight.  Although…”  She reached for the envelope, “…still good advice.”

Michel packed up his magic potions, and they went down to the lobby.  Melody wondered about tipping him, but she didn’t have any money on her, and she had no idea of either the protocol or the appropriate amount. 

Michel read her mind.  “It’s taken care of,” he said, as they stepped off the elevator.  “But if you felt like talking me up, that wouldn’t hurt.”

“My pleasure,” smiled Melody, who wondered how her life had changed to one where her job now seemed to be to ‘talk people up’.

She dropped the key at the front desk and felt warmed by the appreciative glance from the desk clerk.  I’m Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, she thought.  Yeah, right!

“Melody.”

She turned to find Rafe Ariando standing two feet away from her.  “Wow!” she said without thinking.

Rafe looked amazing.  He was wearing a suit, but it didn’t look like a business suit.  It looked like a dressy suit, not a tux, but a jacket and pants in a dark, dark grey.  There was a texture to the jacket, so subtle Melody couldn’t even tell what it was, but when he moved, it flowed.  He was wearing a light grey silk shirt and no tie.  She didn’t think she’d ever seen him without a tie.  He’d even worn one on the plane.  He looked incredible!  And she knew that somehow he had chosen her outfit to compliment his.  He looked great.  She looked great.  Together, they looked phenomenal.

The cocktail party was fun.  At first, it was quite a formal atmosphere, very stiff.  Rafe moved her around the room, introducing her to business associates as ‘Melody Jones, the lead guitarist for Nick Carter’.  Melody smiled and sipped a glass of wine and made selections from the trays of hors d’oeuvres offered by circulating waiters.

Melody thought Rafe sure knew a lot of people who were in business business, not music business.  But he knew a lot of those too, and by the end of the second glass of wine and a dozen canapés, she was finished meeting the CEO of this and the Executive Vice-President of that and Mr. and Mrs. Moneybags and was being introduced to the head of this label and the agent for that group.

Then the musicians started to arrive.  Some people had been looking at their watch impatiently, but Rafe and Melody knew that musicians didn’t always live by the clock, but they would show up eventually.

“Melody Jones!”

She heard it more than once that evening as musician after musician recognized her.  After the initial small talk – you look good…who are you here with?...yeah, the wife and kids are good – they always asked her what she was doing in New York and if the rumors were true, that she was finally getting her butt out on the road.  And then every conversation came down to two words. 

“Nick Carter?”

This was where Rafe wanted her to jump in and ‘talk the kid up’.  He was quite disappointed the first time when all Melody did was nod and say, “Yep. Nick Carter.” 

Rafe drew her aside a moment later and tried to talk to her about it.  She stood on her tiptoes and whispered in his ear, “You do your job, and I’ll do mine.  Trust me.”  Neither one of them noticed the photographer taking their picture.

So Rafe backed off and let Mel circulate on her own, crossing her path occasionally to ask if she was having a good time, but really just checking to make sure she wasn’t having too much to drink.

“We make a good team,” he said to her at one point.

“That’s great,” she retorted.  “But next time you get to wear the heels!”

Rafe threw his head back and laughed.  It was infectious, and Melody started laughing too.  They didn’t notice the photographer that time either.

After the party ended, Rafe asked if she wanted to go out to a club – go dancing or something.  Melody was tired and her feet hurt and she didn’t think Rafe really wanted to anyway.  But she was touched that he offered.

“Thanks, but no,” she said, with a smile, “I’m pretty tired.”

“Okay,” said Rafe, picking up her hand.  “This was great of you tonight, Mel.  And tomorrow night…”

Oh no! thought Mel.  Again?!

“Relax,” said Rafe.  “Nick will be there this time.  We’re going to a club.  Wear…whatever.”  He squeezed her hand and let it go.

Melody retrieved her key from the front desk and said goodnight to Rafe in the lobby, brushing aside his offer to see her safely to the door of her room.  He said he had a few phone calls to make and he was going to have a nightcap in the bar.

“And Mel…um…”

She looked at him.  Yes?

“You can keep the clothes.  They’re yours now.”

Melody nodded at him and got on the elevator.  Very interesting, she thought.  It was the first time she had ever seen Rafael Ariando blush.

She washed her face and brushed her teeth and climbed into bed.  She turned off the light and lay back on the pillow, running over the evening in her mind, bringing herself down to sleep mode.  And as she drifted off, the ghost of a smile on her face, she was totally unaware that her last thought, the one that made her smile, was that she was going to see Nick again tomorrow.