The Frame-Up (The Golden Arrow #1)(66)

“Are you mad?”

“Beyond pissed.”

“Are we okay, though?”

“We will be, eventually. Let’s work on keeping my ass out of jail first, shall we? You owe me some damn fine costumes for at least a year to make up for this.”

I offer a small smile that doesn’t extend much past my lips. “Deal. I need to know if you have any other journals, and . . . well, the police are going to ask for the journal, and I want to see it before they have it. I think we should copy it in case the crooked cop gets his or her hands on it.”

He moves off, removing his color-guard apron and tossing it on the counter as he goes. “I’ll go grab it. Come with and ask me whatever else you need to know.”

“Okay. Do you have any more journals or know where more of them are?”

“No, I was just given the one by Senior as a gift. Maybe he gave the others away. I don’t know. He was pretty eccentric. Maybe he hid them in a safe or something.”

That confirms my suspicions, but at least L is a second voice for that. I follow him up the narrow stairs in the back of the salon to his apartment. It’s cluttered with what I can describe only as bachelor queen kitsch. Pieces of costumes, wigs, piles of workout magazines, and dirty dishes scattered around a one-color-palette living room dominated by a TV and gaming system. “Okay. I also need to know about your relationship with Edward Casey Senior. I know you said you worked for him and he helped out, but his son seems to feel like it was more. Not in that way, but as in you guys spent a lot of time together?”

Lawrence digs through a box on the kitchen counter, muttering to himself. “I didn’t give you the journal, did I?”

“No, you made copies and took it back.” A tingle starts at the base of my spine.

“Maybe I put it in my closet up here.” He opens what should be a second smaller bedroom door to reveal his personal walk-in closet. Rows and rows of queen costumes. I rarely come in here; he keeps his current stuff downstairs. Lawrence has amassed an impressive collection of fabric.

I’m in awe, looking at a history of my costume design skills. I spy a hastily sewn drapey white evening gown with a stitch so crooked, my fingers itch to rework the entire thing. My first costume for L.

“L, do you keep all my costumes?”

“Of course I do. They’re works of art. Listen, I mean it. When you’re winning awards for costume design, I’m going to sell these for millions. MG originals.” He’s digging through a stack of papers on a side table.

It touches something inside me. I forget the case for a moment and run my hands along the fabric. This is why I love design. Each of these costumes allows the wearer to step into another skin. To be whoever they want for the night. It’s part of what I want to do with my job, and I bite my lip thinking about the promotion I may or may not get. As written right now, it doesn’t out-and-out include design time. I’d still be in limbo. If I, by some miracle, get the job, do I still want it?

“Do you think the queens were serious last night about paying me to make costumes?” My mind also flashes to Nina’s offer to hire me for Kyle’s costume. And her offer to introduce me to the theater costumers. Maybe there’s a simpler way to do what I want. If I’m willing to give up wanting to be an executive at Genius.

“You are my secret weapon,” he jokes. “Even if I’m pissed at you currently.”

“I’m serious. Do you think they’d hire me? If I quit my job or went part-time?”

Lawrence studies me from over a half stack of papers. “You want to talk about this now?”

“Yes.”

He shrugs. “You’ve been turning them down for years now. Most of them would jump at the chance. But you’d have to do mine first and then the others’.”

Isn’t this what Ryan was talking to me about? Being creative with my own solutions instead of hammering a square peg into a round hole? Who says I can’t do both? I have been. If I can costume part-time and write part-time, I won’t have to get the promotion. I won’t have to massage the job description. I can continue my work as a writer on the projects I love, continuing to look for opportunities at work, but not let that stop me from designing. Suddenly the Miss Her Galaxy competition holds new meaning. It’s not a test anymore. It’s the inaugural flight of my new decision. Let Andy have the promotion and kiss executive ass. I’m going to do what I am good at. I’m going to go into business for myself and design things I love for people I adore.

“It’s not here. Bedroom,” Lawrence says.

A dash of cold water on my thoughts. My fashion future needs to wait. We’re both moving quicker now, sensing something is off. Lawrence may be bachelor-messy, but he’s not careless. Especially not with a prized possession.

Lawrence practically tears through the box under his bed, tossing items onto his pillows. “I wouldn’t have put it somewhere else.”

“L . . .”

“Maybe in my closet.” He heads over there and paws through the junk on the floor. Old tennis racquets, a medicine ball, layers of glitter-camo something.

“Lawrence. You know last week how you thought someone had been in your apartment?”

Lawrence stops digging and turns to me.

“What if the Golden Arrow got your notebook?” I finish.