Chapter Twenty Eight

  Desmond did not sneak into Ornette’s studio dorm that night, or if he did, she wasn’t there. Her dorm room was empty. Instead, she was in a room in Varner’s house. It was a room that didn’t have any windows. Lots of bedrooms on Venus didn’t have any windows. Sometimes, that was the only way to make sure there was enough darkness for a person to sleep.

  Desmond did not sneak into Ornette’s bedroom, but Varner did.

  She wasn’t sleeping anyway and turned on her bedside lamp to see him creeping across the room.

  “Papa Bear may have been unhappy to find Goldilocks in his house, but on that occasion, he didn’t invite her to stay over. What are you doing here?” Ornette asked firmly.

  “I want to talk to you about what you said earlier,” he replied, putting his hands in the pockets of his pajama pants and trying to look harmless.

  “Which thing?” she asked drolly, unwilling to say a word unless he spelled out what he wanted. She slid her hands under the covers, found an emergency button on her bracelet, and pressed it three times. Pressing it once would send a message to Desmond saying that she had found herself in a tricky situation and she was requesting aid (because he was her owner). Pressing it twice would send an alarm at the Sleeping Beauty Inc. head office on Venus. Pressing it three times did nothing, but Ornette felt like it helped her feel better.

  “About Desmond. You can’t really want to go on a date with him. Why didn’t you say you wanted to go on a date with me?” He was trying to make his voice soft, he was trying to make himself sound the way he had when he sent off Clandestine, but no soft sound was going to change Ornette’s mind. He was in her room when he shouldn't be and he was not like the other men who had ‘borrowed’ her for their little game show. The game was set up so he could break the rules.

  She removed her hands from under the blankets and tried to take a position that communicated indifference, resting her cheek on her hand and scratching behind her ear with her other hand. “Uh… Varner, you don’t want to have this conversation with me.”

  “Why not?” he asked, sitting on the floor beside her bed rather than on her bed. It was a non-threatening move and she appreciated it. If he was off the bed, he wasn’t on it.

  “Because I didn’t always work for Sleeping Beauty Inc. I used to work for Jewel Girls.”

  He returned her stare blankly. “What does that mean? How are they different? I thought they were just competing brands.”

  “They’re not. Sleeping Beauty Inc. is classier because they’re kinder to their models. The thing is, I have read the Sleeping Beauty Inc. owner manual more times than a saint has read the Bible.” She was lying. She didn’t know it that well. She got her hot tip from her conversation with Stonic, but it sounded better the way she was spinning it. “I know what’s in it and I know that Sleeping Beauty Inc. would never sell me to you.”

  His expression became one of confusion and overwhelm. “Are you telling me to rig the game?”

  Ornette snorted. “I’m not telling you anything of the sort. I’m telling you that the rules of your game cannot trump the rules of my contract with Sleeping Beauty Inc.”

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  The look of outrage and confusion on his face was priceless, not because Ornette had any wish to see him put in his place specifically, but because he looked like the kind of spoiled emperor who had never been told he couldn’t have what he wanted in his entire life.

  There was a sudden knock at the door.

  The Coordinator opened it without waiting for a response. “Varner,” he said gently. “Can I talk to you for a microsecond?”

  The intensity of the shock and outrage on Varner’s face only intensified. “What are you doing here?” he hissed furiously.

  “We need to talk… like… seriously,” The Coordinator insisted, not entering the room further but stressing his words from the door.

  Varner didn’t move but pointedly stared at his subordinate.

  “You do not want to hear what I have to tell you in front of Ornette,” The Coordinator insisted.

  “Does it need to be a secret from her?” he snapped. “I’m not having you tell me that I have to leave when she spent the night in Hans’ bedroom.”

  The Coordinator did not like the position he was being put in, but he wasn’t a coward and he squared up to Varner while keeping a look of understanding on his face. Ornette thought it was quite the feat. “Hans meets Sleeping Beauty Inc.’s criteria for an owner for Ornette,” he explained carefully. “You don’t. None of this is a secret to Ornette. She knows full well that you would never qualify for a contract with her.”

  “Why?” Varner shouted, completely unconcerned over who could hear him or what could be caught on video.

  “You’re too large,” The Coordinator said helplessly.

  It could only be explained one way.

  Varner’s face changed completely. “This is unbelievable,” he spat. “I’m not that big.”

  The Coordinator cleared his throat and expanded his patience. “Ornette is not allowed to be paired with a man over two hundred and ten pounds. She’s five foot three and she weighs a hundred and ten pounds. Sleeping Beauty Inc. has rules that models are not to be sold to men who weigh over a hundred pounds more than them. You were two hundred and thirty-seven on your last weigh-in. You match up fine with every other contestant.”

  Varner’s face changed again. “That pencil-neck did this on purpose to ruin the show,” he said harshly. “Get him on the communicator. I need to talk to him.”

  He didn’t say Desmond’s name, but he couldn’t have meant anyone else.

  Papa Bear got up and took two steps away from Ornett’s bed before he turned and asked her in a lighthearted tone, “You think it’s a stupid rule, don’t you?”

  Ornette smiled faintly and said, “I would only think that if I was a bigger woman.”

  He seemed to think that meant she agreed with him as he strode out of the room. When he and The Coordinator had wished her a good night and the door between them was shut, Ornette tried to go to sleep, but it was impossible.

  Her mind was on fire.

  The truth was clear as a bell. Desmond had known about the rule and he had got her because she was probably the smallest woman Sleeping Beauty Inc. had in the catalog who liked fashion that wasn’t a Thumbelina model. He did it on purpose to screw Varner over–absolutely.

  It perfectly explained why he took such good care of her. Desmond had known Varner would be brainbreakingly interested in her and he wanted to make it worse. She was his type if he already had a maid that looked like her. That was why Desmond woke her up from cryostasis, fixed the makeup on her hand, and helped give her better makeup on her face. She bet that Varner hadn’t bought any of the girls himself. Each girl had a different backer. They were betting on which of their choices would win him over, except Desmond had chosen someone Varner could never have to spite him.

  It was pretty beautiful when she thought about it, partly because she did not like Varner, and partly because she still felt chapped at the Venecian aristocracy because of what they’d done to her when she was a young girl.

  What Varner accused Desmond of, trying to ruin the show, had to be somewhat, if not completely, true.

  She hoped it wouldn’t come back to bite Desmond in the face.

  He had such a cute face.