Playing Against Type: Soulgirls, Book 4 Read Free

dressing room slowed.  
    “Are you in trouble?” Dayna leaned against the doorjamb to her room.
    “I hope not.” Peppermint tried to give her self-confidence a boost with a smile she didn’t feel.  
    Dayna and Britta shared a worried look. It hadn’t escaped the notice of any of the dancers just how much things had changed in the last few months—Kiki’s recent exit, Pandora’s exodus, even Roseâtre’s change of circumstances. All lead dancers, all freed. And though Roseâtre still appeared in the lounge show, she didn’t live with them anymore.  
    “It’s probably about the show,” Britta suggested, but her doubtful tone belied the hope in her expression.
    “Or maybe we have a new dancer that needs to be trained,” Dayna offered, but even Cerveau frowned. Little ever seemed to ruffle the Amazon, but it had been a long time since they’d had a new dancer join the theatre.
    A very long time.
    Disturbed by the troubled expressions around her, Peppermint quashed her unease. Her friends needed a pick me up. She gave Dayna a quick hug and squeezed Britta’s hand. “It’s going to be fine, just wait and see.”  
    They still looked skeptical, but returned her attempted cheer. “Well, hurry back. We have to get ready.”
    Britta rolled her eyes. “It’s not like she has to get dressed. We spend most of the show naked.”
    Laughter erupted down the hall and music began to play in the dressing room. “I’ll be right there,” Peppermint promised, and crossed mental fingers for it to be true. “Save my spot!”
    Dayna and Britta moved on, but Cerveau paused before following them. She studied Peppermint with a quiet expression and gave a simple, “Good luck,” that was more unsettling than the rest of the conversation.  
    By the time she knocked on the door to Heidi’s office, all of Peppermint’s faux confidence fled. The muffled “come in” invited her inside and she tried to quell the shaking in her limbs. She’d been in the office just twice before—the day she struck her deal with the stage manager and the first week after she joined the review.
    Both happened more than thirty years ago.
    Amazingly, nothing in the office seemed to have changed. The dark wood still looked forbidding and the low lamps cast a wild profusion of shadows across the artwork—paintings Peppermint refused to stare at too closely lest she notice the people moving inside of them.
    Heidi waved her in and motioned to the chairs, her pen never ceasing its motion as she wrote in a folder. Perching on the edge of the seat, Peppermint crossed one leg over the other and then uncrossed them. Her hands opened and closed, clenching into fists and releasing. She resisted the urge to start tapping them against her lap. Minion wasn’t in evidence. The little imp could never keep quiet when she was around, so the silence confirmed she must be playing elsewhere.
    Closing the file, Heidi set the pen to the side and leaned back to study her. “Thank you for coming. You look lovely, by the way.”
    “Thank you.” She refused to touch her hair, certain she must have ripped out several strands in her frenzied brushing. She hadn’t been able to think about anything but this meeting and the favor Heidi wanted to ask.
    “How are you doing? I know we’ve had a lot of changes in the revue this year, shifting leads, new styles—”
    “Heidi, please forgive me, but if you don’t get to what the favor is you wanted to ask, I may just pass out.” Peppermint hated interrupting her, but her jitters had jitters at this point.
    “Fair enough. It’s not a favor I would ask you personally, and I will stress that I resisted the request at first. You deserve to know that. However the casino has an issue and the Overseers have requested your assistance.”
    Spots danced before Peppermint’s eyes. Bands wound around her chest and threatened to cut off her oxygen supply. The room swam and Heidi went from being behind the desk to next to her