Page 50 of Billionaire Romance

"Deal."

She sits me down at her vanity because my best friend is the kind of woman who has a vanity. She's beautiful and glamorous and she can play dress-up with me all she wants but it's not going to change that this isn't who I am. I'm pretty and I clean up well but I'm not this gorgeous, carefree supermodel who can just walk into a club and expect that everyone is going to want me.

But Eric...just thinking about him makes me blush. He's so attractive that I was getting hot when he looked at me. This is the kind of man that virgins like me dream of having a first time with. But that's not going to happen. I'm only doing this as a favor to Bianca. There's no way it's more than that. I can't get my hopes up, otherwise going with him to this party would destroy me. And I'm sure he won't want someone on his arm who is so depressed that should thought she could get a billionaire into bed and couldn't. That's not going to be fun for anyone.

Iris combs my hair back from my face. "We're going to curl your hair and it's going to be big and sexy."

"I'm basically your Barbie tonight, aren't I?"

She grins. "Yep. You'll thank me." I roll my eyes, and she says, "I saw that. Okay, clothes first."

It takes a few minutes, but she hunts through her closet and finds a few outfits that she wants me to try on. Two of them I dismiss out of hand. Short skirts that would make it pretty clear if I was wearing underwear or not, and a neckline that would almost fall to my belly button. "Iris, I'm not going to seduce him. It's just drinks so we're not doing all the 'oh, what's your favorite color,' stuff at his family's party."

"No, you're not going to seduce him," she says, smiling. "You don't have enough practice for that. I'm going to make it so that he'll seduce you."

"Iris—"

She holds up a hand. "I'm very good at what I do."

"But..." I trail off. She's one of the few people who know that I'm still a virgin. And that this isn't necessarily the way I imagined. "Iris I'm not sure about this."

Sighing, she sits on the bed. "Yeah, I know. I'm not saying I want him to just take you home, but this is a chance you're probably not going to get again. If there's a chance that you could date him, and it could lead to something, don’t you want that?"

I barely know him, but my stomach plummets with nerves and anticipation. "Yeah," I say. "Of course."

"Then trust me," she says. "It's going to be good. I'm going to make you look so hot he won't know what to do with himself. And then it's your job to charm his pants off. Not literally," she says quickly. "He wouldn't have asked you to drinks if he only just wanted you as arm candy, right? So you're already halfway there."

"I don't want to get my hopes up," I say. "I was literally asked to do this because I almost killed his sister and she needed a favor. So it's not exactly like he found me and decided to ask me on his own."

"No," Iris says, going back to her closet, "But he could have introduced himself to you and had you show up at the party and that would be that. But he didn't. So let's lean into it and make sure you're not going to let him slip by just because you're nervous or because you think that you're not worth it. You are."

I look down. When she puts it that way, it seems really simple, and I can't remember why I was protesting in the first place. "Yeah. Okay."

"I think I have just the thing," she says, pulling a dress out of her closet. The dress she's holding in her hand has a long, pleated skirt that flows. It's ankle length and swishy, and the purple material looks iridescent in the light. The top half is a little more revealing, with lace that falls from a halter top to cover the chest and sweep around the back. It's a little sheer and just as iridescent as the skirt. But it's also classy and sexy. And not nearly as over the top as the other outfits that she already tried to put together.

"I like that," I say. "I don't think I've ever seen it before."

Iris shakes her head. "I got it on a whim at some sale, and I've never worn it. Dresses that kind of change colors like this don't work well for a lot of stuff. I think it'd be perfect for this."

In addition to a vanity, Iris has a screen in her room for changing. Her room decorated the way you might imagine a movie star of the 50s might have it, with perfectly feminine decor and minimal clutter, and beautiful things like the changing screen. Stepping behind it, I change into the dress, and as it falls around me, I can already tell that it feels good. There's no way that I can wear a bra, but it's not quite as revealing as I thought it might be, and the little skin that you can see through the lace does make me feel sexy.

I step out in the dress and Iris gasps. "Oh my God that's perfect!"

Looking in the mirror, I swish the skirt around and watch the purple swirl through green and back, shimmering. It seems like something that I might actually wear to the party and not to drinks. "Are you sure it isn't too formal?"

"Girl, who cares? Being the best dressed person in a room is never a bad thing unless you're in a tux while everyone else is in t-shirts, and that's not going to happen. Try these on too." She hands me a pair of black heels. They go perfectly. "Honestly, when tonight is over, don't even give that back. It looks too good on you for you not to keep it."

"You don't have to do that, Iris," I say, laughing.

"Of course I do. Now take that off so we don't get make-up all over it." I slip back into my own clothes and she plants me at the vanity again, pulling out a frankly alarming number of palettes and hair instruments.

"Make sure I still look like me," I say.

"You're going to look like you plus."

She flips the chair around so I can't see the mirror. "Really?"

"Really. You think I'm going to let you peek and ruin my creation? No, no. Not gonna happen."

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