Read In the Nick of Time for Free Online

predator.”
    “You were too at one time…”
    “I know what you’re driving at, but…it wasn’t children…no comparison.”
    “Where are you getting these assumptions from, Taryn? Neither he nor I or anyone else has asserted your accusations regarding Oliver.”
    “I can just see it…I can just feel it. Can’t explain it.” She shrugged. “It’s just something about him.”
    Frieda opened her mouth for a rebuttal, then clamped it shut, as if second-guessing herself. The lady clasped her hands together and sat a bit taller.
    “I see you have on your spring fashion in the dead of winter.” The lady offered a coy smile, causing Taryn to lightly laugh. She lifted the floral shirt at the belled wrist, picking at the delicate fabric as she observed it for the umpteenth time.
    “Yeah, it makes me feel good. I know it’s like twenty degrees outside, but—”
    “No explanation needed.” She waved her off. “You look pretty.”
    “…Thank you.”
    “But you don’t feel pretty, right?”
    “Mmmm,” she shrugged. “I feel alright I suppose. I guess since I don’t get paid for my looks anymore, I am less concerned about the complete package, so to speak.” She leaned slightly forward, twirled her ankle around and around in slow, deliberate circles. “No more eating only raw vegetables weeks before a shoot. No more body wraps, caffeine shots and all of that.” She waved her hand lazily, paired it with a forced smile…trying to convince herself she hated everything about the life , but she failed miserably.
    “I’m more worried about what is lying against my skin, versus anything else.” And that was true… “Oh, and the fact that I woke up feeling all sorts of aches and pains. As I told you, I don’t feel well today, Frieda.”
    Those words, though simple by definition alone, weren’t simple for Taryn to admit at all.
    I thought I was past that…
    “And how does that make you feel, Taryn?”
    She sniffed, twirled her ankle a bit faster, flexed her toes, and stared a moment or two out the window.
    …Looks like it’s going to rain today.
    “It makes me feel incompetent and incapable. I’m tired of being tired.”
    “Ahhh,” the woman tossed her head back ever so slightly. “I wish you would have told me sooner. Well, here is something that may make you feel better.”
    “What’s that?”
    “You’re a big hit here. I know you don’t notice it, but I have. You really do have a knack for putting things together—clothing, that is. The ladies have gushed over your ability to pull thrift store outfits together for their job interviews and make them look as if they’d spent hundreds of dollars.” The woman smiled sincerely, no doubt attempting to pump up her wounded ego.
    Taryn nodded, not wishing to make a big ado about nothing.
    “The fashion end of it, the fabrics, the materials…” the lady went on, her eyes narrowed ever so slightly as she appeared to be remembering certain outfits worn here and there. “You’re good, have a great eye, Taryn.”
    “Yeah? You really think so? Let me stop trying to act surprised. Yeah, I think you’re right. I do have a great eye for this sort of thing.”
    They both laughed lightly.
    “You know, in all seriousness, when I was a teenager I wanted to be a fashion designer, Frieda. But then I got ‘discovered.’” She put her hands in quotes, scratched her scalp through the silken material once more, and looked off into the distance. “Please don’t think I’m not grateful.”
    “I didn’t think that; never said that, either.”
    “Good, ’cause that’s not it. It’s just that that was never my personality, you know? The superficiality and unrealistic nature of it all is astounding. Do you know I hated most of the people I worked with? I truly did.”
    Frieda cocked her head to the side then rested her chin on folded hands, seemingly intrigued by the confession.
    “I wanted to drop kick a hundred of ’em in the back of their damn