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ever created. Carrie Bradshaw would have a field day here. Well, she would if she weren’t a fictional character, anyhow. I gulped and tried to appear nonchalant, although my little shopper’s heart was beating rapidly.
    “What are we doing here?” I asked, trying to sound grumpy instead of impressed. I refused to admit that I was trying not to salivate. “I’m hungry,” I said instead.
    “Har
per,
” Emmie said in exasperation. “Can you not think about food for, like, thirty seconds? We’re trying to get you outfitted for the Blonde Theory experiment.”
    “Outfitted?” I asked suspiciously, my gaze finally drawn away from the endless rows, shelves, and racks of beautiful clothes. I focused on Emmie with some reluctance. “What are you talking about? We didn’t say anything about outfits.”
    Emmie sighed, clearly exasperated with me.
    “Harper,” she began slowly, as if she were talking to a child. “In acting, the first step to
being
the part is
looking
the part. And you’re not exactly going to
look
the part in
your
clothes, are you?”
    I looked down at my body. I was dressed in a slim, pin-striped black Armani pantsuit over a crisp white blouse with Jimmy Choo stiletto pumps peeking out from beneath the slightly flared bottoms of the pant legs. I looked all business. My favorite necklace, a sterling-silver Tiffany heart on a slim silver chain, dangled in the cleft of my collarbone.
    “I can see your point,” I admitted reluctantly. Although I loved my clothes.
    “So I’ve taken the liberty of picking out several outfits for you,” Emmie announced. I just stared at her. She pulled out one of the sliding racks.
    “Smart Harper,” she said, grinning at me, “meet Dumb Harper.” She gestured grandly to the rolling rack.
    It was a veritable sea of acid-trippy tight pants, clingy dresses, halter tops, and shirts that looked suspiciously like bras.
    Oh no. I could
not
wear any of this. No way.
    “A tube top?” I asked skeptically, pointing to the first outfit that Emmie held up.
    “Yep,” she said proudly. “And don’t worry; everything’s a label.”
    I groaned. “Yeah, the label of ugliness,” I muttered.
    She rolled her eyes. “No, look.” She pulled out one of the dresses, a short, white, nearly transparent one. “See,” she said, showing me the tag. “Versace. And this one,” she said, replacing the white dress and pulling out a little turquoise number, “is Stella McCartney.”
    I quickly leafed through the rack, and indeed, nearly every item on it seemed to be from an expensive designer label. Not that I could imagine anyone spending that kind of money on these kinds of designs.
    “Emmie,” I said flatly, turning back from the rack to face her. A slightly ill feeling rose inside me as I tried not to picture myself in some of these dresses. “I would never wear any of this.”
    “Exactly,” Emmie announced triumphantly. “Harper Roberts, meet the new you.”
    T EN MINUTES LATER , I was poured into a strapless fuchsia dress that was long enough to keep me from looking like a streetwalker but clingy enough in all the right places to leave little to the imagination. It followed the curves of my hips then flared out into a flowy tulip skirt that ended well above my knees. I frowned at myself in the mirror.
    “I look like a prostitute,” I groaned, knowing very well that I didn’t. Actually, I was ashamed to admit that I looked a lot better in the dress than I had expected. Not that I would say that to Emmie. I wouldn’t want to encourage her.
    “You’re exaggerating, Harper,” she said dismissively. “Besides, do you know any prostitutes who wear Dolce?”
    “I suppose I’m supposed to wear this to the firm dinner tomorrow night?” I asked wryly, ignoring the fact that Emmie was right about the dress’s label as I turned to stare at myself in the mirror from another angle. No, this was definitely not working for me. “You know, the dinner I don’t have a date