Read The Doctor's Damsel (Men of the Capital Book 3) for Free Online Page B

the insulation. There was also no ambient light slipping in around the blinds because it was windowless. With a sigh of relief, Becca went to sleep.
    In the morning, she woke up refreshed after a good night’s sleep and gathered up her things for the first open call of the morning. Becca slipped into the bohemian orange dress she’d found at a thrift shop and wrapped a braided leather belt around her midsection. Twisting her hair up into a messy bun and stacking on some dime store bangles, she smiled at her reflection and put on some mascara. She threw the sex toys on the kitchen counter and grabbed a folder of her headshots. With just a touch of rosewater behind her ears for a sweet, feminine scent, she was off to audition.
    First Becca went to the studio address she’d been texted the day before. She waited in a grimy anteroom with a score of other blonde girls, some younger, some older, some discouragingly recognizable from other commercial work. At last, her number was called and she was led into a room where three suited executives sat at a table. Standing in the center of the rather dull office, Becca launched cheerfully into the copy she’d been provided.
    “Do you ever get that itchy, uncomfortable feeling down there ?” She asked in a low, confidential tone. “There’s an easy way to find relief. Try using Jackson’s Feminine Balm, now available in original and lavender scent.”  She finished, miming the display of a tube of anti-itch crème with her hands.
    The executives flicked through papers and shook their heads.
    “What’s the matter with your hand?”
    “I—I had to have stitches. It’ll be totally invisible in like a week. Or I could wear gloves, give it a very sophisticated, ladylike vibe,” she offered brightly.
    The man grunted and she was summarily dismissed.
    Off to the next audition, Becca made her way downtown to a cramped off-off-Broadway theater, where she waited about an hour before stepping out onto the stage. Becca composed herself and began, her lovely face transforming into the guileless wonder of a much younger girl, her voice low and earnest and beautiful.
    “ He told me to look at my hand, for a part of it came from a star that exploded too long ago to imagine—“
    Becca usually auditioned with a piece from Tennessee Williams or sometimes a little Neil Simon if it was a comedy. She reserved this monologue, Tillie’s opening from “The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds” for parts she really, really wanted. It was a little girl’s part—perhaps fourteen or fifteen—but it had always fit her better than any other role. Not even her critically acclaimed turn as Emily in “Our Town” (in an off-off Broadway role in a play that closed after three weeks) had ever felt so right. The stunned awareness of her own sacred magic, the coming of age into a knowledge that, despite all the adverse circumstances and obstacles around her, she was special—Tillie’s role was Becca in some small way, in that unassailable hope and belief. She even had a perfect sun tear gather in the corner of her eye from the overhead spotlight as she finished up. She felt elated, her heart full of the beautiful words she’d spoken, of her hope for herself and Abe, for a role in this play, for Hannah and Jasper to be really happy together. She smiled, hands clasped, and the tear fell.
    “I would have suggested a more adult audition piece for you. We are looking for a younger actress anyhow, and your childish choice of monologue has, shall we say, made your maturity rather more glaring,” the director said acidly.
    “I understand. But I assure you, I’ve read this play and I have a very deep understanding of Matilda’s motivation, her hopes as she comes to this country—”
    She broke off when a stagehand motioned to her to vacate the stage. Crestfallen, she went to her third and final stop before the Laundromat. She knew she could get this part—it was a waitress, after all,