MY FAMOUS FRENEMY (The Greene Family #6)

Chapter 1

From barbershops to posh salons, gossip and hair are intertwined like love and flowers.

Being a hairdresser in a small town like Sunrise Bay comes with challenges. I’m not like my sister Nikki, who loves spreading any juicy story she can on her radio segment, Scandals of Sunrise Bay. But at the same time, I can’t stop people from sharing news they hear or discussing private matters while they’re getting their hair done. This is especially true on Teased Thursdays, as we call them, at my salon, Fringe. Every Thursday, leisure-suit-wearing Fran and her gang of followers inundate Fringe for their weekly curl, tease, and hairspray that somehow lasts them until the following Thursday.

The difference this week is that I had no idea I’d be the topic of gossip.

“Hot Pants was down at the bay, running without a shirt again,” Fran says with her eyes closed as I tower over her, washing her gray hair.

I mouth “Hot Pants?” to Malia, another hairstylist at my salon.

“Are you spying on Gavin Price again?” Malia asks, her fingers digging into Fran’s biggest sidekick, Nora’s, bottle-red hair.

“Fran’s daughter sent us all the CDs. We’ve been watching that show of his,” Nora says.

My eyebrows shoot up. Gavin Price, the Hollywood heartthrob who moved here permanently this past spring, is well known for his role in the teenage drama series High Society. I can’t lie and say I didn’t have pictures of him on my walls.

“I think you mean DVDs.” Malia bites her lip to stop from laughing.

Fran ignores Malia’s correction. “The four of us get together every Saturday night to watch two episodes. We make margaritas—virgin, of course—and eat pineapple upside-down cake.”

“Sounds fun,” I say, putting a towel around Fran’s head and slowly raise her up in the chair so she doesn’t get dizzy—a constant complaint that she posts on the Sunrise Bay social media page. As though I’m whipping people up in their chairs as though it’s a carnival ride. “Let’s get over to the chair now.”

“He’s so good-looking. You’re single, Posey.” She shuffles over to the chair, trying to glance back at me over her shoulder.

“Thanks for the reminder,” I say, easing her down in the chair, then I gently massage the towel through her short strands.

“I just thought most of your siblings have found love. What about you?” She eyes me through the mirror.

I offer her a tight smile. She’s not the first and won’t be the last person who wants to discuss my love life. “Well, I have the good fortune of being the youngest. Less pressure. Lots of time still.”

“Time flies.”

The other two women from Fran’s gang agree from the waiting area.

“The years will fly by, and sooner or later, the well of men dries up. Even here in Alaska.”

It’s common knowledge that the men in Alaska outnumber the women.

“You’ve seen all the single guys down there by the docks,” I say. “They wouldn’t know how to woo a woman if someone handed them roses and a box of chocolate.”

Fran shakes her head at me.

“They’d probably eat the chocolate and give the roses to their mamas,” Nora says in the chair next to me and chuckles.

“Malia found a good man,” Fran says, grabbing Malia’s hand as she passes by.

Malia kindly smiles. She knows she needs the good juju on the social media page since she cut Ginny’s hair too short last week, which is why Ginny is in the waiting area and not having her hair done today.

Malia has been seeing a guy, but the relationship is new, and she’s already confided to me about her concern about his lack of kindness to the waitstaff when they go out to dinner.

“Let’s go back to you and the ladies watching High Society,” I say. “I used to watch it. What season are you on?”

I want to move the conversation away from my love life. Fran is right though—lots of my siblings and stepsiblings have found the love of their lives. I’m not sure I’m ready for all that just yet anyway. I’m only twenty-four.

“We’re on season three. After they graduate from high school and go on to college,” Nora says. “I don’t feel quite so dirty now.”

Malia and I laugh, although I’m pretty sure Gavin was over eighteen in the later years he was filming High Society, portraying a rich teenager living in the elite circle of New York while attending a boarding school. I loved that show, but I really fell for Gavin when I was only eight and watched him in a family show called The Carters. He played the youngest brother, and I often imagined having a family as perfect as theirs while mine was falling apart after my dad cheated on my mom.

“I’m serious, Posey. You gotta go after him. Now that he’s chosen Sunrise Bay as his home, the women are going to flock here,” Fran says.

“I heard from Matt that the guys on the dock are worried he’s going to steal all their women,” Malia repeats what she heard from her boyfriend.

All the women agree again. Louder this time.

“He can’t possibly take all the available women in this town,” I say, combing out Fran’s wet strands to start trimming.

“Have you been in the same room with the man? He steals all the attention. He’s just got that thing, that X factor or something about him.” Malia nods, as though to convince me.

I have been in the same room as him, and although yes, he does have a certain charisma with his easygoing boy-next-door vibe that’s mixed with a rule-breaker, he’s also the man who ran me off the road in his ridiculous Porsche rental car last summer.

Hello, we’re in Alaska! Which goes to show that he’s either vain or a show-off. Probably a mixture of both, which means he is not for me. If only I could tamp down my crush from when I was younger.

“If I was your age, Posey, I’d be showing up outside his house in a trench coat with nothing underneath but skimpy lingerie.”

I almost choke from Fran’s words, smiling nicely at her through the mirror. “I’m just not like that.”

Because I’m not. I never have been. I’ve always sat back when it comes to things involving guys, letting them come to me. Even then, trust can be hard when your dad cheated on your mom. I know there are good guys out there—my brother and stepbrothers have shown me that—but I can admit to myself that I didn’t come out of my parents’ divorce unscathed.

I cut Fran’s hair while the entire salon dissects why Gavin Price is sticking around town, other than being good friends with my sister Nikki’s husband, Logan.

Some speculate he’s undercover for some important role he’s trying to get into. Others say he’s been chewed up and spit out by Hollywood and needs a place to hide out. Whatever the reason, Gavin has chosen this town as his home for the foreseeable future. The reason doesn’t matter, because the man is so full of himself, he can go back to where he came from for all I care. Then again, I’d probably miss spotting him at The Grind or seeing him leaving Logan’s gym all sweaty. It sucks having a crush on a man you don’t even like.

The bell on the door rings. I don’t bother looking up, putting the last roller into Fran’s hair. Mostly because I’ve been running behind all day.

But the rush of quiet that suddenly blankets the salon makes me peek over my shoulder.

Lo and behold, Gavin Price himself stands inside, smiling at Ginny and Rita. “Hello, ladies.” His voice is sultry and soothing, like a cold glass of iced tea on a hot summer day.

They both smile and whisper to one another before Rita lifts her hand and says hi for both of them. They’re like two teenage girls, I swear.

“Let’s get you under the dryer,” I say to Fran, and she stands from the chair.

I go to loop my arm through hers to make sure she doesn’t slip on any of the hair on the floor, but she quickly shoos me away. “I’m not ninety, Posey!”

I step back and Malia shakes her head.

“Hi, Gavin, what brings you into Fringe?” Malia asks.

Isn’t that my job? But I remind myself that I don’t want to talk to him anyway.

“I’m here to see Posey.” He smiles, and I hate the fact my stomach stirs at the sound of my name coming off his tongue.

“Oh,” Fran says and stops to nudge me with her elbow.

“I heard him,” I murmur. To him, I say, “Give me one minute. I have to get Fran all set.”

“I can do it,” she says, sitting in the chair.

“No, actually, you can’t.” I lower the dome over her head and turn the dryer to the correct setting.

She hits me in the stomach. “Go,” she pretends to whisper when, in fact, she said it loudly enough for a smile to creep up the corners of Gavin’s lips. I’m sure he’s used to women fawning over him.

I walk across the salon, feeling every eye on me. It reminds me of high school when I thought it was crazy hair day, but I was a week early. I couldn’t even take out all the little ponytails all over my head because I’d hair sprayed them.

“What can I help you with?” I slide behind our reception counter, picking up the pencil so I have something to do with my hands.

He runs his fingers through his unruly hair. There’s a slight wave to the texture which I can see being unmanageable if he doesn’t get regular haircuts. “I hoped you might have some time to give me a cut.”

“Sorry, I have Rita next, but Malia—”

“I can wait,” he interjects.

Every woman makes a small sound as though he said something heart melting.

“I’m actually booked for the rest of the day, but like I was about to say—”

“He can take my appointment. You’d probably just cut mine too short like Malia did to Ginny last week.” Rita fluffs up her hair.

Malia growls under her breath.

I slide to the side of Gavin to give Rita a death glare.

“Oh, I’d hate to take your appointment,” Gavin says to Rita before he turns back to me. “I can just wait around and maybe you can squeeze me in at some point. I should only take ten minutes.”

Again, he runs his fingers through his hair, and I can’t even pretend my own fingers don’t tingle with the need to thread through those strands.

Jeez, someone save me from myself.

“Ten minutes is all, huh?” Malia asks.

He turns his attention to her. She smiles softly, like the Southern girl she was born and raised to be.

“I guess I shouldn’t assume. Posey?” His clear blue eyes meet mine as if he stepped off that poster from my wall when I was a kid. He’s so damn hot.

I sigh. “Let’s hurry. I might be able to fit in Rita as well.” I usher him over to the shampoo bowl.

“I’ll make this up to you, Mrs. Ashland,” he says to Rita offhandedly.

“Happy to help, Gavin.”

All the women giggle like preteen girls. Exactly how I would’ve had I met him as a child.

He leans back in the shampoo bowl, and once again, his eyes pierce into mine. A smile forms on his lips and a warm sensation runs down my body. He’s too attractive for his own good.

“Are they looking?” he whispers when I bend over him to turn on the water, never more aware than at this minute how close my breasts are to my client’s face when I do so.

“Um…” I glance over, and sure enough, Fran is staring at us. I nod to him.

I run the water over Gavin’s hair. It’s so silky, my fingers glide right through. His eyes slowly close as I massage the shampoo into his hair.

After I finish rinsing and putting a towel over his hair, his eyes pop open. “That felt amazing.”

I have no idea what to say, so I say nothing. Way to go, Posey.

“She’s good with her hands, right?” Fran interjects and ruins the moment.

I glance over to see that she’s leaning with half her head outside of the dryer.

“That’s what he said,” Nora says from the dryer next to Fran. The two of them laugh, and a small chuckle slips out of Gavin.

I point him toward my chair, where Malia is sweeping up all of Fran and Nora’s hair.

“Don’t trust me, huh?” Malia asks as Gavin settles in my chair.

“Nothing like that. I just…” He looks around, seeing four sets of eyes watching his every move. “I just thought maybe Posey could do it. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

“Oh, believe me, I’m not that sensitive.”

She clears her throat and moves her eyes toward the mirror, where Gavin is watching us with rapt attention.

“So.” I turn all my focus on him. “Just a trim and a cleanup?” I run the towel over his hair and wipe my hands on it before setting it on the counter and grabbing a comb.

“Yeah, it’s gotten way too long.”

We discuss how much he wants trimmed off, and I set up, asking Malia to wash Rita’s hair since this won’t take long.

Gavin watches me work the entire time. When I’m done, he looks so much better, but our conversation was filled with superficial stuff, and I hate myself for being a little disappointed that the only reason he was looking at me was for a haircut and nothing more.

I check him out and he tips me generously, rocking back on his heels as he thanks me for the tenth time.

He lingers, so I ask, with my heart pounding, “Did you need something else?”

“No. Thanks for squeezing me in.”

“That’s what he said,” Nora says from Malia’s chair.

I groan. “Have a great day, Gavin.”

He stands there for a moment, then shakes his head and leaves. The bell rings with his departure. I can’t deny I feel deflated. I kinda thought maybe he was going to ask me out.

“Someone needs to get that man a set of balls,” Fran breaks the silence and everyone agrees.