"Damn, woman," she said.
"What?" I asked.
"So many clothes," she replied. Oh.
"I, uh... I'm good bait," I said.
"You what?" Kat asked. I sighed. When Axel and I had first started out, he had to make sure he could trust me. He'd send me into situations and places first to scope everything out, make sure it all looked normal. And then he'd started sending me in to lure out people that owed him money. I'd go in and flirt with them, convince them to leave with me, and lead them out the back to where Axel and I could gang up on them. We were both perfectly sufficient on our own, but teams were always stronger.
I'd honestly hated doing it. Hated to just be used for my looks and nothing else, which is all Axel thought I was good for at first. That's why he got so mad and shot me. He told me I could have a week on my own to make the same amount or more than he did. He clearly didn't expect me to be able to, but I met up with him at the end of that week with nearly double what he'd had, and he had routine client visits set up while I'd had to scrap around while still laying low. Got pissed that a little girl beat him at his own game.
"Bait. Eye candy. Can we move on?" I said uncomfortably. I could basically feel Colby staring at the back of my head as if he could look into my brain to see what I was hiding. But he couldn't. Not yet, at least. I still didn't even know what type of powers were being discussed earlier.
"Well that sounds like it sucks, but you've got one hell of a wardrobe because of it," Kat said.
"Yeah, lot of different places to go, people to trick, and false impressions to give," I said. Kat was right, though. It sucked a lot but I had so, so many clothes. Different styles and colors and sizes, everything. Accessories and shoes and wigs and bags galore.
"Hm. Well, Colby, were we wanting to make her blend in with everyone else or be hot? The latter would be a lot easier because this girl isn't someone that's easy to make look 'average'," Kat said. She was right again. I'd used to spend hours getting ready for a 20 minute bust. I almost always had to style a wig because my hair stood out. I'd have to put on fake tattoos or cover mine up so that no one could recognize me between one place and another. Hell, Blaze had even sent me and Trixie to a couple cosmetology classes to perfect our ability to do this stuff. Trixie went with me to help out her girls with different looks they wanted to try.
"Uh," Colby said awkwardly. I bit the inside of my lip to keep from smiling. I'd probably be as awkward as he was if the roles were reversed, though. How was he supposed to answer that? 'No, make her look normal and boring' or 'Yeah, make her hot as fuck'. The answer he chose was either going to imply that I either didn't look hot on my own or that I needed a new outfit from Kat to get hot enough for their taste.
"Stupid question, babe. It's him. He's already hot on his own. No homo, bro. But might as well make her hot, too. A matching set," Sam said, laughing at the end.
"Oh my god," Colby said, walking away in embarrassment.
"Okay, hot. Will do. Now get out," Kat said, motioning toward the door.
"Yes, ma'am," Sam said, kissing Kat on the cheek before leaving.
"Okay, so he said matching. What was Colby wearing?" Kat asked.
"Black," I said.
"I don't know why I even asked," Kat said.
We spent the next 30 minutes getting me ready. Kat put me in a low-cut flowy black long sleeved romper, then had me wear black thigh high boots with white socks peeking out of the top. And then she found my wigs, which she sorted through while I did my makeup. She eventually came out with my white wig. It had dusty grey roots that faded into a bright white. It was really long, too, falling all the way down to my hips. She'd braided it into two French braid pigtails. We got it fit onto my head after tucking away all of the red, she put some silver jewelry on me, and then decided I was all set.
"Okay, first, selfie," Kat said, opening up Snapchat.
"You guys use social media?" I asked. That probably seemed like a dumb question.
"Oh, yeah. We've all got hella followers on everything. People seem to like us a lot. We're called the 'shocking seven' by a lot of people. It's, like, our thing. We decided that we might as well make money in our free time in a fun way. Dev's an ambassador for a couple makeup companies and Tara is an Instagram model for a platform shoe company. I get sponsorships for hair dyes," Kat said, pointing up at her bright blue hair. "Jake has a business deal with Sour Patch Kids, Sam's got one with Redbull, and Colby... Colby's just attractive for a living. Different brands just send him shit and he'll post about it once and get hella clout and money for it. He's got way more followers than the rest of us," Kat said. "I was kind of surprised when Colby told us you had no idea who any of us were."
"I'm not really big on social media and stuff. Don't want people to be able to trace my location on anything. And I hadn't heard of you guys, but I had heard of the Traphouse," I replied.
"Okay, I'm glad there was at least something," she answered. "Oh! Maybe now we could be the 'electric eight'!" she exclaimed. I laughed.
"Yeah, I guess so. I've still got to find a way to step down from my position with work. I don't know how I'm going to tell Axel and Trixie. And how am I supposed to make money now?"
"For starters, you can just Urge your way out of work. That's why it's the first thing we wanted to show you. And we don't even need money. We've been on Earth for hundreds of years and we didn't used to make it. We just make it for fun now. We've literally got a collective ten million dollars at least. Money isn't an issue, but if it was we could Urge our way around it. If you still want to make some money, which I totally understand, I bet you could start an Instagram page with Colby right this second and have a million followers by the end of the week. He's already at 22," said Kat.
"Whâ22 million followers?" I asked. Jesus, it would have been smart to get on social media earlier to keep track of targets and clients.
"Oh, yeah. The rest of us have 8-14 million. I'm at 12.6. Like I said, everyone just thinks Colby is hot, which is why he has way more," Kat said, putting on some lip gloss that had been sitting on my counter. "And they're going to think you're hot, too. Ready?"
I looked in the mirror. I hadn't worn a wig or put this much effort into looking cute without a legitimate purpose in ages. I barely even recognized myself. I didn't mean that in a bad way, though. Kat was very correct. We'd made me look hot as fuck.
"Yeah, ready," I said. I turned off the lights and let Kat lead me down the hallway to the living room.
"Alright, sinners," she said. That was kind of a funny thing to call them. It was true but still seemed like she was just teasing. "How'd I do?" Kat asked. She yanked me out from behind the corner where I'd been hiding. I was glad that Colby was sitting in one of my chairs facing away from me and staring down at his phone.
"Did she sneak any weapons into her clothes?" Colby asked, not looking up.
"I don't... hell, I don't know. I left her alone in the bathroom to go through her closet some more," Kat said. Sam looked over at me.
"Oh, fuck," he said.
"Right?" Kat asked. I wondered why she of all people didn't seem to get jealous that her boyfriend or whatever was clearly checking me out. She was literally Envy, after all. Maybe they didn't care if the other looked at different people because they knew for certain they only loved and wanted each other.
"Anything in the boots, Jupiter?" Sam asked. Yes, actually.
"I can't carry one thing?" I asked.
"No," Colby said. He still hadn't looked up from his phone, hadn't turned around.
"Ugh," I groaned. I unzipped one of my boots and pulled my thing out.
"Is that a fucking Juul?" Sam asked, laughing.
"No, it's not a Juul, idiot," I replied.
"What is it, then?" Kat asked. Colby still hadn't looked up.
"Let me show you," I said. I took a step over behind the chair Colby was sitting in. I lightly touched the tip of it to his neck and pressed the button.
"Ow! What the fuck is your problem, Jupiter!" Colby yelled, jumping up while rubbing his neck.
"It's a taser," I said. "Relatively low voltage as far as tasers go, but obviously still hurts."
"You know, I don't know whoâ," Colby stopped when he finally turned around and saw me. I crossed my arms.
"Don't know who what?" I asked.
"DoâIâis, h-how...," Colby stuttered. "Oh, fuck," he hissed, clutching his chest. "Ow, oh my god, ow," he said, hunching over.