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Contents ( 28)
  1. SHOPAHOLIC TO THE STARS
  2. Sophie Kinsella
  3. ONE
  4. TWO
  5. THREE
  6. FOUR
  7. FIVE
  8. SIX
  9. SEVEN
  10. The Missouri Echo
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. TWENTY-TWO
  26. TWENTY-THREE
  27. THE SHOPAHOLIC SERIES
  28. OTHER BOOKS

Another TV camera is pointing at my face, and a guy with red hair grins at me.

‘Hi there, Betty!’ he says in a Southern accent. ‘How’re you doin’?’

‘It’s Becky,’ I say politely.

‘So, shoplifting. Is it a crime or is it a disease?’

What? How on earth would I know? I stammer some answer, feeling like a total moron, and before I know it, I’m moving on to the next interview. That guy wants to know if Lois put up a fight when I confronted her, and the next woman asks me if I think Lois might have shoplifted because she was pregnant. I haven’t had a chance to mention my dress, or the fact I’ve styled Sage. And they all call me Betty.

‘I’m called Becky!’ I exclaim to Charlotte as we’re moving on. ‘Not Betty!’

‘Oh,’ she says, unmoved. ‘I guess it might have been written wrong in the press pack.’

‘But—’ I stop, mid-sentence.

‘But what?’

I was going to say, ‘But don’t they all know my name?’ Looking at Charlotte’s expression, though, I change my mind.

Maybe I’m not quite as famous as I thought I was. I feel a bit crushed, even though I think I manage to hide it quite well. Charlotte leads me on to another reporter, who shoves a radio mic in my face, and I’ve just babbled a few lines about how I’m really glad that Lois and Sage have reconciled and yes, I did see the interview … when there’s the most almighty roar and I can’t help looking round.

It’s Sage.

She’s standing in front of the photographers and they are going wild. I mean, nuts. The level of shouting is going up and up and up, and the flashes are like some kind of lightning storm, and the crowd is surging in her direction, pressing against the metal barriers and holding out phones and autograph books.

Sage looks absolutely delighted. She’s posing in Danny’s white dress, which looks sensational, and she’s flicking her hair around, and blowing kisses to the crowd. And then it happens. She blows a particularly energetic kiss … and somehow the side seam of her dress comes apart. I watch in shock as the whole thing unravels, exposing the entire side of her body.

Sage gives a huge gasp, and clutches at the dress, and the photographers nearly have fits, trying to get a shot of her.

I’m slack-jawed in horror as white beads start rolling all over the red carpet. That dress was fine this afternoon. It was fine. She must have doctored it. That was her secret plan which she didn’t want to tell me. A deliberate wardrobe malfunction. A girl in a black trouser suit is trying to offer Sage a coat, but she’s ignoring the offer, and beaming at the cameras.

Danny’s going to kill me. He’s got a particular sore spot about his clothes falling apart, ever since an unfortunate incident in Barneys when he hadn’t sewn up his seams properly. He’ll ask me why I didn’t make sure she was dressed properly, and I’ll have to say she wouldn’t let me near her, and he’ll say I should have insisted …