Throw inSeaborn'sever-decreasing profit margins as chain stores flourished under a worsening economy, and Maroney Mine doing their best to drive them out of business, and the last few months had sucked.
But she had twelve weeks while Sapphire recuperated to turnSeabornaround, twelve weeks to prove to her sister and the rest of the corporate world she wasn't the flighty airhead they thought, and kick some business butt.
As Ruby moved through the crowd, accepting air-kisses and congratulations for her latest creations, her gaze drifted towards the surly stranger too many times for her liking.
Worse, whenever it did, he was staring straight at her.
Determined to shake the feeling they were inexplicably linked by a force bigger than the both of them, she flitted from one group to another, laughing at nothing, smiling at anything.
All too soon the event ended and she sagged on a stool in relief. Until her cousin Opal tapped her on the shoulder and shoved a manifesto under her nose.
"How many pieces did we sell?"
Her heart sank as Opal frowned and shook her head. "Not enough."
"Damn." She snatched the listing and scanned it, the lack of gold foil sale stickers making her stomach gripe with angst.Seabornhad been in financial trouble for a while and nothing, even their biggest launch and her best pieces yet, could save it.
Opal squeezed her arm. "It'll be okay."
Unexpected tears stung Ruby’s eyes and she blinked them away. "It'll have to be."
For Sapphire's sake, for her sake, for the sake of a family business she had no intention of losing.
Unbeknown to her until recently, Sapphire had made a promise to their mother on her death bed last year when Mathilda Seaborn, the matriarch ofSeabornfor the last fifty years, had been pumped full of morphine but completely lucid.
The pancreatic cancer might have ravaged her body but it hadn't touched her astute business brain; her mum had made Sapphire promise to do whatever it took to make her legacy survive. For them. Fortheirchildren.
Considering Ruby couldn't sustain a long term relationship any longer than Sapphire, kids were a long way off.
Irrelevant now, with her sister under strict doctor's orders after collapsing from stress and exhaustion because she'd shouldered a burden they both should've shared.
It had been a double shock, learning ofSeaborn’sgrim financials, and the fact she'd been inadvertently responsible for Sapphire's collapse.
And she had been, no matter which way she looked at it. She'd always been the indulged Seaborn, the one allowed tofollow her dreams and travel, with Sapphire happily shadowing Mum, learning everything she could.
While Sapphire had studied hard to obtain straight As, she'd coasted, lucky to pull her usual Cs up to an occasional B.
While Sapphire had done a master's in Economics as a foregone conclusion, she'd breezed through an Arts major, not really caring whether she finished or not because she'd already started creating signature pieces forSeaborn.
While Sapphire had no social life due toSeaborn'scommitments, she'd danced and partied her way around Melbourne with a hip crowd as laid back as her.
Little wonder Mum hadn't trusted her withSeaborn'sviability.
Time to prove her mother and Sapphire wrong.
She might've been too self-absorbed in her carefree, creative life before, but now she had a chance to set things right by takingSeabornout of the red and firmly into the black.
Opal nudged her. "By the way, we've got a hanger-on."
Ruby glanced over her shoulder in time to see Security hassling Happy Face. He'd waited around for her. Her pulse skittered and she clamped down the urge to grin in triumph despite the bad news Opal had just delivered.
Men were so predictable. A little light hearted flirtation and they thought you'd handed them your heart on a plate.
"I'll take care of this."
Opal frowned as Happy Face glowered at their security guard, towering over him by a foot. "Sure?"
"Yeah, the bigger they are, the harder they fall." Opal groaned at her cliché as Ruby hugged her. "Thanks for your help, Cuz, couldn't have done it tonight without you."
