Vicki laughed. “All right. Can I get your client anything, while I’m at it? Not for me to bring in,” she added. “Just so they have something to warm them up.”
The bodyguards exchanged glances before Rumble said, “Red berry tea,” as if he might be divulging a state secret. Vickisuspected that it might be enough to tip off a fan to who the celebrity behind closed doors was, but she knew exactly one celebrity’s favorite drink, and it was not red berry tea, so Benton “my friends call me Ben” Sinclair was not in Zane’s studio just then.
“One red berry tea, one regular tea, and one small single shot caramel latte. Gotcha. Back in a few.” She bounced off to Imelda’s doughnut shop feeling pretty cheerful about things, and got back just in time for the limo door to close behind someone, and to hand over three drinks in a carrier to the bodyguards. “Drive carefully!”
Rumble said, “Thank you,” in a tone that suggested the bodyguards weren’t used to being noticed, much less treated like people, and Vicki bopped up the steps to Zane’s studio with the last two drinks balanced in their carrier.
“Vicki’s coffee delivery service—whoa.” Vicki stopped as the door swung closed behind her, and gawked around the studio wide-eyed.
A fabric tornado had hit the place. Or maybe a fabric landslide, followed by a tornado. Something that first dropped a lot of fabric in the workspace, then flung it all over the place, wildly. There were bolts of beautifully colored silks and velvets, acres of delicate netting-like fabric—Vicki suddenly realized she knew absolutely nothing about what any fabrics were actually called—scraps everywhere, and Zane draped dramatically in a chair in the midst of the chaos.
Vicki, cautiously, said, “What, ah…what happened?”
“The creative process,” Zane said theatrically. He rose, murmured a blessing for the coffee, and pulled Vicki in for a rueful hug. “Seriously, this is what my workshop usually looks like. Controlled disaster.”
“This is controlled?” she asked dubiously.
“Oh, yeah. I still know where everything is, and we have a plan of sorts.” Zane took a sip of coffee, which, from his grimace, was still very hot. “I also have a full agenda of clients driving—or sometimes flying—up to Virtue over the next three weeks. I have no idea how Dion talked them into it, but I think my father may straight-up murder me. Talk about putting my home town on the map.”
“But the ball is in a month,” Vicki said in a little dismay. “How are you supposed to get my dress done with all those clients coming up?”
“Most of their work will be done by my team in Los Angeles,” Zane promised. “A Zane Bellamy design doesn’t mean Zane Bellamy sews it all. It means his company does.Yourgown, however, I intend to sew myself. Come on, this is the fabric I’m thinking of.” He put his coffee aside, and then put hers aside too, which Vicki thought was fair. The fabric filling his studio all cost a great deal more than a cup of coffee did, and she dreaded the idea of ruining any of it.
Together they went through the fabrics, Vicki mostly running her hands over them gently and sighing at the soft swishy hiss or plushy napes. “I don’t know how you decide which ones to use. I want all of them.”
“They don’t all go together,” he said in a slightly stern tone that made her laugh. “See, for this, for the skirt, I’m thinking of pleating it…”
For the next hour he talked her through design and dressmaking, all the while flinging stretches of fabric around, showing her how they moved and flowed, pulling them under different lights to compare their reflectiveness, until Vicki, laughing, said, “Now I understand how the tornado hit. Tornado Zane. I can’t wait to see what you do with it,” she said happily. “But should I just drop by after school tomorrow, or wait untilyou text? Because if you’ve got a bunch of Hollywood stars in here, well, I’m not buying coffee for all their entourages.”
“Maybe wait until I text,” he admitted. “Although the hours I’m keeping will be all over the place, because some people are coming in between shoots so will be here in the middle of the night. No, it’s not normal,” he said to her expression. “But I’m not normally in small town New York, either. And sometimes,” he added solemnly, “thereisa fashion emergency.”
“What on earth constitutes a fashion emergency?”
“A dress doesn’t fit, a designer doesn’t come through, there’s sudden political pressure over something someone said or did, a hundred things that can lead to suddenly finding yourself twelve hours out from a huge event without a dress. There have been entire scandals over people wearing similar dresses. And also over themnotwearing similar dresses.”
“How can you have a scandal for wearing the same dressandnot wearing the same dress?”
“Welcome to the fashion industry,” Zane replied solemnly, then made a little face. “I knew there would be people coming in, but I didn’t expect them to start showing up this fast. Dion may do his work too well, sometimes. So I’m sorry in advance that I’m going to be busy.”
“Well, it’s all right. It is your job. It’s not like I’m blowing mine off to come spend time with you.”
“Huh. I guess not. And why not, young lady?” Zane pulled her close again, and for a breathless little while, Vicki forgot about her job, his job, and the world in general. They ordered dinner in at the studio, and reluctantly went their own ways as the evening got later, which set the pattern for the next several days together.
A few of Zane’s famous clients were less standoffish than the first one had been, and one, a young woman with an equally famous boyfriend who were together carrying an entiresuperhero franchise on their backs, spent half of Saturday afternoon playing with kids in the town square, trading off with each other as Zane worked with them. Vicki thought Noah Brannigan was actually going to explode of joy, and that Arthur Lowell might literally expire of rage.
By the time the next week’s town hall meeting came around, there was a palpable tension in Virtue. Vicki had seen Zane’s father everywhere in the intervening week, stirring up passions, arguing about the dangers of so many strangers, especially famous ones, coming to Virtue and drawing attention to it. Even locals Zane said weren’t shifters were on Arthur’s side, clearly afraid their small town was going to be overrun by?—
“What,” Zane had asked impatiently at one point, “impossibly attractive human beings? Film studios? Tourists hoping to catch a glimpse of the rich and famous? I’m only going tobehere a few weeks, and all the interest will die down.”
Vicki had been trying not to think about that. The Starlight ball was at the end of the month down in the city, and after that…
…well, after that, the only reason Zane had to stick around Virtue was her, and even she knew that wasn’t practical. Given that his clientswerecoming to see him suggested hecouldrun his business out of his home town, but the reality was, he was a fashion designer for film stars and other celebrities. The closest he would possibly settle, realistically, would be the city, and even that would mean upending his entire business and moving it across the country. The reality was that he would go back to Los Angeles, and she would stay in Virtue until her contract was over, and then…
…then she didn’t know. The part of her that understood about Virtue’s secrecy made her want to stay for good. The part of her that would always miss Zane if she stayed, though, seemed much stronger and more powerful. The idea of being where he’d grown up, but hadn’t chosen to stay, was just too painful.
They were having a moment, she told herself. An absolutely glorious fairy tale moment, acting on an incredible attraction that neither of them quite believed wasfate, but which was certainly real and wonderful and all-encompassing. But all fairy tales came to an end, no matter how much Vicki might hope otherwise. She had to be brave and sensible when the time came, because she simply couldn’t imagine asking Zane Bellamy to stay in Virtue for her.
Not with his appalling father getting louder and nastier every day. Vicki could almost see people picking sides even before the town council meeting. The discussion about reopening the train line was meant to be the major topic, but Vicki knew it would be masking an entirely different conversation, and she had no idea which way it would go.
