“Gabe?” Her voice is muted by the panel that separates us, but the locks are already snicking free and then she pulls the door open and stares at me. She’s wearing a wine-colored camisole and loose black pajama pants. No makeup, her dark hair swept up in a messy bun.
And Christ, she’s never looked more beautiful.
I can see the questions in her eyes. I can see the worry. It’s the soft affection that humbles me the most.
I have things I want to say to her—apologies for this morning, and for the way I’ve showed up on her doorstep late tonight without permission or explanation.
There are a hundred different things I want to tell her, all of them jammed in my throat. And they all boil down to just one truth, anyway.
“There’s nowhere else I want to be right now.”
She opens her arms, and I walk into them.
21
~ Evelyn ~
After nearly a week of incredible nights spent in Gabe’s arms, my Friday morning at L’Opale could not be off to a worse start.
Katrina storms into my office carrying one of our signature bespoke boxes and drops it on my desk with a hard thump. “I’ve had it, Eve. I have fucking had it with that man!”
Shocked at her outburst, I turn away from my design table where I’m working on one of Avery’s pieces. Kat’s temper is on a full boil, which is difficult enough to deal with in private sometimes, but especially when I know we have a sales floor and dressing rooms busy with shopping customers today at the other end of the corridor from our offices.
Frowning, I motion for her to shut my door, which she does with an equal lack of discretion. It bangs closedand I stand up, confused and displeased. “What’s going on, Kat?”
She reaches into the open tulle-stuffed box. “Too much lace,” she says sharply, holding up a lovely custom-designed bra. She chucks the piece into my trash bin and grabs a pale mint negligee from the box. “Wrong shade of green.”
That, too, is thrown into the bin. She pulls out a third, a beautiful black silk and Leavers lace bustier, some of Kat’s most stunning work, which I personally modeled and sized for Jane’s final stitching earlier this week.
“Too slutty,” Kat announces, sneering.
When she starts to toss that piece into the trash, I reach out and take it from her hands. “Enough.”
“Hennings has rejected them all, Eve. Every. Fucking. Piece. He’s just left the shop after refusing this entire order.”
It’s no secret that Katrina’s gotten off to a rocky start with Mr. Hennings. She hadn’t been excited when I asked her to take over his account for me after I landed Avery Ross’s project, and it seems their working relationship has only deteriorated. It’s been a lot of strain and miscommunication on both sides, from forgotten appointments with Hennings—which Kat not only denies but refuses to apologize for—to constant back-and-forth over designs. All unusual problems for Kat, whose work ethic with other clients has always been impeccable. But she and Walter Hennings have clashed from day one.
And now this.
I walk around to retrieve the other two pieces from my trash bin and release a heavy sigh. “Would you likeme to talk to him?”
“No,” she snaps. “I’d like you to take back his account. It’s obvious that’s what he really wants. And I can’t keep working like this, Eve. I won’t.”
“What are you saying?”
Her jaw tightens. “Either you take me off his account, or I’m done.”
Her ultimatum hits me like a slap. “Done?”
She fists her hands at her sides as though girding for battle. “I have other design clients here at L’Opale and I’ve never had issues working with them. This man has been sabotaging me at every turn—”
“Sabotaging you?” I shake my head, taken aback by her drama. “Kat, do you hear yourself? You sound paranoid and that’s not like you.”
“I’m not paranoid, I’m pissed off. I take meticulous notes on all of his design changes, only to have him contradict everything the next time we meet. He signs off on paper, then finds fault with the finished piece.” She scoffs. “Honestly, I don’t know how you’ve been able to deal with him all this time, but I can’t. And for the record, I never scheduled that appointment with him on the day I requested off last week.”
“It was on your calendar,” I remind her. Gently, because I can see how upset she truly is. “Megan showed me the boutique client schedule. The appointment was on the computer, and Mr. Hennings certainly thought he was supposed to be here to meet with you.”
She shakes her head, a vigorous denial. “I never scheduled it.”
