‘Both,’ admitted Libby. ‘And his pickle!’
‘I beg your pardon?’ Julia looked amused.
‘His dappled Dachshund—who is called Pickle—decided to go for a swim in my hot tub, which was completely embarrassing as I was standing there in my bikini and red bobble hat when his dog came from nowhere and launched herself straight into the water.’
Julia let out a hearty laugh. ‘No way! I bet that was quite an introduction.’
‘It was downright embarrassing, but he did comment that I had a nice hat.’
‘Oh, I bet he did.’
Libby pointed to the wall and mouthed, ‘He’s staying right next door.’
‘He can’t hear you,’ Julia said. ‘Why are we whispering?’
‘I don’t know,’ replied Libby. ‘But I have to say I didn’t find him aloof. In fact, he was friendly and funny. What gave you the impression he was aloof?’
‘Maybe it was the wrong choice of word,’ Julia admitted. ‘But the boys were saying that the last time he was in town, he just seemed very preoccupied and not his usual cheery self. But then, I suppose we can’t be cheery all of the time.’
‘You’re right, we all have bad days and we never really know what’s going on in other people’s lives. Well, aloof or not, it’ll be good for me to have company on a daily basis. My job can be quite lonely and there are days when I don’t even speak to another human, except when I shout answers at Bradley Walsh whenThe Chaseis on in the background.’
Julia laughed. ‘But all that is about to change.’
For the past ten years, Libby had kept costs down and worked on her designs out of the spare room of her home. Most days, she threw her hair up in a messy bun and stayed in her PJs unless she had to venture out for a meeting. She absolutely loved her job, but the one downside was that she missed the day-to-day conversations and interactions you had when working with other people. But Julia was right, all that was all going to change now. The fashion house in New York City was spread over six floors with hundreds of employees.
Libby smiled to herself, remembering how when she was growing up she’d thought a ‘fashion house’ was a giant house that everyone lived in, not that it housed many famous designers under one brand.
Libby had always been into textiles and started making her own clothes as a teenager, becoming the envy of her friends, who loved her designs. As soon as she left school, she went to college and studied fashion design. She started out doing clothing alterations at home after work while also working full-time in a department store as a personal shopper, advising customers about what looked good on them. After a while she began to get more creative and fashioned her own line of clothes, which she promoted on social media. Once she had built her reputation online, the demand for her designs was huge and before she knew it her business was growing rapidly. Within a year, she was making good money and had booked her first fashion show. Soon the press couldn’t get enough of her and she started spotting people from reality TV shows wearing her outfits to media events. Before she knew it, Libby had received a DM and had signed up to create an exclusive outfit for her first celebrity client.
Her dream had always been to showcase her designs at New York fashion week and with this new job she was one step closer to achieving it.
‘It is. It’ll be very strange working in a busy, noisy environment, but I’m looking forward to it too.’
‘Let’s hope you aren’t too busy for me in the coming month. I want to see you at every opportunity before you fly off to New York.’
‘I’ll be making all the time in the world for you and Flynn in between working my socks off.’
‘I do hope we’re going to get lots of enquiries when all the promotion stuff goes out. This is going to be a truly amazing wedding on Christmas Eve with you at the helm.’
Libby smiled at the compliment. She knew if she could pull this off for Flynn it would be such a win for Starcross Manor.
‘It’s a good job I love weddings and putting a smile on people’s faces.’
‘Libby Carter, your infectious personality and work ethic should be bottled. Talking of bottles, this one is empty!’ Julia waved it in the air.
‘There’s plenty more where that came from.’ Libby got up and fetched another bottle from the fridge. ‘So how did Guy end up with the gig? What’s his connection to Flynn?’ she asked, intrigued. She didn’t mention that she’d overheard Guy’s telephone conversation and that he wasn’t looking forward to the next few weeks.
‘Flynn has met Guy several times through Rory. Rory knows how much Flynn needs this to be a success and as Guy owed Rory a couple of favours, Flynn became one of them.’
‘That’s decent of him. I’ve checked out his profile and trailing a bride and groom for a few weeks seems a little mundane compared to his usual line of work.’
‘“His usual type of work” … someonehasbeen doing their research.’
‘I only wanted to know more about who I’d be working with … and, in my defence, I looked him up before I actually met him.’
‘And what was Guy’s reaction when you shared that you would be working together over the next month?’
‘I’ve not actually got that into the conversation yet. Hopefully, it’ll be a nice surprise.’
