He offered his hand again.
April took it and stepped out of the car.
April
COUTURE MAGNIFIQUE didn’t have a sign on the door.
It didn’t need one.
The people who shopped here already knew where it was; the people who didn’t weren’t supposed to.
Liam guided April through the unmarked entrance, his hand resting at the small of her back. The noise of the morning dropped away. No more pings or audits. No lobster shells. Just the soft hum of hidden speakers and the scent of expensive silk. The air felt different here, cooler and quieter, like stepping into a vault where the currency was taste and the interest rate was measured in envy.
A manager appeared from deeper in the boutique, head-to-toe black, posture trained by ballet and finished by old money. She moved with the efficiency of someone perfected at being helpful without being present. Without breaking stride, she hung a small elegant sign on the front door:CLOSED FOR PRIVATE APPOINTMENTand guided them past racks of gowns to the velvet suite at the back.
It was the size of April’s entire apartment. Three walls of mirrors, floor to ceiling and perfectly lit, reflected them in triplicate. A single rack of gowns stood in the corner, each dress individually spotlit like an installation.
The manager lifted a gown from the rack—layers of tulle that seemed to multiply in the light, a bodice that involved both a corset back and a zipper, structure that suggested the dress had opinions about posture. "This one first." She gestured toward the velvet curtain that separated the dressing area from the rest of the suite.
April took the gown and moved behind the curtain. The manager glided out, the door closing with a near-silent click that only happened in places where even the hinges had pedigrees.
Liam settled into one of the chairs and waited.
She stepped into the gown. Or the gown stepped onto her; the aggressor was unclear. It was a two-person operation masquerading as an independent task, and April was reasonably certain there were too many components for this to operate on instinct alone.
The tulle alone posed a spatial dilemma. It expanded like a sentient cloud with consequences, readjusting every time she tried to contain it, soft and relentless in its occupation of space.
The bodice required engineering. Real boning, as if she were a load-bearing structure meeting code. A corset back with laces that demanded her arms bend in ways evolution had not prioritized.
And then, the zipper.
April reached behind her, found the pull, and tugged.
Nothing.
She adjusted her angle.
Still stuck.
Either the fabric was caught or the zipper had developed a personal vendetta.
She tried with her other hand. Worse angle, worse result. The strap twisted across her shoulder blade, pinning her arm in a pose that would’ve been ambitious in yoga and was downright architectural in haute couture.
She attempted a strategic shimmy.
The dress responded by tightening.
April tried to gather the tulle, establish some kind of hierarchy. It redistributed itself with what felt like enthusiasm, a cloud that had found its calling.
Her pulse kicked harder against the boning, which was deeply unhelpful.
Because the only person outside that curtain was Liam Sterling.
Liam, who had looked at her in a car and saidI wanted youlike it cost him.
Liam, whose brother she’d been dating until breakfast.
There were probably rules about this. Specific categories of people allowed to help you out of clothing.
