His short dark hair accentuated his sharp bone structure, and he looked more like someone who should be modeling clothes than someone shopping for them.
Vigo appeared behind her — when had he left the room? — with two glasses of champagne in either hand. He edged past her and extended a hand for me to take one, then gave one to Hawk and Jagger.
The woman tipped her head, like she was trying to figure out a confusing puzzle.
“Shit!” Vigo said, looking at her from behind the Versace sunglasses. “I’ll go get you one.”
“That won’t be necessary,” she said as he started for the short hall leading to the rest of the store. “And please, just let me know if you need anything and I’ll have it brought over.”
There was an element of pleading in her voice and I hoped she wasn’t going to get in trouble if things went off the rails. Because looking at the Hawks, occupying the space like three panthers corralled in a playpen, I had a feeling things were definitely going to go off the rails.
Jagger scowled as Vigo hopped onto the console table next to what looked like tens of thousands of dollars in jewelry.
“Sure thing,” Vigo said.
Meredith turned to me and extended her hand toward the racks of clothes. “As you can see, I’ve pulled some pieces based on the brief. You’re attending an academic award ceremony?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
“Wonderful. You’ll find these selections are suitably restrained, all from this season, and all in your size.”
“My size?”
“A twelve right?” Vigo said, swinging his legs on the console table.
I sighed. There was no use fighting it. “Yep.”
Jagged approached Meredith, several dresses in his hands. “You can take these. And no more synthetics please.”
She nodded, took the dresses from this hands, and looked at me. “I’ll take you to the dressing room and we can get started.”
29
CASSIE
The dressing roomwas more like a luxury walk-in closet, as big as my living room in the apartment over the coffee shop, and I quickly got lost in a flurry of silk and satin, feathers and lace. There wasn’t a single bad dress, and I got used to standing in my underwear sans bra waiting for Meredith to choose a different size or style from the racks in the sitting room, and sometimes from the store beyond the private space where the Hawks had taken up residence.
The labels were a blur: Oscar De La Renta and Elia Saab and Jenny Packham and Balmain.
There were no price tags on anything, which was probably a good thing because I felt a little sick thinking about the Hawks buying me one of the dresses, all of them beautifully made of expensive fabrics and crafted with hand-sewn detail, something I wouldn’t even have known if Meredith hadn’t pointed it out to me.
I went out into the sitting room wearing each new dress, letting the Hawks weigh in. At first I was self-conscious about the fact that I was accompanied by not one but three hugetattooed men, only one of whom — Jagger — looked like he belonged anywhere near such a restrained environment.
But Meredith was brisk and friendly, without a shred of judgement or criticism, and she seemed as at ease with the Hawks as could be expected, although she did tell Vigo to please refrain from swinging the three-thousand dollar handbag that was in his hands when I emerged from the dressing room wearing a sequined cocktail dress with a bustier top and big gold rosettes across the skirt.
By the time I exited the fitting room in a halter dress with a keyhole cut out under the bust I was starting to wear down. The dress flowed over my body in a waterfall of black satin, pooling at my feet even in the Christian Louboutin heels given to me by Meredith.
“I think this is made for someone tall,” I said, looking down at the fabric puddling on the floor.
“We’ll have it tailored,” Jagger said, his arms folded over his chest, biceps pronounced in the starched fabric of his button-down as he studied the dress with a critical eye.
“Absolutely,” Meredith said behind me. “Tailoring is no problem.”
I looked at Hawk who had turned away from the window and was now staring at me with hooded eyes, his gaze raking my body in a way that made my pussy clench with desire.
Like I was naked. Like he was thinking about all the things he wanted to do to me.
Vigo had moved to the sofa, his leg thrown over the side, swigging from a bottle of Veuve Clicquot, a silk scarf tied around his neck like he was an eighty-year-old shipping magnate in a smoking jacket.
