But he didn’t.
I put it down to history.
It had been the three of us since preschool. Even though he had guy friends, including his best friend, Judd, he still hung out with me and Gem.
“Ava?” he whisper-shouted, squinting at me under the moonlight.
“It’s me,” I acknowledged, my voice trembling.
He must have heard it, because he instantly disappeared and a few minutes later the French doors in the kitchen opened. Nick rushed out to me in a T-shirt and long shorts, as tall as my dad at five foot eleven already and still growing.
“What happened?” He took hold of my arms, concern in his soulful dark eyes.
And without meaning to and completely mortified, I burst into tears.
Nick enfolded me in his arms, his voice shaking as he said, “Now I’m really worried. Talk to me.”
I managed to calm, scared I’d wake his parents and have to explain why I was there in the middle of the night crying my eyes out. And then I whispered what happened. Nick’s hold on me tightened.
“He didn’t touch you, though?” He bit out.
I shook my head. “I got out of there.”
Gently prying me from his chest, Nick gave me a severe look, seeming so much more like a man than a boy in that moment. “We have to tell my parents.”
“No,” I whisper-shouted. “Nick, no, please. I don’t … I don’t want to make a big deal out of this, okay? My parents won’t care anyway.”
“If they won’t care about that, then they won’t care if you live here instead.”
“Your parents will never go for that and … look … I don’t want anyone knowing, okay? I don’t want to be the girl whose parents let a pervert into the house.”
We had a staring match. Something he and I had gotten good at from the age of four.
I always won.
With a heavy sigh, Nick kept a strong arm around me and led me toward the house. “Fine. But I’m putting a lock on your bedroom door. And anytime your parents say they’re having a party, you either stay here with me or stay with Gem, okay?”
I nodded in agreement, relief flooding me that I didn’t have to go home.
“You can sleep in the guest room.”
I grabbed his hand, not wanting to be alone. “Can’t I stay with you?”
He paused at the French doors, seeming to ponder it. Then he nodded. “But we have to be quiet.”
We tiptoed upstairs and down the creaky hall toward his bedroom, the smell of boy hitting me as soon as I walked in. It was a little musty and sweaty, but I didn’t care. I felt safe here with him.
“I’ll sleep on the floor,” Nick whispered.
I eyed his bed, which was definitely big enough for us both. We’d shared a bed before—not in a while, but still. “We can share.” More than comfortable around him and his stuff, I hopped up onto the bed and relaxed back against his pillows. I was so happy to be away from home and with someone I could trust. Still, my insides felt shaky and I couldn’t stop shivering. I wanted Nick near me to help abate the feeling.
My best friend, however, stood across the room and stared at me.
He seemed … uncertain.
“What’s going on?” I whispered, leaning forward. Uneasiness crept over me and I wondered if Nick was secretly sick of having me and Gem around. Was having me infiltrate his space, like, the last straw or something? “Nick?”
“You’re in my bed,” he whispered.
“Technically, I’m on it,” I joked stupidly, wanting to defuse the sudden tension between us.
Finally, he took a few steps toward me, and the chill the strange man had put in my blood suddenly dissipated under a wave of warmth. My cheeks grew flushed and my palms sweaty and I didn’t know why. Except … except Nick was looking at me … differently.
Like a boy looks at a girl.
“Oh.” I tensed in realization.
Nick threw me a lazy, almost shy, self-deprecating smile. “Yeah. Oh. I, um … I shouldn’t get on the bed with you.”
“Since when?” My breathing sounded a little funny. It felt funny too. Like I couldn’t quite catch a complete breath.
His eyes pinned me to the spot and he seemed so nervous I wanted to hug him. He swallowed hard. “Since a while.” He exhaled. Shakily, making the butterflies in my stomach spread their wings and come to life again. “I … I love you, Ava. And not like how I love Gem. I don’t want to kiss Gem.”
Wow.
Oh my God.
How did this night turn from the worst night ever to … well, kind of freaking epic?
I stared at him in total shock.
Nick was always the “boy next door,” but lately I knew my feelings toward him had been changing. I just wasn’t brave enough to admit it like he was. And I never, ever thought he would feel the same way back.
It wasn’t like I didn’t get asked out, and I’d been on a few dates. I’d even dated Michael Crawley in the seventh grade for eight months. But this was Nick. I never imagined Nick could love me romantically.
“What if I’m glad?” I whispered, my heart racing. “What if I love you too?” And I did. He was Nick. My protector and my best friend.
His eyes widened ever so slightly and then he rounded the bed, getting onto it beside me. I turned into him and he reached out to tentatively cup my cheek in his hand.
“It’s okay.” I sighed, nuzzling into his touch, amazed how the ugly shivers from a mere few minutes ago had transformed into excited trembling. “You can kiss me.”
When he did, it was the sweetest, softest kiss I’d ever been given. Boys usually just stuck their tongue in my mouth, wiggled it around a bit, and then grinned smugly like they’d accomplished something great instead of something yuck.
Not Nick.
My best friend could kiss.
I laughed softly at the thought, amazed that this was happening.
Nick smiled, caressing my cheek with his thumb. “What?”
“Only you could turn the worst night ever into the best.”
He grinned and wrapped his arm around me, pulling my head down onto his shoulder. “I can’t believe you like me back.”
“You thought I wouldn’t?” I asked in disbelief.
“You’re the most beautiful girl in school. Even the guys on the varsity team talk about you.”
“They talk about a freshman? Perverts,” I joked.
He chuckled. “My point is, you could have anyone.”
I frowned. “But I don’t want just anyone.”
“Not even Styler James?” he teased.
I rolled my eyes. Styler was Gem’s big crush, and I indulged her by oohing and aahing over him sometimes. He was a junior and admittedly extremely cute. “His name is Styler, Nick.”
My head rose with his shoulders as he laughed quietly. “Doesn’t seem to bother every other girl, including Gem.”
“Gem can have him. I want you.”
I felt his lips on my forehead. “You have me,” he whispered. “I’ll always protect you, Ava.”
Snuggling deeper into him, I believed it. I believed it with every bone in my body. He had all my faith.
“So you’re my girl?” he asked. “I get to tell everyone to back off now, ’cause you’re my girl?”
“Yes.” I reached for his hand. “I’m yours. And you’re mine.”
“Always.”
I woke up in a jolt from the dream. The memory. Sweat soaked the hair at the back of my neck and my skin felt flushed.
So much for sleep taking me away from the ghosts my time back home had stirred up. If sleep wasn’t going to do it, then I hoped running would. I got up just as the dawn was breaking, changed into running clothes, and took off.
A few miles later I felt marginally better, but I knew keeping busy would be the only way to distract myself from the shaky hangover dreaming of my past had left me with. Which was why I was so happy to return to work that morning.
Stella Larson Designs was located on B
eacon Street, just a few doors down from XV Beacon Hotel but on the opposite side of the street. It hadn’t always been in such a prime location, but as Stella’s company took off, she relocated, taking the risk on an expensive office location in the hopes that it would appeal to wealthy clients. And it seemed to work. We had an airy reception room with muted gray tile flooring, a white leather corner sofa scattered with a few different-sized pillows in a gray palette, and a gray throw. At the back of the room was a sideboard in a gray-painted finish that held our public portfolios. Hung on the wall above it were photographs from some of our favorite designs framed in thin lemon-colored frames. That tiny burst of color continued in the vase on the sideboard, the handblown glass bowl on the coffee table, and the miniature button-back armchair in the corner of the room.
We had a glass reception desk, chosen so that it would seem to almost disappear into the room, but it was only for show. There was a bell that sounded in each of our offices when someone entered our reception area, and one of us would go out and greet the client. Stella didn’t see any point in wasting money on a full-time receptionist when most of our clients came in by appointment.
The great thing about our location on Beacon Street was that I could walk there from my apartment in less than ten minutes.
As I strolled into the office, relief flooding me at being home, my cell rang. Of course it did. I sighed, digging through my purse to locate it. Not even two seconds into the place and my clients needed my attention already.
However, caller ID told me it was my uncle David, not a client. “Good morning,” I said as a greeting, always happy to hear from him.
“Good morning, sweetheart. Just checking in to make sure you got home okay.”
It must have been the stress of the last few days, but his words caused a burn of tears in the back of my eyes. Grateful for his concern, I smiled. “I’m home, safe and sound. Just walked into the office, in fact.”
“And you’re okay?”
Here was the thing that you needed to know about my family. My childhood had been tumultuous since my parents didn’t really know what to do with a kid. They’d wanted one, but when they got me, they seemed to flounder. They were never outright unkind to me; they also never provided me with any real affection, beyond whatever they gave to anyone else. Their philosophy was to let me find my way, believing it would make me a freer, more independent person. They also didn’t believe in grudges or arguments. So when I was bullied in the seventh grade, they told me to just forgive Amanda Pointer for pushing me facedown in the dirt until I almost passed out, and get over it.
I could have been out smoking dope and stealing cars, and they would have shrugged it off as me “trying to find myself.” They knew very little about my personality, never taking the time to get to know me, and the only compliments they ever gave me were on my physical appearance.
One bright light in my upbringing was my uncle David, my mom’s big brother. He was totally different from my mom, and he disapproved of the way they brought me up. I’d heard him attempting to say so to my mom when he visited, and my mom would tell him they didn’t invite negativity into the house. I knew she and my dad frustrated my uncle to the point of real anger, but he still visited whenever he could to check up on me.
He even sent me money when I attended Savannah College of Art and Design. With his support, and with Nick and Gem only a few hours away studying at Georgia State, college had been the happiest time in my life. A year after graduation, however, after I’d been convinced to move back to Phoenix, the two people I trusted the most destroyed my faith and broke my heart. It was my uncle who stepped in to help me pick up the pieces. He insisted I move out to Boston to stay with him and his wife while I got on my feet. I’d been working as an intern with an interior design company, so my hope was to find a new position with another company. My uncle was a successful accountant and I convinced him to let me redo his office so I could add it to my small portfolio. Instead, Stella Larson noted the changes on her next visit to my uncle’s office and inquired about it. Being the super supportive guy he was, my uncle waxed poetic about me to her and got me an interview. Seven years later the rest was history.
It wasn’t the only time my uncle David had come through for me. He was also the reason Harper got a chance at Canterbury. Jason Luton was not only his client, but they’d become friends, and I asked him to ask Jason to give Harper a shot as an apprentice chef when she was nineteen.
My uncle was semiretired and lived in a beautiful house in Hyde Park. One they didn’t stay in that often because his wife liked to travel. Still, Uncle David stayed in touch as much as possible. And I knew he’d been worried about me after the news broke of Gem’s passing.
“I’m fine,” I replied, strolling past Stella’s office and waving to her as she looked up from her computer. My office was just as I’d left it—spic and span. All my work put away and organized. It didn’t look like that normally. It was the one personal space of mine that was usually covered in drawings, fabrics, photographs, and papers. “I’m just glad to be home.”
“I would have dropped by, but we’re in New York. When we get back, let’s have dinner.”
“I’d like that.”
“And how is my sister?” he asked, almost reluctantly.
“The same.”
He grunted. “Okay. Well, I’ll let you get back to work. Call me if you need anything.”
“I will. Love you.”
“Love you too, sweetheart.”
We hung up and I slumped into my chair, looking around my office, preparing myself. First coffee. Leaving my bag and phone at my desk, I headed back toward reception and to the fancy coffee machine that had taken me months to figure out how to use correctly.
“Welcome back.”
I glanced over my shoulder and spotted Stella leaning against the doorway to reception with her arms crossed over her chest. She wore a white blouse with balloon sleeves tucked into an oyster pink pencil skirt. On her feet, nude patent Louboutins. I could admit I may have modeled my own style on hers, because I thought she was pure class.
Her dark brown hair was cut short and blunt so that the shiny ends touched her chin. She had it tucked behind her right ear, revealing a large diamond stud. Her dark eyes were filled with concern.
“I’m fine,” I said, without her having to ask.
“You should have taken today off.”
“And what would have been the point?” I approached her with my coffee. “What I need is to get back to normal. I have a ton of work to catch up on. You know, as my boss you should actually be pressuring me to do that.”
Stella snorted. “I like to think I’m a human being as well as a boss.”
I laughed as she walked back to my office with me. “You’re an anomaly among your kind.”
“Since you aren’t taking me up on my offer for time off … is there anything I can do to help?” She gestured to my office, thus indicating my work. “And by help, I mean off-load some of your work to Gabe.”
As our newest and youngest employee, Gabe worked with only one client at a time, so he technically had more availability than me, Stella, or Paul, the other senior designer.
“I’m really okay. And you know I would never off-load work to someone else. The thought makes my chest hurt,” I joked. But it was true. I was maybe too much of a control freak sometimes, but that was just who I was.
“Fine.” Stella regarded me seriously. “I want to know, however, if you can’t handle things. Not just out of the kindness of my heart either. We can’t afford for any screwups on your current projects. Both are longtime clients.”
“I know that. I’m good,” I promised her.
My boss left me to it and I booted up my computer to start working my way through e-mails. Patrice Danby, the forty-eight-year-old daughter of an oil baron and wife to a high-powered attorney, had been using Stella Larson Designs for the past six years. It seemed she had a new project for us to do every six months, whethe
r it was personal or part of her philanthropic work. We found ourselves designing space for hospital common rooms, retirement homes, free clinics, and once even a charity-run veterinary hospital. I liked Patrice. She didn’t seem like some bored housewife who needed something to do and so turned to charity work. She genuinely appeared to care about her philanthropic projects, and while some people might be of the opinion that it was silly to put so much work into making a space look pretty, Patrice believed in the power of beautiful things. She believed the perfect space could help healing or provide comfort to people and animals. And Stella was more than happy to work with her on that.
For the past three years Patrice had worked exclusively with me after enjoying my collaboration on a retirement home.
I was also working with Roxanne Sutton aka the Shrew. This was my first time working on a project with Roxanne, because her usual designer had said he was too busy to work on her latest project. It became clear to me quite quickly that that was an excuse, and Paul had landed me with Roxanne for a reason. She was rude, demanding, and interfering. However, she had been a client for ten years, and as the young wife of Marcus Sutton, of the New England Suttons, she had more money than God. That family had their fingers in all kinds of different pies, and their wealth had accumulated for generations. They were the kind of wealthy that was difficult to wrap your head around.
My latest project with Roxanne was redecorating not one room, but the entirety of their summer home in Nantucket.
After making a few calls to the tradesman I was collaborating with on the project to see where things stood, I called Roxanne. She lambasted me for a while about being unavailable for the last few days, and although I tried to explain the situation once again, she pretended like she couldn’t hear me. Once I’d promised to send over the latest photos I’d received from the work on the house, and resend samples and drawings I’d already sent her, I managed to get off the phone.
Then I called Patrice. I was redesigning the guesthouse at the back of their property in Wellesley Farms. They had family from Europe coming to stay with them over the summer, and Patrice wanted them to feel like they had privacy, but the guesthouse hadn’t been redecorated in ten years.
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