by Megan Mulry
“So have I,” he replied, handing her the mug after she’d shifted into a sitting position. “So, what do you want to do today?” Devon asked.
Sarah took a sip and stared at him. “Um. I’m going to work. That’s what grown-ups do.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Is that right? Do grown-ups get to fool around before they go into their grown-up offices and sit at their grown-up desks?” He put his mug down on the steel bedside table and crawled onto the bed.
“You’re going to spill the coffee!” Sarah squealed.
“Then you’d better put your mug down… I’ve got to get busy before you run off to be all grown-up…” Devon continued to prowl over her, kissing her bare shoulder and working his way down the length of her arm. She laughed and put the mug down next to his on the side table.
“Hurry then!” she said, and kissed him hard on the lips.
An hour later, they were in Devon’s car heading toward Mayfair, Sarah scrolling through her emails on her cell phone while he drove.
“Maybe being a grown-up is not so bad after all,” Devon said. “Sort of like playing house. I get to make coffee and pull a bird. Make toast and drive you to work.” His face pinched. “Wait. That’s not right. Makes me sound like a valet.”
“Oooh. I love that idea!” Sarah cried, looking up from her phone. “The world’s sexiest valet. Every woman’s dream come true. You have to take a very keen interest in clothes!”
He shook his head. “I’ll take a very keen interest in taking off your clothes, but that’s about the best I can offer.”
Sarah sighed theatrically. “Oh well. I guess I can’t have everything.” She happened to say it right as they pulled up in front of the construction site of her shop, where the builders were lazing about. They scurried into action when they saw her arrive.
Devon shifted the car into park but kept his hand on the gearshift. The engine rumbled aggressively in the narrow mews.
“What am I going to do? This is never going to get done.”
Devon dipped his head to get a better look at the full height of the building through the windscreen. “Sarah…”
“What?” She was collecting her computer bag and her purse and looking around her seat in the car to make sure she hadn’t dropped anything.
“Look. Do you want me to help? It’s sort of ridiculous that I work for an architectural firm and I’m decent at maths and you just happen to be having issues with both…”
She stopped fussing with her stuff and looked at him. “Can I think about it?”
Devon looked down at her short skirt and the sheer stocking covering her thigh. He reached out his pinkie from where he was holding the gearshift and touched her there. “I just want to help.” He looked up from her thigh and into her eyes. “I promise. I won’t be all controlling and weird.”
She looked back out at the swarm of workmen and thought about how much still had to be done if the shop was going to open for business on September 1 in time for London Fashion Week.
“Just let me think about it, okay, Dev?”
He nodded. Devon marveled, as always, at the swinging pendulum of Sarah’s maturity. Sometimes she seemed so afraid and vulnerable. Other times, like this, she was wise and cautious. “Of course,” he said. “Whatever you decide. Can I give you a lift home from work?”
She shut her eyes for a few seconds, then opened them. “Home?”
He looked humbled. “I knew I shouldn’t have said it like that. Will you come over to my place for another sleepover date tonight? Is that better?”
She exhaled a long breath.
“That doesn’t sound good at all,” he said.
“Oh stop. Of course I want to sleep at your place. I just feel all discombobulated. All of my things are at the Connaught, except for what I left at your place… and I just am not the type of girl who can live out of a suitcase in the corner. I guess we should have talked about this last night over tikka masala instead of here in the idling car when I’m all stressed about getting into work.”
“No worries. I’ll clear out the closet in my office at home and you can put all your stuff in there. There’s a small loo off that room too—”
She smiled widely. “You would clear out a closet for me?”
He shook his head. “You have no idea what I would do for you, Sarah James.”
“I’m beginning to get an idea.” She leaned in and kissed him. “I don’t know how late I have to work tonight. I’ll just stay in touch and grab a taxi.”
“Just call me. I’m happy to come and get you.”
“I bet you are,” she teased. “Have a good day… now go to work!”
“Okay, okay.”
Sarah got out of the car and watched as the Aston Martin rumbled down the narrow street then turned onto Berkeley Square.
She spent most of the day back and forth with her forensic accountant and took his recommendation that she hire a seasoned investigator to look into any possible malfeasance. After she’d had the chance to sleep on it, Sarah was actually grateful to Devon for voicing the hard truth she’d been avoiding for the past six months: that someone either inside or very close to her company was stealing from her. She decided to set aside all of her creative obligations and deal with the ugly facts until she got to the bottom of it. Despite Devon’s sweet offer to help with that part of the business, she wanted to deal with it herself. It was just too personal, and she needed to figure it out.
As for the layabout construction team, she was going to put Devon on retainer and let him have the run of the place. If he was half as good at charming the workers as he was at charming the ladies, the shop would be finished by the middle of July.
When Sarah heard her stomach growl, she looked up at the wall clock to see it was nearly eight o’clock at night. Her phone trilled.
“Sarah James, sexual adventuress. Who’s calling please?” she said, seeing that it was Devon.
“Your boyfriend!” He laughed.
Her stomach flipped at the matter-of-fact way he said it… like, duh, she had a boyfriend.
“So, what are you up to?” Devon continued. “Working hard or hardly working?”
She started to gather her papers together while she spoke to him. “I was working hard, but I’m ready to wrap it up for the day. Where are you?”
“Around the corner.”
“You are such a stalker!”
“No, I’m not!” He paused, then laughed. “Oh, okay. I am a little bit of one where you’re concerned, but not on this particular occasion. My mom invited us to join her for supper. You up for it?”
Sarah stared at her makeshift desk. The construction crew had set her up with a pair of sawhorses and a plank to work on while she was here. She often worked out of her room at the Connaught, or at Bronte’s small office in Soho, but she felt like more of the construction work got done when she was physically present at the worksite, basically breathing down their necks.
She tapped a pencil against the bare wood of the tabletop. “I don’t know, Dev.”
“Oh, come on. She’s not that bad. Just because she and Bronte don’t get along.”
“It makes me feel like a traitor.”
“Oh, cut that out. Be down in front in five and we’ll have a great glass of wine and a hunk of steak. She’ll meet us at the Guinea Grill in fifteen minutes.”
She hesitated again. “Oh, fine. I’ll see you there.”
Devon was right. The dowager duchess was not that bad. She was smart and funny, elegant and sharp. But there were a few times that her expression turned stormy, quite like Devon’s actually, when the conversation veered in a direction that was not to her liking. Basically, anytime Bronte’s name came up. After one particularly cruel slight, Sarah spoke up.
Sarah didn’t want to be disrespectful to her boyfriend’s mother (boyfriend! yay!), but she finally had to be disagreeable. “I’m sorry, Duchess, but I must defend Bronte. She is incredibly loyal and wonderfully creative. Maybe you two got off on t
he wrong foot.”
The duchess widened her eyes and took a sip of her wine. “She’s just so… what’s the expression you all use these days, Devon?”
“I don’t know, Mother.” Devon laughed as he cut into his enormous steak and pushed his thigh closer to Sarah’s. They were sitting along the banquette facing his mother, who always preferred a straight-backed chair.
“Bronte is in my face.”
Sarah laughed at the turn of phrase coming out of the older woman’s pursed lips.
“Well,” Sarah said. “I suppose she is that. But that’s what makes her so lovable.”
Devon’s mother raised one eyebrow. “If you insist.”
“Moving on…” Devon said as he cut another piece of meat and motioned for the waiter to refill their wine glasses.
“Oh, very well.” His mother shrugged her acceptance but looked a bit like her favorite toy had just been grabbed out of her hand.
“I know what we can talk about that we all enjoy,” Sarah said.
“What?” Devon asked.
“Fashion!”
He rolled his eyes.
The duchess’s eyes twinkled. “Well, two out of three of us will enjoy. What did you think of the Milan shows? The colors were vile, but all that satin—”
“I know! What were they thinking? I love the citrusy yellows but that tangerine—” Sarah made a face that looked like she’d swallowed something unexpected and revolting.
“Oh, we must go together next year. Or to Paris? How divine. I would get to meet your grandmother and immerse myself in all of those delectable shows. Does she still go?”
“Occasionally, but usually the designers have her in…”
Devon watched as his mother and—he hesitated in his mind—girlfriend (there was a first time for everything) chatted on about the details and gossip of the fashion world. He looked from Sarah’s long, shimmering blond hair to his mother’s coiffed updo and shook his head. The two of them together would be impossible.
“Why are you shaking your head, dear?” his mother asked.
“No reason.”
“He’s thinking how he regrets bringing us together,” Sarah said.
“Right you are, Sarah,” the duchess agreed. “Well, too late now, I’m afraid. I think you’re fabulous and I will have my share.”
Devon rolled his eyes again, then looked at his mother. “Impossible. She’s already the busiest woman in London and you know how I hate to share… I learned it from you!”
“Naughty boy. I always taught you to share but to choose very, very carefully with whom you do.” She smiled at Sarah to indicate that he had chosen wisely.
Sarah loved the idea of the two of them fighting over every minute of her spare time, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that they weren’t really joking. They were both far too used to getting every little thing their way. She might have been raised in the lap of luxury, as it were, but between her mother’s no-nonsense morality and her father’s Yankee thrift—private jet Yankee thrift, but still—Sarah had always maintained a ferocious work ethic. She smiled at the turn of the conversation and they finished off the meal with a few vague promises to get together the following week for tea or lunch.
On the drive home, Devon concentrated on the car and hummed a light tune.
“What’d you do at work today?” Sarah asked.
“Oh, nothing much.”
“Did you even go in?” She couldn’t keep the stridency from her tone.
“Even?”
“Sorry. I’m feeling a bit tetchy, I guess. You and your mom live in some crazy dream world where the words ‘getting work done’ usually refer to a weekend getting plastic surgery in Switzerland.”
“I worked on a few ideas for your squishy-steel stiletto idea. Does that count?”
Her stomach flipped. Maybe this was what it was like to be in love with a crazy genius. “You did?!”
“You’re unbelievable. I offer to take you to Venice or Rome for a romantic getaway, and you’re more turned on by a high heel.”
She looked out the window to hide the smile.
He came to a stoplight and reached for her chin. “You don’t have to look away. I love it.”
She kissed the palm of his hand. “I love you too. I’m sorry I’m grumpy.”
“I wish you’d let me help.”
“I decided it’s a good idea.”
Finally! thought Devon. Now he’d find a way to confess he’d been nosing around for months.
“I’d love to hire you as a general contractor or whatever you want to call it, to oversee the construction… the guy who’s supposed to be doing that is such a waste. Would you be willing?”
Shit! That was not the kind of help he had in mind, but he’d do whatever she needed.
She sensed his hesitation. “It’s fine if you don’t want to. I totally understand. You’d rather do all the financial stuff, but I really need to do that on my own. You know what I mean?”
Double shit.
“Of course I understand. I’ll get on those guys tomorrow and your place will be done with plenty of time to spare.”
“I feel better already,” Sarah said, and sank deeper into the soft leather upholstery of the powerful car.
The next eight weeks went by in a thrilling blur. Devon and Sarah were the toast of the season. The Chelsea Flower Show. Glyndebourne. Ascot. Henley. Polo. Wimbledon.
Bronte used all of the publicity to capitalize on promotional opportunities for Sarah’s store opening in London. The tabloids were ravenous: the ducal brothers, the American best friends. Sarah’s head began to swim with the constant whirl of social engagements on top of all of her work responsibilities. She still kept her room at the Connaught, even though she rarely used it. Devon had begun to hint (constantly) that it was silly for her to pay exorbitant hotel fees (as if he cared about economy) when his large, spacious apartment was more than big enough for both of them.
“Just move in already, Sarah.”
“Already? We’ve barely been together two months.”
He was back at it one late Thursday night in July when they’d come home from an evening at the theater.
“You know what I mean. We’re staying together, aren’t we?” He came up behind her in the bathroom as she finished taking off her earrings and put them in her jewelry case. She leaned back into him.
“Of course we’re staying together. Eventually. But I have so much I need to get done in the next few months and you are very…” He was kissing her neck and reaching his hands under her blouse. “…distracting…” She sounded simultaneously delighted and exasperated.
“Mm-hmm…” he hummed into her skin.
“Devon!”
“Sarah!”
He was so gorgeous, staring at her expectantly like that in the mirror. He hadn’t asked her to marry him, but she suspected he was only holding on by a thread. It was what she wanted, wasn’t it? Who wouldn’t?
“Let me just get through the store opening and then we can figure it out. Maybe we can move into my apartment over the store when it’s done.”
“Wherever you want…” he said into her skin when he resumed kissing her.
They slipped into bed, and as usual, the outside world slipped away.
***
Six hours later, Sarah woke up refreshed and ready to face the day.
It was four in the morning.
She tried to appreciate the comfort of Devon’s warm embrace and even thought of taking advantage of him, to enjoy it further, but her mind was already racing forward to meet the day. She’d received another update from the investigator and she wanted to look at the new numbers. Corporate sabotage? Money laundering? It was all starting to seem likely.
After a few more minutes of pretending she might be able to fall back to sleep, she got out of bed, pulled on Devon’s white shirt that she’d pulled off him the night before, and padded quietly back to the dining room table. The city lights were dim but cast enough of a glow th
at she could see her way around the apartment. She opened her computer bag and pulled out her iPad and iPhone; both were so low on battery power, they were about to crash. She grabbed the charging cable but was unable to find the wall adapter.
She headed into Devon’s small office. He had cleared out the closet as promised, but he still used the immaculate desk for his after-hours work. She flipped on the light and saw his computer. She put the cable into the side of his laptop to charge her phone that way instead. When the computer screen lit up, recognizing the new device, Sarah clicked that she did not want to sync. She was about to turn back to the living room when she noticed myriad lines of data scrolling up the computer screen. She was only giving it a brief glance, not wanting to pry, but she looked more closely when she realized it was filled with information that read like a travel log from her own diary: Chicago… Chicago… Milan… Chicago… Geneva… New York… Chicago… Chicago… and she recognized the IP addresses.
She felt him standing behind her, but she couldn’t bring herself to actually turn and face him. She wasn’t sure she could bear the sight of him. There was something psychotic about the whole thing. “Why, Devon?”
“I was going to tell you—”
“When? Like, one day when I got around to revealing my deepest secrets to you? Like, that I was a virgin when we met? Oh, wait, I did that! Or that I am totally insecure about my father? Oh, wait—I confessed that too. You want more? Are you always going to want more, Devon? When will you have enough of me for you to reveal you?” By the end, she wasn’t even screaming, it was more of a lacerating snipe. The bitter sarcasm in her voice was totally unfamiliar to him. She pulled the charging cable out from the side of his computer, wanting to smash his whole laptop on the floor, or better yet against the side of his head.
She turned her back to him as she passed through the narrow door, not wanting her treacherous body to respond to his slightest touch. She put all of her things from the dining table back into her briefcase. After changing into a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt, Sarah gathered a few things out of the bathroom and the closet and shoved it all unceremoniously into her luggage. The wheelie bag had been at the back of the closet since she’d started shacking up with him in May. Thank God she had kept her room at the Connaught.