CHAPTER NINE
STACY
AFTER THE MEETING WITH EXPENDABLE Chic’s design team is over — after I’ve met Todd, with his reluctant but ostentatious approval, and a bunch of other people whose names I’ve already forgotten — I end up back in the little living room where I met Nancy. It’s a wonderful room, well-appointed, but it still feels like a waiting room. Before I went in to meet the team, I sat here. Now that I’m done, it looks like I’ll sit here.
A slight black man with a mustache comes through the double doors into the other room and approaches me. For some reason, it makes my skin crawl. Probably because I’m technically in a hospital, where all news is potentially dire.
“Looks like he will be a bit longer, Miss Grace.”
“Thanks …” I stall. Another name I’ve forgotten. I know he’s someone important. Director of Something-or-Other. Perhaps even Executive Director of Whatever I Can’t Remember. Not just Todd’s boss; Todd’s boss’s boss. You’d never know it, the way his hissy fits run the room.
“Andre,” he says.
“Please don’t call me Miss Grace.”
“Stacy, then.”
I look out the window. You’d never know this was a medical facility from here. Even the views are tranquil. I see trees. Meadow. Nothing but peace.
Andre is standing by me. The door is ajar, and through the gap I can hear Hampton’s voice. “He wanted me to ask if you’d like to fly home now.”
“In the plane?”
Andre smiles. “That’s generally how we fly around here.”
“I meant, in the company jet? Doesn’t he need to get back as well?”
“The commercial airport isn’t far. There are usually seats available last-minute.”
This takes a minute to dawn on me. “You mean he’ll fly back on a regular plane?” Even as I hear it, the words sound ridiculous to me. Why wouldn’t he? That’s how everyone in the world flies. But it feels strange to think of Hampton Brooks anywhere but on his elite jet.
“They serve champagne in first class. I think he’ll survive.”
Andre’s hand is out. Apparently, this is an offer they expect me to take. I assumed I’d be flying back with Hampton. I should be relieved that I don’t have to. I hate that guy.
But over the past hours, I’ve found myself wanting to ask him some questions.
To understand more.
It was interesting to watch him in his element, directing his team. Shaking hands with me beside him like a guest, making introductions.
They respect him. They seem to like him. That’s strange. I was sure he’d be a boardroom tyrant. I was sure he’d manage through insults, get results by way of derision. At least I’m an effective bastard, I imagined him saying.
But it wasn’t like that. At all.
And this place? This compound? The way the kids greeted us on arrival?
Well. It’s not like I figured at all.
“Can I wait?”
“For Hampton?”
“I just don’t know my way around a private jet. I’d feel funny without someone else showing me how to act.”
Again, Andre smiles. “It’s simple. You sit, and the pilots take you home.”
“It just seems like I’d feel weird, flying alone on someone else’s plane.”
Andre looks at his watch. His head tips as if he’s making calculations. “I could fly with you. It’s not far, and I can just as easily work on the plane as here.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t want to inconvenience you.”
“One of our designers, then. That actually might be good, if you’re going to be working with them?”
He says it like a question, but I’m not sure if that’s because he’s making a proposal or if it’s because he knows that I’ll barely be “working with” Expendable Chic. Why Todd had to meet and approve me before I could make sketches in my shop, I have no idea. I’d be shocked if I ever saw these people again.
“I wouldn’t want to inconvenience them, either.”
“It’s no inconvenience.”
Is he going to make me say it? I don’t want to admit I’d like another chance to talk to Hampton. I still detest the man. But now I’m curious, too. And yet, he’s a billionaire business mogul with his own agenda. Am I pushing for him to rush through meetings so he can fly as my security blanket?
Andre must see my indecision. “Or you can wait a bit longer, and see what happens.”
“The grounds seem nice,” I say, looking out the window again.
“Do you have a phone?”
But no, dammit, I don’t. I realized that hours ago, while bored waiting. It’s charging on the counter in the shop. I left too quickly to remember.
“It’s at home.”
Andre reaches into his pocket and hands me his phone. “Take this so someone can reach you when the flight is ready. And if I could be so humble as to make a suggestion, if you plan to explore?”
“Please.”
Andre points out the window. “If you go straight down that path, there’s a grove of peach trees that’s not to be missed.”
The campus is beautiful. Rolling hills, trees in bloom. With my back to the buildings, I can’t even tell civilization is near. The hospital — and the spa, apparently, though I haven’t partaken — is silent. I can’t even hear cars. From what I saw coming in, people get around the complex on golf carts.
I close my eyes, strangely peaceful. I would never have imagined — after fighting with Hampton yesterday, and especially when he called and rushed me away from home — that I’d feel this tranquil. The frenzy seems months behind me.
I’m wearing Converse rather than more sensible meeting attire, so the path is easy. It’s patted down red dirt in the middle of a grassy span, not formal at all.
The peach grove is exactly as Andre promised: not to be missed.
The trees are all in bloom, bedecked with tiny flowers. Their scent fills the air, sighing through a soft breeze. There is a small clearing in the center, with a ring of pretty stone benches around the edges. They are neither simple nor ornate. They fit this place perfectly.
I sit.
After a while, the weight of the day catches up with me, and I realize how tired I am. I look around and see that I’m utterly alone.
I lay back. The bench is long and, considering it’s made of stone, surprisingly comfortable. The grit has been worn away from use, and the stone itself is mostly smooth. I’m able to fit entirely, from head to foot.
After a few seconds, feeling the heaviness of my body, I’m fully at peace. I reach down for my purse, make sure it’s zippered, then set it under my head.
I’m not going to fall asleep or anything.
But of course, I do.
“Am I supposed to kiss you or something?”
My eyes open to Hampton, silhouetted against the brilliant blue sky.
“What?”
“I said, am I supposed to kiss you?”
I blink. I roll my head, then shift to sit up. Falling asleep on a stone bench maybe wasn’t the best idea. I slept well, but I’m going to pay for it.
I’m trying to process his words, but am still too stupid from slumber. Apparently, I can’t understand language until I’m fully awake. I can only feel the emotions. One is curiosity. The other, to my embarrassment, is excitement.
… kiss you …
I get a mental flash of Hampton leaning down and pressing his lips to mine. It takes me another second to understand why the thought makes me uneasy, but then I remember: I was dreaming about him just now, too.
“Like Sleeping Beauty? Maybe Snow White.” When I don’t respond, he says, “Haven’t you ever seen a Disney movie?”
There’s a crick in my neck, and I can tell by a cursory fluff that my hair is a bird’s nest.
“Oh. I get it.”
“Have you been here the whole time?” he asks.
“What time is it?”
“Almost five.”
That wakes me up the rest of the way. It was around 3:30 local time when I came down here, according to Andre’s phone. How could that much time have passed? But I can see that the light has changed and stretched the shadows of the peach trees.
“That’s crazy,” I say. “I guess I was tired.”
He’s looking at me funny.
“What?”
“You have …”
I’m drooling. Oh hell, that must be what he’s staring at.
But he reaches above my right ear, and I feel a small tug as he removes a twig. His fingers brush my face just above the eyebrow. The gossamer threads of my dream make me shiver.
“Are you cold?”
I straighten up, then brush myself down.
“I thought you’d call Andre’s phone to find me.”
“It’s a company phone. They’re all location-tracked. Andre said you were going to the grove, so I checked, and you were still here.”
I wish he’d stop looking at me that way. Like he can see through me. He found me sleeping, joked about kissing me, and now looks like he’s X-raying my head to sift through thoughts and flustered dreams.
Time for this silly business to end.
I stand, then try to act like I’m cool and in control. Naturally, I find two more twigs in my hair. “Are you ready to go?”
He raises his hand, shows me his briefcase.
“It would have made more sense if you’d just called.”
“Actually,” he says, pointing past me, “the airstrip is only about a half-mile that way.”
“We came in a car.”
“The car had to drive all the way around. This is a shortcut.” He rolls his shoulders, shakes himself out. “I’ve been cooped up in meetings, and I’m about to sit on a plane. I need the walk.”
“You don’t know clothes,” I say, pointing down, “if you think those are appropriate hiking shoes.”
Hampton looks down, too. His pair cost a thousand dollars, easy.
I think he’ll smile. It’s a lighthearted joke in the middle of a fruit tree grove.
But he doesn’t.
“I told Andre you’d leave his phone on one of the benches for him to pick up later.”
It takes me a moment to dig the phone out of my purse. Hampton doesn’t wait. He rolls his eyes, turns his back, and starts walking without me.
“Let’s go,” he says. “The pilot is already waiting.”