31. Rosie
31
ROSIE
“ O h my god, Rosie.” Georgia squeals, coming into my apartment Monday night with Chinese takeout.
“What?” Panic tightens in my chest.
“We need champagne for this.” She smiles.
Shit, I rush into the kitchen and grab it from the fridge, she places the takeout on the counter and starts unloading it while I grab two glasses and pop the bubbly. We both let out a whoo-hoo when the bottle pops, and I pour us a glass each and hand it to her.
“Okay, you’re scaring me. What the hell is going on?”
“You know how I’ve been wanting to leave my job?” I nod. “And you know how Emily is in France, and she got to meet her mother and all that stuff this weekend,” she explains. Emily told me how she found her mother again, well Daniel found her, and Louis took her to meet her, and she found out she is married to Louis’ mentor. Such a small fricken world it is between Emily and Louis, they were always destined to be together. I nod again, hoping she hurries up and tells me as the anticipation is killing me. “Well, they had dinner with Matthieu while they were there, and Emily asked him if he knew anyone that needed my kind of expertise and he said yes, him.”
“What?” I yell, surprised.
“He’s offered me a job in Paris, Rosie. Fricken Paris.”
Oh my god, this is huge. So huge. “Are you taking it?”
“Hell, yeah I am,” she says, raising her glass high in the air. I do the same as we clink our glasses, and then I launch myself at her, hugging her tightly and spilling our champagne everywhere, but I don’t care, she looks so happy. We bounce around together squealing with excitement.
“When do you go?”
“Two weeks. I handed in my notice this afternoon. It felt so good.”
“I bet it did.” I raise my glass in her direction, then take a sip. “I can’t believe you’re leaving London.”
“And my lease is up at the end of the month. Thankfully, it’s been on a month-by-month basis as the owners were not sure if they were coming back to London or not.”
“It’s fate.” I grin.
“No, it’s having friends in the right places.” She smirks.
“Emily for the win. And you think you can work with Matthieu?”
“He seems nice. We get on well, he knows my struggle with work, I’ve been moaning to him about it every time we’ve been pushed together because Louis is with Emily, you’ve snuck off with Daniel, and Ava is Ava. We’ve had some great conversations, he said that he didn’t want to offer me anything until he had spoken to his brother and Daniel about it. He’s looked at what I’ve been doing for the football club, and he loved what I did for Emily and Louis’ exhibition, which was just me messing around.”
“You are so talented.”
“Thanks, babe. I know I am, but I’m wasted where I was. Time for a fresh start. Maybe I can find myself a French man, Emily seems happy, as do you,” she adds, wiggling her brows.
“I am,” I confess to her as we start giggling again.
“I’m starved, let’s get food and drinks and then chat,” she says, but then my buzzer goes.
Oh shit. I forgot all the things Daniel bought for me yesterday are arriving now, I said after six and that is now. I forgot about my impromptu Monday night catch-up with Georgia. I buzz them in and wait. I hold open the door, and I don’t realize how much stuff Daniel actually bought me until I see it takes four people to deliver it. Georgia’s eyes widen as they come in and place the designer bags in my living room and then disappear again.
“What the hell is this? Do you have a sugar daddy I don’t know about?” Georgia asks, eyeing off the bags.
“It was Daniel,” I confess.
Georgia’s brows raise high on her face. “Daniel? Wait. How did you get from hooking up at a bed and breakfast in Kent to shopping out Bond Street? Teach me your ways,” she teases.
“It’s not like that. We went shopping for the cottage, which is so stunning, it’s my dream home.”
“Did you christen it?” I quickly take a sip of my champagne. “You did, you dirty whore.”
“Anyway, we spent all day yesterday shopping for the home which is nearly done, and then he insisted I try on this dress and …”
“You had your Pretty Woman moment and he bought you everything.” Georgia grins.
“He wanted to.”
“I’m not knocking it at all, good for you. But I thought you were trying not to fall for the guy. This is swoony,” Georgia says, waving her hands over at the bags.
“It is, isn’t it? This weekend was one of the best I’ve ever had.”
“Oh no,” Georgia says, “you’re falling for him.”
“What? No, he’s much more than I ever expected, that’s all,” I gush.
“You’re so falling for him,” she repeats.
“I’m not. Dubai is my plan, will be my plan, Daniel is … just …”
“A distraction,” Georgia finishes for me.
“Yes, a pretty one. I’ve been honest with him from the start. I told him nothing else can happen between us other than fun.”
“He knows about Dubai?”
I shake my head.
“Do you think when the time comes, you will be able to say goodbye?”
“Yes,” I answer.
“And what about when Emily and Louis get married? When you come back, you’ll have to watch him with another. Do you think you could do that?” The thought of him with another woman has me seeing red. “I can see it on your face, you’d be jealous.”
“It would take me a moment to get used to seeing him with someone else, but as long as he is happy, that’s all that matters.”
“That’s a bullshit answer, but I’ll let it slide because I know you’re not being honest with yourself.”
“My career will always be a priority.”
“But you could have a career and love if you stay in London,” Georgia argues.
I still because I hadn’t thought of it like that. “Enough about me, tell me more about your move to Paris.” We spend the rest of the night chatting about Georgia’s new life.
“Rosie, Mr. DuPont is here to see you,” Adina says, popping her head into my office.
“Send him in,” I say, surprised by his visit. Nerves flutter in my stomach, catching me off-guard, I’m excited to see him. He walks, into my office, dressed like he’s stepped off the cover of GQ, in a navy suit, with a white shirt, no tie but sunglasses, his dark hair slicked back with a takeout bag in his hand.
“I was passing by and thought I’d pop in. I knew you’d be hungry, probably haven’t eaten and I wanted to check in on how yesterday went with the install.” He grins, taking a seat in front of me and then pulls out two bowls of salad for us. He hands me my chicken Caesar salad which he knows is my favorite. “So, how did yesterday go?”
Yesterday, a shiny black luxury van was waiting for us at work to take us to the property, and there was a picnic basket filled with snacks and drinks for us. He had left a note in the basket, too.
Rosie & Team
Thanks so much for taking the time to put together my home, I look forward to seeing the results soon.
You girls will be working hard, and the shops are far, so I thought I would send you a basket of treats to help you make it through the day.
Daniel
The girls swooned over it, and I did, too. Especially when I saw cheese and crackers and remembered our drive down together.
“Thank you for the picnic basket, it really came in handy as we worked. Everything arrived on time, nothing broken, and we were able to get everything cleaned and put away for you in a day,” I explain as I take a bite of my salad.
“Fantastic, can’t wait to see.” He grins, digging into his own meal. “How have you been?” he asks.
“Good. Busy, but hey, you never told me Matthieu offered Georgia a job. My best friend is now moving to Paris in a couple of weeks.”
“That was business, I think she’s going to be a great asset. Matthieu likes her. He may look like the easiest going out of us DuPonts, but he’s not. But they seem to have hit it off.” He grins.
“She’s so excited. I’m going to miss her. At least Emily is back in London, but she is holed up with Louis all the time, so I barely get time with her. Oh, and thank you for helping her find her mother, that means the world to her.”
Daniel shrugs. “Louis asked. He wanted to make sure that she was worthy of having Emily back in her life. He never considered who she ended up being, but he feels bad that he got to spend all this time with her mother when she was desperate to find her.”
“Don’t you think it’s wild that the two of them were so close yet so far from each other like two planets orbiting?” I ask him.
“If they had met earlier, I don’t think they would be together now. Louis was with Elisabeth and Emily was with that guy,” he says, shoving a couple of bits of lettuce in his mouth. Why is that sexy the way his mouth wraps around the fork? I’m losing it.
“True, guess things work out in the way they should,” I say as I fork some salad into my mouth. We sit and talk for most of my lunch hour. I explain to him about the installation and update him on the furniture that will arrive next week. So, I’ll be going back down there again with the team, and he insists on organizing the car service again. After next week the house should be ready to go. It is the quickest home I’ve turned around, but thankfully, it was only cosmetic.
Daniel stands up and puts his rubbish away, and I’m sad that our time is up. “I better let you go. Thanks for the update. I’ll see you at Ivy’s?”
I nod, trying to chew the bit of salad I put in my mouth. “Yeah, I’ve organized a car so all good.”
“You sure I can’t change your mind about that? We could make a stop along the way, deserted country lane,” he asks, wiggling his brows.
As tempting as that might be I can’t. “I’ll see you there.”
“Fine. But I’ll be expecting a late-night visit.”
“Let’s see how the night goes.” I smirk.
Daniel starts to walk out of my office, he turns and those turquoise eyes land on me. “Like the outfit,” he says, raking those eyes over me hungrily before shoving his sunglasses back on and walking out the door. I’m wearing one of the gorgeous outfits he bought me, a black shift dress with white piping and the matching jacket which is hanging up on the coat rack, red bottom heels, and a designer bag.
“That man is so fine,” Helena says, poking her head into my office, making me jump as I’m a million miles away.