Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
GRIFF
One of the best parts of my life is coming home every night to adoring kisses. It would be nice if it was a little less sloppy, but she never did learn the art of kissing.
“Hey, darlin’,” I murmur, moving my face away from her eager tongue. “Miss me today? I missed you.”
Vivi, my almost four-year-old Yorkshire terrier, barks her excitement at having me home at last. Like always, she met me at the door with demands to be picked up and cuddled.
I complied, of course. What kind of monster would I be if I didn’t?
It’s bad enough that I have to leave her alone most days.
My neighbor who works from home has a key and stops by to play with her nearly every day, but it’s not the same as having full-time company.
By the time I make it to the kitchen and set her down, she’s settled enough not to get underfoot while I sort out her dinner.
“Maybe I should look into daycare again,” I suggest. “It would be good for you to make some more dog friends.” She has a few we see at the dog park, but I worry that she’s not being socialized enough.
One of my clients recommended a canine club, but that would require me to be social, too, and I feel like I get enough of polite chitchat in my job.
The one I looked up did seem nice, though. Kind of like a country club for dogs. My girl deserves to be spoiled like that.
I’ll think about it.
We make it through dinner, a walk, and an episode of Emily in Paris—which makes some very questionable fashion choices—before Vivi’s second-favorite moment of the day comes. She’s been waiting for it, and when the phone finally rings, she goes nuts barking.
“Okay, settle down,” I chide, but I can’t help smiling at how excited she is. She goes quiet as soon as I grab my phone from the coffee table. “Hello?”
“Hi, Uncle Griff!” The piping voice is as familiar to me as my own. “Is Vivi there?”
I grunt and hold the handset toward Vivi. Carter won’t care that I didn’t use words—he doesn’t want to talk to me anyway.
Vivi barks once, as if saying hello. She’s the smartest dog I’ve ever met, as well as being the sweetest and prettiest.
“Hi, Vivi,” my nephew croons. “Are you ready? I learned a new song for us today.” Vivi barks again, and Carter launches into a frankly terrible rendition of a pop song that’s currently being overplayed on the radio.
I love him, but there’s a reason nobody in our family ever considered a career in music, and he’s not an exception.
But ever since the day my sister rang me three years ago, at her wits’ end and almost in tears because work had been shit and her kid was being clingy, begging me to talk to him so she could have five minutes to go to the bathroom in peace, this has become our nightly routine.
Back then, I told Carter he was talking to me and Vivi because I thought it might stop him from needing me to reply if he’d accept the occasional bark instead.
Then he had the bright idea of singing to her, and I made the mistake of saying she really liked it.
My fate was sealed.
Vivi does really like it, though. She’s only met Carter twice, once when I took her with me to Portland to visit and once when they came here, but she’d recognize his voice anywhere and looks forward to this every night.
They finish their bedtime song and chat, and then Vivi lies down beside me on the couch, her head on my thigh, while my sister takes the phone.
“Thank you, Griff,” she says, the way she does almost every night. As if it’s a burden for me to answer a call and not talk.
I grunt acknowledgement, but instead of hanging up like she usually does, she asks, “So, is anything new with you?”
I hit Pause—Emily was irritating me anyway—and focus. We do talk sometimes, but she doesn’t usually start out sounding so tentative. “Not really. Today I talked to a designer I haven’t worked with before.” If you can call it talking. I talked to Calla, anyway.
It didn’t strike me until this second that normally I hate when I have to be overly verbal, and today I’m mad because Phil Marchand wasn’t verbal enough for me. It’s different, though. I don’t think I’m better than people, I just… don’t like talking to people.
Pushing the complicated new thoughts out of my head—it really is different, even if I can’t explain how—I add, “Anything new with you?”
She hmms and makes other “not really” noises, then hits me with, “I’ve been seeing someone.”
My spine goes as stiff as a steel rod, and I immediately start a mental list of people I know who’d help me intimidate this guy if I need to. Penny’s most recent ex was an absolute waste of space, and I celebrated hard when she told me she’d left him. Not where she could hear me, of course.
Please let this guy be better.
“That’s great” is what I say out loud. “Tell me about him.” Like his name, address, and social security number so I can get a friend to run a background check.
“I met him at work,” she starts. “He works in the IT department and helped me when my computer was doing weird shit. I, uh, maybe did some stuff to the computer so I’d have an excuse to keep going back for help.”
I laugh. “That’s so bad, little sis. I’m proud of you. And obviously, it worked.”
“Not really. He was completely oblivious, even when I ran out of stuff I could do without actually destroying company property and was asking him to ‘give it a preventative checkup.’”
That makes me laugh again—Vivi lifts her head to look at me, since twice in as many minutes is rare—and also sets my mind at ease. If the guy didn’t even realize he was being hit on, he’s not likely to be a predator like the ex was. “What’d you do?”
“For a while I thought I’d just have to give up.
Like… maybe he wasn’t oblivious, just not interested, and I’d misread the signs.
But on Carter’s birthday, he brought a present for me to give him, and…
anyway, after I finished kissing him in the middle of the office, HR called us both in for a meeting, and the whole story came out.
He was into me, just had no clue I wanted him too. ”
He brought a present for her kid? I’m not sure if that’s sweet or something I need to worry about. “What’s his name?”
“Harry. We’ve been dating for three months, and last weekend I introduced him to Carter. They built LEGO and played video games for four hours, and I got to read a book. Then Carter went to bed and—”
“I don’t need to know what happened then,” I interrupt.
I respect my sister’s right, as an adult woman, to have a sex life, but I really don’t need to know the details.
“I’m happy for you, Pen, and hopefully I’ll get to meet him soon.
Maybe we can FaceTime?” Even if this guy turns out to be a whole golf course of green flags, I still want him to see me glare at him and know I can pound him into mush if he hurts Penny.
“Well, actually… he’s got family in Vegas, and we were thinking of spending Christmas with them. Would you maybe want to—”
“Yes. Of course. Let me know when you’ll be there, and I’ll book a hotel. I’ve got a couple of friends there I can visit when you’re doing stuff with his family.”
“Harry says you should come to his parents’ place for Christmas dinner. They do a whole big thing and invite a lot of friends and neighbors.”
I can’t imagine anything worse. “I’ll see. I might spend it with my buddies, since I haven’t seen them in a while.” Or in the hotel bar… or getting major dental work. Either would be better than a big family Christmas with a lot of people I don’t know.
We talk for a little longer, and Penny sounds genuinely happy when she hangs up. I’m glad—she deserves it. Carter’s dad was the love of her life, and when he died, right before Carter was born, she was convinced she’d never be happy again.
Fuck knows she wasn’t with the most recent douchenozzle.
Vivi crawls into my lap and curls up, and I pet her precious ears. “How’s a trip to Vegas for the holidays sound, darlin’?”
Midmorning the next day, I get an email with secure links to the 3D modeling for Margaret’s dress. It’s from Phil, surprisingly, not Calla. I guess the ban on speaking to plebs like me only applies to verbal communication.
Hi Griff,
It was great meeting you yesterday, and I’m glad our vision for Margaret is mostly aligned.
As discussed, I’ve included 3D models both with and without the overskirt, and I’m sure you’ll see why the skirt is necessary to the design.
To give an idea of our vision, I’ve used some of the sample fabrics we showed you, but the final decision hasn’t been made yet.
If Margaret or you would like some changes made to the embellishments, we’re able to do that, especially if you have specific accessories you’d like to use.
Calla and I look forward to working with you! She’ll be in touch later today with information for Daria’s order.
Best wishes,
Phil Marchand
Co-owner & Head of Design
Phallacy
I scoff. I’ll see why the overskirt is necessary, will I? Doubtful. And wow, suddenly he’s verbose, almost chatty. Anyone who wasn’t at the meeting yesterday would think that we’d talked for hours and got along like a house on fire.
“What’s made you all grumbly and scowly?” Adam asks, then makes a hm sound. “Although, that’s normal for you, so more grumbly and scowly?”
I shoot him a dirty look, then stab the button to open the models. While they’re loading, I say, “This dickhead—” Fuck. I glance toward Damian’s office, but the door is closed. Still… “The designer thinks he’s right about something that I know is wrong, and I’ll prove it in just a second.”
“Oooh. I love drama with designers when it’s not me who has to deal with it.” He rolls his chair over to my desk so he can see my screen. “Who’s the designer, and what are they wrong about?”
The first model, with the overskirt, finishes loading, and Adam gives a little gasp. It does look good, though I still think it’s overdone. “Phil Marchand at Phallacy,” I tell him. “He thinks this”—I wave at the screen—“looks better with the overskirt than with—”
My voice dies as the second model loads. Adam and I both study the screen silently, eyes flicking between the two looped videos as the 3D figure rotates 360 degrees to show the gown from all angles.
“Fuck,” I mutter, and Adam pats my shoulder commiseratingly.
“I’m glad you see it. I didn’t want to be the one who had to say you were wrong.”
I stare at the dress without the overskirt. It’s… fine. Beautiful, even, and still a lot of fun, with the embellishments and richly printed fabric.
But it lacks the stunning impact that the original design has, and I swallow my bitterness. “I hate that he’s right. That fucker,” I mutter.
“Whoa,” Adam says. “That’s… harsh. I get being annoyed that you weren’t right, but didn’t the Marines teach you that names hurt?”
I blink, then slowly turn to look at him. “What exactly do you think Marines do?”
He shrugs and smiles dreamily. “I don’t know, but all those ripped, hunkalicious men hanging out together and getting sweaty on runs? Definitely you sit around shirtless watching gay porn and talking about your innermost feelings while eating candy and braiding each other’s hair.”
I lift my hand to touch my hair, which is longer now than it was when I was enlisted, but still not long enough to need braiding. “Uh-huh. I understand why knowing me for the past three years has given you that impression.”
Adam clutches imaginary pearls. “No! Say it isn’t so! I thought you were an anomaly—the antisocial stereotype who proves the rules of fabulosity. Now you’re telling me my dreams are lies?”
I grunt but can’t help adding, “Fabulosity isn’t a word.”
He sniffs. “Darling, anything’s a word if you want it to be. Just say it with your whole chest.” The leer that forms on his face would be creepy if I didn’t know he’s kidding around… and that I could bench press him. “And you have so much chest to say it with.”
Just another day at the office.
“But anyway, why are you so shitty with Phil Marchand? He’s a sweetheart and I love him.”
I roll my eyes. “Yeah, everyone seems to. Doesn’t it bother you that he acts like he’s better than us all?
” The question bursts from me, fueled by irritation and bile, and I immediately regret it.
Damian lets us get away with a lot, but I’ve always tried to maintain a standard of professionalism.
The Marines taught me discipline and structure, and that’s hard to let go of.
“Phil does? Are we talking about the same person? Red hair, cute smile, taller than me but not as tall as you? Designs incredible clothes? You think Phil acts like he’s better than… anyone?” His outright disbelief has me faltering for a second.
“Doesn’t he? What else would you call it when his partner warns people not to upset him and then he doesn’t bother to speak for a whole meeting about an important client?
” I am not making this up… except Adam is shaking his head slowly, an appalled expression on his face.
My stomach sinks. I don’t know what he’s about to say, but I’m positive it’s not going to be good for me.
“Griffin, Phil Marchand has anxiety and selective mutism. If he didn’t talk to you, it’s because you scared the fuck out of him and he couldn’t.”
Well, fuck.