Chapter 47
Lauren
The sign didn’t say shop. It said The Stockist—A Curated Experience.
Even the doorknob looked expensive. Through the tall glass windows, she could see a single tree branch suspended from the ceiling.
Lauren adjusted the strap on the bag over her shoulder and pushed through the door.
Displays lined the walls: ceramic bowls, silk ribbons, linen cushions in colors with names like Bone and Fog. Lauren was the most colorful thing in the store.
A woman in a monochrome jumpsuit smiled from behind the counter.
“Lauren Barrett?” she asked, voice smooth as tissue paper.
“That’s me,” Lauren said. Her voice came out too bright in the hushed space.
The woman’s expression warmed. “I’m Margot. Let me take those for you.”
Lauren set the bag on the marble counter and unzipped it, revealing the pair of wreaths she’d made—one riotous with color, the other all gold leaf and wild texture. They looked almost high-end under the store’s soft lighting.
The woman’s breath caught. “Oh. My. God.” She looked genuinely stunned. “These are—” She stopped, searching for the right word. “—extraordinary.”
Lauren felt something hot and dizzy rise in her chest. Pride, sharp-edged and satisfying.
“Would you like to see the display placement?” the woman asked.
Lauren followed her through the showroom. The space opened into a wide, skylit atrium. There was an empty space on the wall and her name sat on a small gold plaque beneath: Lauren Barrett—Available for Commissions.
They wanted her here. Her work, her name, her too-muchness—all of it.
She turned, taking in the space—paintings, sculptures, everything arranged with precision. In a nearby pane of glass, her reflection caught her eye: hair pinned up with a pencil, paint still smudged under her nails.
She grinned at herself.
Judith and Richard would hate that she was here.
When Lauren stepped back onto the sidewalk, the winter air felt sharp and bright.
She stood there a moment, hands jammed in her pockets, and let herself feel it.
Vindication.
Not the petty, brittle kind—though God, the thought of Judith’s face did have its sparkle—but the real kind. The kind that came from being seen, finally, exactly as she was.
She’d built this with her own hands. Buttons and rhinestones and stubborn joy.
And for the first time, good taste had bent to her.
Lauren smiled, turned up her collar against the wind. Time to get to her day job.
She pulled into the Muse parking lot and killed the engine.
When she angled the mirror to check her reflection, she looked the same as ever: cheeks flushed from the cold, hair still pinned up with a pencil.
She’d thought she would have looked… different.
The Stockist. Her wreaths. Her name on that plaque.
Her building’s glass facade reflected the pale winter sky, the same way it had a month ago when Tom had been standing there waiting for her.
The day she’d agreed to that “first date”. The second first date with her husband.
That was what she was thinking about now. Not the professional success, not the artistic acclaim.
No.
She was thinking of the man who broke her heart.
Tom’s voice, low and rough: I love you.
His hands, gentle when he’d adjusted her scarf.
The way his arms had wrapped around her. Like he was holding himself together. Like she was the only thing keeping him upright.
Lauren dropped her forehead against the steering wheel.
What the hell was wrong with her?
She wanted to tell him. Wanted to call and blurt out, They’re selling my work, Tom. My work. The Stockist has me on display.
She wanted him to be proud of her.
That scared her.
Because what if he wasn’t. He hadn’t been at Christmas.
The anger flickered up again, sharp and bright.
Because hadn’t this been the whole point? Proving to herself that she didn’t need his approval, or his mother’s, or anyone’s?
And still—
God, still—
Lauren blew out a breath and sat back.
It wasn’t fair, the way love and fury kept trading places inside her like warring seasons.
She could still feel the weight of his arms around her—desperate, tight, safe. She could lose herself in that memory.
Her phone buzzed on the passenger seat. A message from Wren: Running late—be there in 10.
Right. Work.
Lauren grabbed her tote, shoved the phone back into her pocket, and stepped out into the wind. The air was sharp and bright, the kind that cleared your head.
She squared her shoulders and looked up at the building, its glass panes catching the sun.
She wasn’t the same woman who’d let herself be broken.
That was enough.
The rest she could untangle later.