Chapter 44
Frankie Peterson stood at the head of the glass conference room in Naked Runway, her editorial team arrayed around the long white marble table.
She had been back for a week. In that time, she had finished How to Make Friends (Even If You’re a Bit of an Asshole) and had sent her old therapist forget me not flowers with a note: You didn’t suck as a therapist.
“It’s time to begin,” Jane, her assistant, said before locking the door so late comers couldn’t come in.
Something traitorous fluttered in Frankie’s chest, suspiciously close to nerves. Present the new me? Embrace the old me? How can I lead when I don’t even know who I am anymore?
This was the first pitch meeting since her exile.
Nerves weren’t weakness. They just meant you cared enough to value opinions. Which, in Frankie’s book, absolutely qualified as weakness.
Bottom line, Frankie was back where she belonged.
“Here’s your coffee. The latest way you like it,” Jane said.
Frankie accepted the cup. “Thank you.” Her tone came out pleasant. Weirdly pleasant.
Choice made. New Frankie wasn’t hiding behind old Frankie. This should be fun.
Jane blinked. “You’re…welcome.” She turned to Isabella and held out the phone basket. “Phones in?”
“We’re skipping that tradition.” Frankie slid into her chair at the head of the table. “I trust you won’t use them during the meeting.” She paused. “For your own safety.”
The silence was thick enough to spread on toast. Then someone whispered, “She’s been replaced by a clone.”
Fair.
“Welcome back,” Isabella said. “I’m kind of digging chill Frankie.”
Old Frankie would have iced her with a, “Save it.”
She almost said something about how kindness supposedly upped your chances of dying surrounded by friends, not cats. Instead, she went with, “Statistically speaking, spewing kindness illuminates which employees actually belong on your team. Like a blacklight for loyalty.”
She paused, then tossed in, almost like an afterthought, “And thank you.”
More silence. Suspicious silence.
Finally, Samantha muttered, “Oh God. Are we getting fired again?”
Frankie huffed out a laugh. “No one is getting fired.”
“Demoted?”
“No.”
“Pay cuts?”
“I should have bet money on that,” Jane whispered.
“No.”
“Reassigned to Siberia Fashion Weekly?”
“Just a regular pitch meeting where I thank you for your hard work, and we all act like professional adults who deserve to be at the table.”
The silence held.
Samantha narrowed her eyes. “Blink twice if an alien is controlling you.”
“At the risk of sounding repetitive, I’d like to start by again saying thank you—”
“Wake me when the kumbaya circle starts,” Anthony muttered.
Frankie ignored the interruption. “—for keeping this place running while I was busy gathering information for next year’s special guest column.
” A column that they’d started two years ago when a bad-boy royal fell into their laps.
Followed by Sophia’s column, which matched book boyfriends with their living, breathing, real-life twin.
“I thought you said that column was officially cancelled,” Samantha said.
Frankie lifted her chin. “I changed my mind.”
Ziggy, God love him, let out a slow whistle, the kind usually reserved for public scandals and regrettable red-carpet choices. “A woman’s prerogative and a queen’s sacred duty to keep her subjects guessing.”
Trust Ziggy to turn loyalty into a performance piece. Beneath the sass though, she knew what he was saying. He was in her corner. “I know I haven’t always been the easiest person to work for.”
Jane snorted, then waved a hand. “Sorry. Allergies.”
“I’m committed to less yelling,” Frankie continued.
Anthony narrowed his eyes. “What’s the catch?”
“No catch.”
“There’s always a catch,” he insisted.
Frankie sighed. “Fine. Less yelling because it is exhausting, and exhaustion leads to frown lines. Botox before forty is tragic.”
There were nods. Cautious, skeptical nods. Like they were watching a soap bubble and praying it wouldn’t pop.
“If you’re all quite done with your whining over your boss being nice, shall we start?” Frankie said. “Who’d like to pitch first?”
Isabella cleared her throat. “I will.”
Old Frankie wanted to roll her eyes so hard the activity qualified as cardio. Perfect. Let’s get the trash out of the way first.
She was going to miss Old Frankie. Maybe the trick was to find a way to marry her bite with this new, allegedly improved version.
“Excellent. Go on,” she said.
Isabella leaned forward, her tone crisp and professional. “A new Birkin dropped this week.”
Frankie perked up despite herself.
“Vogue is planning their usual What’s in Your Birkin? spread. I’d like us to counter with something a little…different.”
Frankie tapped a manicured nail against the table. “Define different.”
“I want to call it What’s in Your Emotional Baggage?”
Silence.
Then—
Ziggy dabbed an invisible tear from the corner of his eye. “Excuse me while I cry over the brilliance. That’s actually kind of genius.”
Samantha nodded. “People love knowing they’re not the only hot mess in town.”
Frankie leaned back in her chair, lips curving. “It’s fresh. It’s sharp. People will eat it up.”
Isabella blinked. “So…you like it?”
“I am physically pained to say this, but yes.”
Isabella smirked. “I can live with that.”
“Next pitch?”
Forty-five minutes later, Frankie rose. “This was productive. Good work, everyone.”
As chairs scraped and people began to file out, Isabella lingered.
Frankie raised a brow. “Something on your mind? Or are you here to bask in my aura?”
“A couple of things,” Isabella said. “One—I like this version of you. You’re still lethal, just…easier to sip.”
“No idea what you’re talking about,” Frankie replied, tone dry enough to exfoliate. “And the second?”
“I noticed you haven’t returned the pink Birkin. I can have my assistant collect it if you like.”
Frankie’s stomach dipped hard. Like she’d stepped straight into a memory and landed on her pride.
The Birkin was still in her office. The bag Marcus had saved the day she’d arrived in Gi Gi’s Crossing and toppled into a mud puddle.
The one he had placed on her front porch the night of the festival.
It wasn’t just a bag. It was a breadcrumb trail back to a story she had been trying very hard not to reread.
She had returned the wigs. The clothes. Everything but the pink Birkin. She hadn’t even emptied it yet.
It felt like her last connection to Marcus, to what might have been if he hadn’t turned out to be Mr. Uptight.
Part of her wanted to buy it. Keep it. Hoard the heartache like a limited-edition souvenir. But even she knew that was emotional hoarding disguised as sentiment.
It was time to sever that final string loosely binding them.
“That won’t be necessary,” she said quietly. “I’ll have Jane return it.”
Frankie started to turn away but paused. “And Isabella?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you. For helping me build Francesca B. She was a huge hit…until she wasn’t.” Truth was the town hadn’t cared nearly as much as Frankie expected. Most of them had just shrugged. In Gi Gi’s Crossing, everyone had a secret. The only real crime was getting caught without a good cover story.
Isabella’s expression softened. “It’s too bad that damn reporter outed you on her show.”
“I handled her.” Technically, Ms. Birdie had, but Frankie wasn’t giving her that win. She hadn’t forgiven her for not telling her Marcus was Mr. Uptight.
“The old you,” Isabella said, “would have assumed I arranged the whole thing to keep you from returning as editor-in-chief.”
Frankie’s lips curved. “It crossed my mind, but then I remembered you’re not clever enough to pull that off.”
Isabella laughed. “We should get drinks. To celebrate Frankie 2.0. I’ve missed the camaraderie we had when I was your intern.”
Frankie nodded. “I’d like that.”
It wasn’t lost on her that they’d made up with no apologies required.
And for the first time, she wondered, just for a second, if that could happen with Marcus too.
She hated the thought.
Mostly because she wasn’t sure if it meant she wanted to forgive him.
Or wanted a reason not to.
Either way, forgiveness was off the table. At best, she might consider a flash sale on indifference…see earlier footnote on wrinkle prevention.