Chapter 37
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Audrey
Wedding dress shopping without a budget was incredible. I’d never seen so many gorgeous dresses. I’d never been treated like royalty before and I wasn’t even the bride. Emeline and I were both handed champagne flutes and were told to sit on massive white, velvet chairs while we waited for Carina to try on the first gown.
It was an incredible off-the-shoulder dress by a designer whose name I couldn’t even try to pronounce. Emeline sipped on her champagne and shot me a massive grin. She was over the moon that she got to do this with Carina. I vowed that I would take pictures of all of the dresses and send them to Carina’s mother. I hated that she was missing out on all of this, but she’d made her bed and now had to lie in it. But that didn’t mean that I had to.
Carina came out of the room and I was stunned speechless. The gown seemed to be made for her. It clung to all of her curves beautifully. Emeline sucked in a breath and practically swooned right there.
“Oh, honey, that’s just marvelous.”
Carina smiled at us both but it didn’t reach her eyes. I made a shooing motion with my hands. “Next! This is not the one!”
Emeline frowned at me. “How do you know?”
“I’ve known Carina almost all of my life, I know when she wants something. That wasn’t it.”
Carina stepped off of the white platform and shuffled back into the dressing room with the two attendants following right behind her.
Dress after dress, and not a single one sparked that look in her eye. Emeline and I were about ready to throw in the towel when Carina came back out in her jeans and sweater. She shrugged. “There are three other bridal boutiques in this square.”
Emeline clapped her hands, she could do this all day. I gave her a thumbs-up, and we carried on to the next.
Five bridal boutiques later and I thought I was going to pass out. Sheer will was the only thing fueling Carina to continue… and probably Emeline’s excitement. Her excitement would have fueled me too if I had eaten more than a muffin for breakfast and hadn’t skipped out on coffee. It also didn’t help that they pumped us full of champagne at every shop we stopped in and I was starting to feel it in my toes.
She’d found the dress that made her heart sing and I couldn’t wait to watch her walk down the aisle in it. She beamed at us from the pedestal. “This is the one!”
Emeline burst into tears and jumped from our elaborate seating situation. They were both a mess of tears and all I could do was smile while I swayed on my feet. My best friend did a little happy dance as the attendant was all smiles with us.
“When is the big day?” the attendant asked, pulling out her iPad and writing things down.
“We were thinking November.”
The woman paled. “That soon?”
Emeline became the stoic businesswoman I’d never seen before. “Is that going to be a problem?”
The woman stammered. “I don’t think we can get it done that quickly.”
Carina’s brows pinched but she didn’t get a word in. Emeline placed her hands on her hips. “I thought we needed to have a one-of-a-kind dress made. I only indulged in this because I thought it would be fun. I’ll call in a few favors to my friends.” She ticked off on her fingers. “Fashion week shouldn’t be an issue.”
Fashion week?
Sometimes I forgot just how rich the Cristofs were. I was so confused about how she allowed us to drag her to all these boutiques when they were obviously below her and her standards. Not that she was rude about it, she supported our whims and was going to sit through Carina picking what she wanted but now that the ball was in her court, I could see a new sparkle enter her eye.
Emeline made phone call after phone call to all of her friends in the fashion world. Only a few of them were willing to accommodate her but they weren’t happy with the timeline. She was willing to pay whatever it took but there still seemed to be some issues. I couldn’t tell you what as most of the time on the ride back to Ace’s penthouse, she was speaking French and then she switched to another language I couldn’t even recognize, and never before in my life had I felt like such uncultured swine than I did then. At that moment I wished I’d tried harder in school.
Ace’s penthouse was completly empty when we made it up. The grannies had thankfully gone home and Carina was back in her bed with her beloved. I rubbed my hands down my arms and closed my eyes when I closed the door to my bedroom. I’d been so focused on how we would pull off a wedding in so little time without a dress that I hadn’t noticed the smirking man lying in my bed.
“You look tense,” he said and I about jumped out of my skin. I let out a squeal and held my hands out like I could karate chop him to death. Alexei smirked from my pillows. At least this time he wasn’t covered in stripper glitter and cheap perfume.
“What do you want?” I held my hands to my racing heart.
“I just wanted to see how wedding dress shopping was going.”
“Since when?” I wanted to close my eyes again and take a deep breath but I knew I couldn’t take my eyes off of my enemy. It didn’t matter how much he’d cared for me after everything happened after Briann. I couldn’t stop thinking about everything that happened before Brian.
“Since now,” he shrugged as if that was the only explanation that made sense.
“Why?”
He scowled. “You ask a lot of questions.”
I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. “You’re in my bed, I think that warrants all the questions.”
A smirk curled his lips and that fire entered my belly again. What was with this man?
“Is there something you wanted?’
His face grew serious and I didn’t know what to think. “How are you feeling?”
My lips parted but no sound came out. “Do you actually care?”
He nodded and for once, I believed him. I sank down on the corner of the bed, careful not to touch him. Careful to stay as far away from him as I could manage.
“I’m tired,” I let out a breath. Brian must have known I would be coming home soon. The calls started when we made it back to Ace’s penthouse. Either he was ready to get back together and beg my forgiveness or he wanted the ring back. Neither of those things would be happening. He didn’t leave a message or send a text so I didn’t know what to think. “I didn’t eat much this morning before we left your parent’s estate and then they pumped us full of alcohol all day and then we skipped lunch. I don’t know, it’s just been a lot.” Plus Brian .
His lips turned into a deep frown. “You haven’t eaten today?”
I shook my head. A muffin.
He hopped off of my bed and grabbed my hand before he yanked me out of the bedroom and down the stairs to the kitchen. He sat me down at the island and started pulling things out of the fridge. It was my turn to frown. “What are you doing?”
He held up a carton of eggs. “Cooking for you, isn’t that obvious?”
“Excuse me?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Didn’t they have people for that?
“Ace’s help was told to take the weekend off, so might as well put my skills to the test.”
“You know how to cook?”
He ran his tongue over his bottom lip and I couldn’t stop myself from staring at the motion. “Unlike Ace, I don’t have hired help. I don’t have a chef, unless I order my meals prepped for me for the week. I order takeout occasionally, but I like to do things for myself.”
“Ohhh, the rich kid knows how to take care of himself, does he?”
His eyes darkened as he whirled around at me. His voice lowered as he glowered across the kitchen. I hit a nerve. He pointed the spatula at me. “Contrary to popular belief, I don’t live off of mommy and daddy’s money and do nothing with my time.”
“Oh?” I didn’t know what to say. What else was there to say? He was angry now.
He clenched his jaw and shook his head. “Everything I have, I’ve worked for it. The only thing I didn’t pay for or take care of myself growing up was my Ivy League degree because I needed to keep up appearances.”
He plated up whatever he put together in the skillet—that smelled incredible— and slid it across the island to me. He leaned against the counter but wouldn’t make eye contact with me again. I’d struck a really bad nerve.
“Look,” I started as I picked up the fork on the corner of the plate. “I didn’t mean it like that. I wasn’t trying to hurt your feelings. I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
His smile was sad and it did something to my insides. What was wrong with this man? How did he have such an effect on me? "Don’t apologize. I’ve been putting up with this appearance for a long time. It usually doesn’t make me so angry when people make assumptions.”
“And now?”
He began to walk away and I didn’t think I would get an answer from him until he stopped in the open doorway. “I want you to know who I really am.”
Everything faded away with his words. There was a pang in my chest as he left but I couldn’t stop him. I wouldn’t stop him, this was getting entirely too complicated. It hurt. It was confusing. The last thing I needed to do was get into a situationship with this man. The omelet he cooked me was the most delicious thing I’d ever had, but I could hardly taste it as his words played on repeat in my mind.
Carina skipped down the steps and stopped cold. “Ohhh, what’s that? I thought Georgie was off this weekend. It smells heavenly. It pulled me out of a nap.”
Georgie was an incredible cook. I’d only had a few of her dinners and lunches, but I completely gorged on her baked goods every chance I got.There was usually fresh bread, homemade by Georgie, in the pantry.
“Georgie didn’t make this, Alexei did.”
She frowned and pulled my plate to her. She took a big bite and moaned. I wished I could have enjoyed it like that. “He was here?” She said it around a mouthful of food and it sounded more like he fush ear?
I nodded.
She gulped the food down and leaned back in her chair like she couldn’t believe what I was saying. I couldn’t believe what I was saying, but she was there when he picked me off of the ground. I knew she was secretly rooting for me to date him but I didn’t think that was possible. Alexei wasn’t date material. Alexei wasn’t marriage material. Alexei liked his strippers and his women cheap. I wasn’t going to be a cheap lay for him too.
“He talked to Ace about it.”
I held my hand up to stop here right there. I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want them meddling in this. I still hadn’t officially broken things off with Brian. I couldn’t be thinking about Alexei. Even if things were completely done with Brian, Alexei was another red flag I couldn’t afford. “Please don’t.”
“But I think?—”
I shook my head hard. “Carina. Please don’t.”
She tucked her bottom lip into her mouth and looked down at the plate. “Okay.”
“Thank you. What did Emeline find out?”
She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. “The only way these designers will do this last minute is if they have creative freedom.”
Thank goodness I wasn’t still eating or I would have choked. “That’s a gamble.”
“Emeline says it’s an honor when all I want to do is go back to that bridal boutique and push the wedding back a little.”
I raised my brows. “Can you push it back?”
“Ace didn’t want to but he said if it would give me my dream dress, we could.”
All I could think about was going back to my job or rather not having one.
“Don’t worry about your job,” Carina gave me a look that told her not to ask any questions. “You will have one when you go back. Ace made sure of it.”
I had a feeling it was more like Ace threatened the superintendent or paid them a lot of money that they weren’t getting from the state. Our poor schools didn’t get enough funding. I was sure they would do anything to get a big fat check from the Cristofs. I didn’t blame them. I was happy they would be able to do more for the kids and hopefully the teachers.
“What if I don’t want it back?”
There was nothing left for me in that little town.
Carina blinked before she launched herself out of the chair and threw her arms at me! “Oh my gosh! Please tell me you’re going to come live here!”
I laughed as she hopped us in a little circle. “I can’t afford to live in New York City, but I think it’s time for a change. You and Ace made sure that I could survive without going to work for a while. Maybe I’ll look into all of my options.”
Her brows furrowed. “You’ve always wanted to live in New York. Please!! You could live here. You and my mom!”
I didn’t know how she would possibly get her mother to stay here with her but I could at least visit for a little bit until I figured out what I was going to do with myself.
“Only for a little bit.”