17. Gabriel
Gabriel
It’s a strange kind of torture, living in this house with Alexis.
As the weeks pass, she starts to settle in.
She’s less nervous and jittery than she was when she first got here, comfortable enough to occupy space without looking guilty.
Comfortable enough to read out in the open.
Comfortable enough to stay in the room when I enter instead of going out of her way to avoid me.
I’m glad to see it. At the same time, though, it only makes this harder.
The more comfortable she is, the more often I catch her smiling, just being herself.
The more I see her in various states of undress, wandering around with nothing but a sports bra while she roots around in the kitchen for a snack. The more I see her, period.
And it’s driving me crazy.
Part of her comfort—and a large part of her allure—stems from the time she’s been spending on her passion project.
Since the day she told me about it, she’s thrown herself into the work. I’ve seen her doodling in a sketchbook, her brow furrowed in concentration as she draws. I’ve seen the sketches themselves too, lying on the coffee table.
She’s unbelievably talented. I don’t know why her family’s company doesn’t put her to work as a designer, rather than shelving her in some background corporate job. She has a grasp of anatomy that I didn’t even realize she had until I saw her sketches.
She understands the human form in a way that’s not just artistic.
It’s technical. There’s a precision in the way she sketches clothing that feels natural, like she’s not just designing the garments, but shaping how they move, how they fit, how they breathe on the body.
Any body, not just the stick-thin models Vérité puts on the runway.
The idea has grown from what it originally was, a line of accessible fashion that will benefit charity.
Now, she plans to build a charity of her own, one that’s focused on expanding the reach of fashion.
A workshop, she tells me, a place where people can learn to create as well as enjoy the things she makes.
She wants to hire a team of designers. It’s ambitious. It’s a project with a huge scope.
And I’m beyond impressed.
Her passion, her talent, her enthusiasm, the way her face lights up as she tells me what she’s working on? All of it pulls me in. She’s magnetic.
It’s gotten to a point where I can’t deny it any longer. I’m deeply, deeply attracted to her. To her gorgeous blue eyes. To her silken, wavy hair. To the freckles that dot her face like constellations across the bridge of her nose. To her lithe, slender frame, her perfect body.
That body makes it difficult to sleep in the same bed as her without going crazy.
I wake up in the mornings well-rested, but worked up, without fail.
It’s a good thing she sleeps a bit later than I do.
It gives me time to retreat to the bathroom and splash cold water on my face until I get rid of my hard-on.
There have been moments amidst the madness that make me think this feeling is mutual. She’ll catch me looking at her sometimes, and instead of the usual nervousness or awkwardness, there’s a different tension in the air, a flicker of something in her eyes that might be attraction.
Might be. I have to tell myself that every time, give myself that firm reminder. Don’t do anything stupid. Don’t make this messy.
For the love of god, don’t sleep with her.
I’ve done my best to keep that barrier up whenever I can. I don’t want to make things complicated. I don’t want to use her. I don’t want her to get the wrong idea about what’s happening here.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve gotten to know Alexis much better. I’ve learned that she’s a fundamentally sweet and kind person. And now, better than ever before, I know just how fucked up it would be if she was hurt by this.
Once it’s all over, I want her to be able to move on. She deserves to have someone who can give her all of himself, and I know that’s not me. Not anymore.
Things are easier when I’m at work. That’s a world I know well, one that takes little mental effort to navigate. The corporate world is predictable. I know the players, the stakes, the moves to make. I can bury myself in numbers, deadlines, and projects. Right now, that’s exactly what I need.
One month to the day after my wedding, I’m on my way back to my office from a meeting when I run into Ivy Langford. She’s got a tote bag over her shoulder and her volunteer badge still clipped to her shirt.
Ivy’s older brother, Jackson, has been close with all five of us since we were kids, so Ivy’s been part of the picture that whole time too, almost like a younger sister to all of us.
She volunteers over at Greater LA Pediatric a few days a week, spending time with the kids who are going through treatments there.
She comes from old money and has never technically needed a job, but she’s been doing this volunteer work for years now, and I know it means a lot to her.
She’s also perfectly suited to it, with the kind of sweet, bubbly personality that makes both children and adults gravitate toward her.
“Hi, Gabe,” she says, smiling when she sees me.
“Hey, Ivy. What brings you by?”
“I just finished up at the hospital for the day, and I was nearby, so I figured I’d stop in.” She shifts the bag higher on her shoulder. “Thought I’d see if any of you wanted to grab lunch before I head home.”
“You should take Beckett.” I tip my head toward his door, cracked open down the hall. “He’s been holed up in his office all morning. If somebody doesn’t pull him out of there, he’ll skip lunch entirely. Do me a favor and make him eat something.”
She hesitates. “Are you sure? I don’t want to bug him if he’s slammed. It’s really not a big deal. I can just grab something on my way home.”
“Trust me. He needs the break more than he’ll admit.” I raise my voice. “Beck! You got a second?”
There’s a pause, and then his voice comes back, distracted. “I’m kind of in the middle of something, actually—”
“Ivy’s here. She’s grabbing lunch.”
The shuffling in his office stops. A second later his chair scrapes back, and then he’s in the hallway, the thing he was in the middle of apparently no longer a factor. He’s already reaching for his jacket.
“Hey,” he says to her. “I could eat.” He turns to me, his brows drawing together. “What were you doing holed up in a meeting all morning, anyway?”
I grimace. “Running damage control on FlashUp.” The platform has started to become my biggest headache. There may be a light at the end of the tunnel, though. Inspiration has come to me recently in an unexpected form. “Oh, hey—speaking of FlashUp—”
“Oh, hell, no,” Beckett says, eliciting a chuckle from Ivy. “That is your mess, not mine. Keep it inside the lines.”
“Chill, I’m not going to ask you to do anything with it. Just wanted to run something by you.”
Beckett raises an eyebrow, clearly intrigued. “Oh, this should be good. What’s on your mind?”
“Well, it’s about the content. FlashUp has been struggling to connect, right? We need something more genuine, something that feels real to people, not just… flashy.”
“FlashUp has been too flashy,” Beckett says, shooting a sideways glance at Ivy that makes her grin. “What’s your big idea, changing the name?”
“No,” I say. “I’ve been talking to Alexis about this thing she’s working on—it’s this charity project.
It started as a line of accessible fashion, but the idea’s been getting bigger, and now she wants to make it sort of a community space here in LA.
I think people would be really into this if she got the right platform to get the word out. ”
“And you’re saying that’s FlashUp?”
“If the problem is the content, maybe this is better content. We could do behind-the-scenes stuff for her space pre-launch. People weren’t engaging enough with the intended aims of the app, but if we try to break into a creative space—”
“—then we’ll get to a point where the users are creating the content,” Beckett completes. “Shit. Yeah. We need to show them how to use the app.”
“Pretty much.”
“Honestly, that sounds pretty great,” Beckett admits. “You might be onto something here.”
“People like to feel like they’re part of something bigger,” I say. “This can be something for them to actively engage with. It can give people a feeling of real connection to the work being done, and encourage them to take on their own projects.”
Beckett taps his chin, looking far more serious than usual. “We could take on partnerships with a few other art influencers. Find some way to—”
Ivy clears her throat, shooting me an apologetic smile. “Maybe you guys can get on each other’s calendars and hash this out sometime after we get lunch? Because I’m absolutely starving.”
Beckett shoots her a grin, clearly taking the hint. “Fair enough. Sorry. Food first. What are you in the mood for?”
She wrinkles her nose. “I haven’t decided. Something filling. There’s that burrito place a couple blocks over.”
“Oh, actually, there’s a new Mexican spot that opened up just a little ways past it. It’s supposed to be really good.” He shrugs. “Might be worth the extra walk, if you’re up for it.”
“Sure!” She nods, smiling brightly. “I’m always up for something new.”
Beckett and Ivy head off toward the elevators, their voices fading away, and I turn back down the hallway, heading for my office. I feel energized by the conversation, the flicker of something exciting beginning to take shape.
The idea of blending Alexis’s project with FlashUp feels like the kind of fresh direction I’ve been waiting for. I haven’t talked to her about this idea yet, but I can’t imagine she’ll be against it. It’ll give her exactly the reach she needs to get this thing off the ground.
As I head back into my office, my secretary looks up with a smile from her desk by my door. “There’s a call for you on line one, Mr. Thorne. Your father-in-law.”