Jules kept her word. When she flew out of London at an obscenely early hour the next morning before Vivian was even out of bed, she was already running through her mental checklist of things she had to take care of when she landed. It was an exhausting list. But Jules had only staved off Vivian’s wrath by promising to take care of things, so that’s what she had to do.
Yesterday afternoon had been okay. Reporters were lurking across the street of the townhouse when they got back from Core, but they hadn’t gotten too close. By evening Vivian had seemed her old self again, and she’d spent the rest of the afternoon giving Jules orders to be fulfilled upon her return to New York.
All in all, it had been the weirdest holiday season ever.
She called Simon once the plane touched down.
“Come to the office as soon as you’ve dropped off your stuff,” he said.
She called her parents at the baggage claim. “Glad you’re home safe, sweetheart,” her dad said. “And she’s still back there?”
“Yes. She’s flying in tomorrow.”
“And she behaved herself?” His voice was hard.
Unfortunately, grievously, tragically, “Yes, she did. I told you it’s not like that.” Because life sucked.
“Well,” her dad said, “okay.”
She splurged on an Uber and made it back to her apartment, which Jules tried not to compare to Vivian’s London place. She was going to miss sleeping in Rob—in the second bedroom, where Vivian had definitely never had sex with Robert, as Jules had told herself every single night with different feelings on the subject each time.
She took a quick shower, telling herself that it was good to hit the ground running. Keeping busy was the best way to avoid spending all her time feverishly thinking about what it would be like to have sex with Vivian. The best part of her relationship with Chelsea had been the sex. Somehow, Jules was absolutely certain that it’d be even better with Vivian because the woman was the best at everything she did.
Jules was pretty sure that a week ago the very thought of having sex with Vivian would have horrified her. Well, okay, not horrified. If you were horrified by the thought of having sex with someone, you didn’t imagine them in lingerie.
At some point, she was going to run out of ways to call herself an idiot.
Either way, Jules wouldn’t have had the guts to sit around and think about Vivian’s breasts and wonder if they were sensitive. Or if Vivian made noises. Or if Vivian liked having sex at all because it was entirely possible that she didn’t, no matter who it was with. Or if it would even be safe for her to do it now. All the information said it was “during most normal pregnancies.” But what about this was normal?
Not that it mattered. It wasn’t going to happen.
Jules dosed herself liberally with coffee on the way back to Du Jour. She still wasn’t prepared to go to her desk and be accosted by Simon within seconds.
“Well?” he said. “What kind of mood was she in yesterday?”
“Nice to see you too.”
He waved negligently. “Blah, blah, blah. Where’s my keychain with a little red phone booth on it?”
Jules grinned and held out the souvenir she’d bought for him in Heathrow.
Simon dangled the keychain from his fingers with a moue of distaste. “This is a teapot.”
She kept a straight face. “Teapots are in right now. Phone booths are passé. Vivian told me so herself.”
“Is that so?” Simon tucked the keychain into the pocket of his plaid pants. “I repeat: how is she?”
“Oh, you know,” Jules hedged. “Fine. The usual.”
“I saw the photos of Robert.”
Jules sat at her desk with a heavy sigh. “Okay, it’s shitty. She took it on the chin, though.”
“She always does.”
Jules fought down a silly, warm tingle of pride. “Yeah, she does.”
Simon gave her a long look, but all he asked was, “So everything went okay, assistant-wise?”
She was catapulted back to the night Simon had interrogated Jules about Vivian’s pregnancy. Vivian had asked Jules why Simon would do such a thing. Jules had said it was because Simon trusted her.
Simon could trust Jules to be loyal to Vivian. He should appreciate that. Weren’t they both on Vivian’s side, after all?
“It was fine,” she said. “She kept me busy with work.”
“Work and the New Year’s ball at the Dorchester. Did you follow her around taking notes?”
“Mental ones, yeah.”
“Jules. It is insane that she took you.”
“She needed a plus-one! Robert—”
“It. Is. Insane.”
They glared at each other.
“I’m an assistant,” Jules said. “Don’t worry. I got the message loud and clear.”
Simon sighed and rubbed his forehead. “I’m not bashing you or implying—hell. It’s just weird. I know Vivian has her whims and it’s not up to mere mortals to question them. And I know you were just doing your job.”
Yeah. My job. That’s all it was, Jules reminded herself. Straight from the clotheshorse’s mouth. Stop being stupid.
Luckily, she knew a welcome change of subject. “Oh, hey! Guess what? I submitted an article for The Cut that got accepted. You know that column ‘I Think About This a Lot?’”
“I do.” Simon’s eyes lit up with genuine interest. “That’s great. What did you write about?”
“Working Girl. Sigourney Weaver and Melanie Griffith’s characters bonding. And don’t look at me like that.”
“Why would I look at you like anything? An ingenue bonding with her cold-blooded boss. Doesn’t ring a bell at all.”
Did Simon think Jules had written a veiled version of her own dynamic with Vivian at Du Jour? How ludicrous. It was totally different! For one thing, Melanie had fallen for Harrison Ford, not Sigourney. For another thing…
Jules would come up with the other thing later. “If you’re implying I wrote about myself, you’re wrong. You should rewatch the movie.”
“With Harrison Ford in his prime? Twist my arm. When’s your column coming out?”
“Two weeks. I’m about to make the edits and send it off.”
“I look forward to reading it.” Simon tilted his head to the side. “Congratulations. A first step. So what’s your second?”
Jules groaned.
It earned her a finger wag. “You can’t slow down,” Simon warned. “Not yet. Chase that dream.”
Against her will, Jules thought of Vivian. Talk about an unattainable dream. Simon was right—better to focus on a writing career that with a lot of effort might be possible.
She was known for making the impossible happen, but there had to be a limit somewhere.
* * *
The following afternoon, the entire office was deathly silent. Jules could picture everybody’s ears pressed to the carpeted ground when the elevator dinged and Vivian walked in, talking on her phone. Jules was just putting the silverware to either side of her salad plate for lunch.
Vivian looked like hell, though probably only Jules would be able to see it. She was dressed beautifully, impeccably made up and moving with her usual confident stride. But Jules noticed the exhaustion in her eyes and the tension in her shoulders. She’d arrived in New York just a few hours ago and had clearly made only the briefest stop at home before coming to work.
Jules made a mental note to schedule a massage for later in the week. In the meantime, Vivian walked straight by Jules’s desk. She didn’t look at her or stop talking. Jules hadn’t really expected anything else, but it was still a little disappointing to realize that pretty much nothing was going to change after she’d spent over a week living with Vivian, making her breakfast and escorting her to meals.
Well, why should it? Nothing would change because nothing was different, except that Jules had let herself ascend to new heights of stupidity, starting with New Year’s Eve.
The rest of the day progressed as most days did, with Vivian being disagreeable and Jules scrambling to obey her orders as fast as possible.
See? Jules told herself. Just an assistant. Like you told Simon.
Vivian left the office at six thirty, looking even more exhausted. Jules didn’t get to go home until her own to-do list was done, so she could kiss her cushy car ride home goodbye.
That should have been that. But as Vivian strode by Jules’s desk, she paused to open her Donna Karan purse. Then she took out a Ziploc bag with a round boar bristle hairbrush in it. “You forgot this.”
Jules’s face burned as she looked at it. She hadn’t finished unpacking yet, so she hadn’t noticed anything missing. “Thanks,” she mumbled. “Sorry for leaving it.”
“Oribe brushes are expensive. I had visions of you disgracing Du Jour by replacing it with something from Duane Reade. Be more careful.”
Jules’s face was even hotter now. On the list of embarrassing things, looking careless in front of Vivian Carlisle placed pretty high. Plus the reminder that she didn’t make enough money to replace nice things.
But…Vivian had noticed, probably when doing one final sweep through the town house before leaving. Which meant she’d touched Jules’s hairbrush, handled it, and then packed it up among her own things.
That’s not sexy, Jules told herself. It’s a hairbrush. It’s not sexy.
“Thank you,” she repeated quietly as she reached for the bag.
Their fingertips brushed when she took it. Jules hadn’t done it on purpose, had she?
Her whole body ached with desire at just the slightest touch, and if Vivian said anything on her way out the door, Jules didn’t hear it. Her blood was roaring too loudly in her ears.
Then she was alone. Jules looked blankly at the plastic bag. Well, out of all the things she’d lost in London, including her hairbrush, her common sense, and her sanity, it was nice to get at least one of them back.