The Allure of Julian Lefray (The Allure #1)(8)

I pressed end on the message before it was over and dropped my phone onto my bed. Throughout high school, I’d overheard hushed conversations between my parents that often followed the same pattern: my dad would worry that I was being bullied at school for the way I dressed, then my mom would do her best to settle his nerves, but nothing helped. “Why can’t she just be like the other girls?” might not have ever been said aloud, but it was the undertone of most of my adolescent years.

My parents had a way of cowing me so easily, so swiftly, that for a moment I almost considered moving home. How easy would it be to live with them and have them help me with my loans? How easy would it be to give up on living my dream in New York City for a quiet life in Dullsville, Texas? Sure, I’d managed to find a tiny apartment, but how long would I be able to afford the rent? How long could I pretend that anything was going according to plan?

I let the nagging self-doubt sink in. If my parents didn’t believe I could make it, then how could I believe in myself? After all, New York wasn’t for everyone. Right?

But then I remembered Julian and the promise of a job interview and I decided that first thing in the morning I was going to march down to the Lorena Lefray offices and demand an interview.

I had nothing to lose, and I knew no one needed the position as badly as I did.





Chapter Five


Julian





As soon as I returned from the gala, I ripped off my bowtie and tuxedo jacket and threw them on the desk beside my computer. My hotel room was dark, but I didn’t bother flipping on any lights. I was thirty floors up and there was enough light seeping in from the city that I could see just fine.

I fixed a drink from the mini bar and settled in by the window, staring down at Central Park. I’d hated hotel rooms for years. I’d had to travel a lot in my twenties, helping to expand the Lefray family companies to the global scale they now enjoyed. At thirty-one, all I wanted was to be back home in Boston in the bed I’d picked out and far, far away from the realities I now faced.

The week before, my baby sister had finally entered herself into a rehab facility after years of trying to fight her addictions alone. It was a bold move, one that the media were already suspicious of, but if she had any desire to see her thirtieth birthday, it was the only option she had. I’d promised her I would step in and keep the ship on course for the time being. She had detailed plans to overhaul the entire place, to get rid of the toxic employees and the clock-punching deadbeats while she had the strength to do it. That was where I came in. Unfortunately, that meant I was in New York, holed up in the penthouse suite of some hotel, alone and tired. I loved the power and responsibility, but I resented the monotony of corporate politics. It reminded me too much of my family.

My father died young in a car crash, and neither my sister nor I trusted my mother with the responsibilities of running Lorena’s company, which conveniently left everything on my shoulders.

I took a sip of my drink and mulled over the list of people I still knew in the city other than my family.

There was Dean, an old college buddy who’d settled down in New York after school, but I couldn’t call him at midnight just to announce that I was back in the city for the foreseeable future. I made a mental note to give him a call the next day just as my computer dinged with an incoming email.

I turned toward my desk and contemplated waking it up. Opening my laptop at midnight was a slippery slope—as with any workaholic—but I was far past the point of pretending I had any work-life balance. Answering emails helped me put my world in order, and if anything, I’d sleep easier knowing I had everything prepared to begin work the following morning.

I pulled out the chair from behind the hotel desk and took a seat. I had twenty-two unopened emails, most of which were filled with resumes and cover letters pertaining to the executive assistant position I’d posted around the web earlier that day. I’d posted on the Columbia and NYU alumni pages and I knew I’d have a number of applicants more than interested in the job.

An image of Josephine flitted through my mind. I’d promised her that all the applicants would be judged fairly, but the memory of how she’d looked in that red dress would be impossible to forget. Even still, I knew how to conduct a professional interview. Just because she was beautiful didn’t mean she was the person most suited for the job. If anything, it’d make my life a lot easier if she wasn’t a qualified applicant.

Curiosity won out.

I scrolled down the list of emails until I found one sent from [email protected]. She’d sent her resume about an hour after I’d first posted about the job.

I scanned her resume, attempting to stay as impartial as possible. She’d done her undergrad at a small fashion school in Texas with a focus on fashion marketing and branding. She’d interned for a few local fashion brands while in school and had started a blog a few years before blogging had really caught on everywhere. I clicked the link to her site and smiled at the name. What Jo Wore was a simple website. It was user-friendly with a clean layout and professional graphics.

My interest was piqued as I scrolled down and realized her last post had been about the gala.



What Jo Wore



Post #1248: You’ll never get anywhere by staying in your comfort zone.

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Tonight, ladies and lads, I will be attending the New York Fashion Gala. That’s right, little ol’ Josephine Keller from way down yonder in Texas (that’s the wild wild West for those of you who’ve never ventured past Fifth Avenue) will be rubbing elbows with New York’s elite. I rented a gown from renttherunway.com. I highly recommend using this site if you’re someone like me and have designer tastes on a beggar’s budget.