Love Handles (Oakland Hills #1)(54)

Rachel grinned. “I do it anyway, with outside vendors and contractors. Nobody would have listened to me otherwise.”

“I was thinking about making a whole new position for you,” Bev said. “I need an assistant—”

Rachel’s smile fell. “Assistant?”

“The way a vice president is an assistant.” Bev paused for that to sink in. “To be more than a figurehead around here I’ll need help. I need someone with your experience, Rachel. And popularity. Not many people around here are as well-respected as you are.”

“They’re just sucking up,” Rachel said. But she was almost smiling.

“Darrin will hate it,” Liam said. “Darrin will hate you.”

“Can you do that?” Rachel asked. “Just hire me away like that?”

Liam’s stare was making Bev uncomfortable. She remembered him sitting on the edge of her bed holding a sweet, frothy drink up to her lips. Staring at her in the dressing room. Sliding her pants down.

“Of course she can,” Liam said expressionlessly. “She’s the owner.”

She swallowed and looked at Rachel. “What can I do to make it up to Darrin after I steal you away?”

“You can’t think that way,” Liam said. “You’re the boss. If you apologize or give in to his demands you’ll lose what little authority you have.”

“You could move him to Women’s.” Rachel came back over to the counter and picked up her unfinished cookie. “Ellen’s couture stuff really bites. I know he hated it, too.”

“Couture?” Bev asked.

“That’s how we got asymmetrical armholes in the spring delivery,” Rachel said.

Bev frowned. “Is there such a thing as couture fitness?”

“Only at Fite,” Liam said. “Making ugly stuff nobody gets is our niche.”

“And my grandfather didn’t object?”

Rachel turned her back to her and began fussing with the plate of cookies, and Bev gave Liam a questioning look. He shrugged. “He would yell and throw things every once in a while—”

“The peekaboo tank,” Rachel said.

“—when things got a little extra creative, but for the most part he left the design decisions up to Ellen. He knew we had to find some way to break out of basics,” he said. “And the overall profits were good.”

“Thanks to Men’s Fite the Man line,” Rachel said. “All Liam’s ideas.”

“Really,” Bev said.

Liam shook his head. “She’s just sucking up. Darrin’s good.”

Interesting. She had no idea Liam was involved that deeply in design. “What was the ‘peekaboo tank’?”

Rachel bit back a smile and looked at Liam, who was staring at Bev with more heat than was comfortable. His gaze flicked down to her chest then back up to her face. “I guess you could call it ‘Jogbra meets Frederick’s of Hollywood,’” he said.

He couldn’t be serious. Bev looked at Rachel. “Just how ‘peekaboo’ are we talking?”

“There were no actual cut-outs,” Liam said. “Technically, there was total coverage.”

Rachel rolled her eyes. “The cups were a semi-metallic, elasticized, open-weave mesh. More gross than sexy. Made your nips look like little pink pancakes pushed against a screen door.”

“Lovely,” Bev said. “And whose idea was that? Ellen’s?”

“She saw it in Paris,” Rachel said. “Thought we could ‘translate’ it.”

“Unfortunately the French have more words for that sort of thing than we do,” Liam said. “Here in America it means ‘trashy ho under arrest.’”

Rachel laughed, and Bev smiled weakly and leaned against the stool. The one goal she was becoming attached to as owner of the company was improving the women’s line. How she could possibly tell experienced designers how to do their job?

“I didn’t make enough cookies.” She pressed her fingers into her temple. “So Darrin would be a better designer for Women’s?”

“No,” Liam said. “He may be a prick, but he’s helped bring the men’s line to the top of the heap. Whatever else you do, leave him in Men’s.”

“All right,” Bev said, happy to let Liam deal with him. “But he’ll need a new assistant. Or two.”

“Who did you have in mind?” Rachel asked Bev, taking another bite. “I am kind of indispensable, you know. Went out of my way to get that way. Didn’t realize it would also screw up my chances of getting promoted.”

“Sorry about that,” Liam said.

Rachel shrugged. “Ed made it up to me.” She crammed the rest of the cookie in her mouth and glanced at her watch. “I really have to get back to my desk.”

Running through potential candidates in her head, Bev led her to the door. “As soon as I line up a couple new people you’ll come work for me. How about next Monday?”

“You won’t find anyone by then, and I’ll have to break them in. There’s a lot. Two weeks, at least.”

“We have plenty of great people here. How about next week you’ll be half time with me, half in your old job.”