Love Handles (Oakland Hills #1)(69)

He grinned, eyes crafty. “Wonderful. My goal is to snag the deal myself and get all the credit and have sex with you again. So glad to hear you’re cool with that.”

“All the credit? You didn’t tell any of the designers, either?”

“It’s a back-channel meeting. Me and an old friend.” He stepped back and smoothed his shirt down his chest in a gesture she was coming to recognize as self-protective. Her woman radar went off.

“An old girlfriend?”

His eyes flicked back to her, amused. “Jealous?”

She frowned. “Relieved. Very relieved. Now maybe you’ll leave me alone.”

“You're still pretending last night was some kind of one-time binge.” He slipped his cell back in his pocket and walked out the door. “When we both know it was just an appetizer.”





Chapter 16

“What shoes are you wearing?” Liam frowned at the woman’s feet crammed into five-inch platforms.

The aspiring model, a thin-hipped woman in her early twenties, kicked up her heel. “Aren't they profound?”

Liam had known instantly she was all wrong for what Fite needed for the woman's line. Still, she’d come all the way from Ukiah to interview for the fit model job, and he didn't want to hurt her feelings. “Very,” he said. “Please take them off.”

“But—they're Christian Louboutin.”

Sally, the patternmaker waiting to check her measurements, patted her on the shoulder. “They mess up your posture for the fitting,” she said. “Barefoot works. Flats are fine. Or tennis shoes.”

“Tennis?”

From the depth of the disappointment on the woman's face, Liam decided she had purchased the designer shoes just for the interview. “Maybe you can return them,” he said, and didn't say anything else until Sally took all her measurements. He thanked her for her time.

Jennifer ran in just as the model was heading for the elevator. “Liam, I’m sorry I’m late—Oh, it’s over.” She gave the woman a head-to-toe rundown before she disappeared behind the elevator doors. “What was the matter with this one?”

Liam threw down the sheet of the woman’s recorded measurements. “Too tall, no butt, too short in the waist. And she’s a six.”

“I thought she looked great,” Jennifer said, then cleared her throat. “But perhaps we do need to get someone a little more realistic.”

Liam raised an eyebrow at her. “You met with Wendi’s mother?”

Jennifer smiled tightly and crossed her arms over her chest. “I met with a number of women, including Wendi’s mother, and wrote up a report. Didn’t you get my email?”

“Summarize for me.”

Her smile strained, Jennifer walked over to Sally’s table and rifled through her piles of sketches and pattern pieces. Without looking up she said, “Nobody seems to like our fit. Nobody.”

It wasn’t really Jennifer’s fault, being under Ellen’s command until recently. At least she had the guts to admit it. “I’ll read your report. Good work. Now we fix it.”

“This chick just now was the last person I could find,” Jennifer said. “Model agencies don’t have women with average bodies. That’s why they’re models.”

“What fit model does Levi's use? They've got a decent fit these days. It's not an athletic fit, but it's—” He held out his hands at butt level as though holding something round. “Feminine.”

Sally edged between her desk and Jennifer, who was touching everything like it was hers. “They use an eight,” Sally said, closing a binder, picking up her coffee mug. “You said you wanted a ten.”

“It’s more accurate in terms of the grading. To get closer to the average customer,” he said.

Sally sighed. “I agree. I haven't been able to wear Fite since Rachel was promoted.”

He put a hand on the table. Rachel. “That's right. She started out here as a fit model, didn't she?”

“Right out of college.”

“And it's not like she's gained weight since then,” he said. “She's remarkably consistent.”

Jennifer’s eyes gleamed with the anticipation of trouble. “She will totally freak on you.”

Sally looked between Jennifer and Liam, realized what they were suggesting, and shook her head. “She'd never agree to it. Never. Not even when we've been desperate for a quick fit to make an important meeting. After all these years, to poke and prod her like that, she'd find it humil—”

Liam gave her his sternest look, the one that used to command effortless authority, and she snapped her mouth shut. He let that sink in then said, “I'll talk to her.”

Jennifer bit her lip. Sally nodded and said, “Of course, Mr. Johnson.”



In spite of what Liam had told Sally, he feared they were right about Rachel never agreeing to fit model again. He interviewed a few more candidates, even dragging Carrie from the front desk up to Engineering for measuring, but none had the specs they needed.

They were running out of time. He sat in the conference room, the long oblong table piled high with abandoned sketches and magazine tear sheets and swatches and sample trim, and worked through the Target dog and pony show in his mind. Jennifer thought it was just concept development for the main line, and he hadn’t enlightened her, in part because he wanted a solo shot at the deal, and in part because he knew she’d be annoyed and snotty about expanding into middle America. Expanding into expanding middle America.