Not Quite Perfect (Oakland Hills Book 3) (35 page)

She peeled the greasy breading off a nugget and fed the chicken to Stool. She didn’t like the idea of getting fired. She’d tried to convince herself she didn’t care, but she did.

She cared, and more every second.

Zack was gone, or soon gone, and she’d need to find a way to recover from the hole in her chest. Her new studio was nice, but it wasn’t hers. It would help her develop the freelance business she’d begun to imagine, but she’d still be living with her mother. And being kicked out of Fite now would be like starting a career with a black mark on her record when she deserved fifteen gold stars, happy faces, and a glittered
Way To Go!
sticker.

No. She couldn’t let Teegan win her campaign of evil.

If there was going to be a Trial of April, she’d have to prepare, like Rita said. And boy, was she going to
prepare
.

What was that line about bringing a gun to a knife fight?

She was going to bring a freaking
nuke
.

* * *

“Zack?” the man asked.

Zack looked up from the grape he’d speared in his salad. He and the three venture capitalists sat outside at a bistro table wedged off a side street in midtown Manhattan. “Yes, Tom?”

The tall, balding guy next to him raised an eyebrow. “I’m Tom. That’s Tim.”

Zack should’ve been mortified. He never got names wrong. But if two men named Tim and Tom are going to go into business together, they should use their last names. “Sorry.” He shoved his fork into his mouth. To him, the grape might as well have been a cow’s eyeball. He rolled it around in his mouth and swallowed it without chewing.

“Are you all right?” the third man asked. His name, no kidding, was Tony. That second syllable made all the difference, and Zack hadn’t forgotten it once.

Although he did think the guy was a jerk, the kind to keep tugging up his shirt sleeves so his Rolex was on constant display.

“I’m fine,” Zack said. If he hadn’t forgotten his notebook at his hotel—his apartment was sublet to a visiting professor for another two weeks—he would’ve had a question to fall back on when his mind wandered. At the moment, it had wandered to Antarctica and was shivering with the penguins. Ten minutes earlier, it had been flying past Jupiter.

Better than California.

“Sylly’s already hired you?” Tom—no, Tim—asked.

Zack speared another eyeball. He’d called Liam. April hadn’t been fired yet, but only because Trixie’s emergency appendectomy had postponed the meeting. The day after tomorrow, she’d be finished. Zack’s report wouldn’t save her—too little, too late.

“Fly in late last night?” Tim—no, Tom—asked.

Zack looked up. He liked Tim. Tim was in his late thirties with black curly hair and a nose that leaned about fifteen degrees to the left, like a dented sundial. “No, I’ve been here since last Friday.” It was almost a week later. He’d walked out on April and flown to New York and there was no chance on God’s green earth she would ever move here to be with him. He’d had another undeserved shot at happiness and blown it.

The second grape caught in his throat. He inhaled sharply, feeling his air supply cut off, wondering if three men who had devoted their fragile, brief mortal lives to acquiring wealth would know the Heimlich maneuver.
 

He wasn’t sure he cared whether they had.

As he clutched his throat, stars flashing before his eyes, he silently cursed the staff in the kitchen who couldn’t be bothered to slice a grape in half. He was going to die without ever seeing April again because of a lazy sous chef. She’d assume he’d died happy, fraternizing with his beloved capitalists on the streets of New York City, never suspecting he loved her and had just decided she should know it, even if she laughed in his face again. Which she almost certainly would.

But the grape dislodged itself, and he covered his mouth with a napkin and waited for his pulse to return to a steady pace.

“You all right?” Tim asked.

Zack nodded, wiping away a tear. “Choking.”

“I’ll say,” Tony said.

Zack put his napkin down. He didn’t like Tony and didn’t expect the man would become more lovable with repeated exposure. Did a guy like that have a woman who loved him? He didn’t wear a ring, just the status-telegraphing timepiece. Zack couldn’t imagine Tony giggling in bed with a cute, funny girl he adored, who adored him. He couldn’t imagine Tony having the kind of genuine friendship and happiness he had with April.

Had
had.

Zack signaled for the waiter, giving Tom and Tim an apologetic shrug. “It’s good we had this meeting,” he said, pulling a few bills from his wallet. “I realize now this isn’t going to be a good fit. I think I should go. Not waste any more of your time.”

Tony rolled his eyes but Tom and Tim argued politely for a minute before wishing him well and shaking hands goodbye.

Within two minutes, he was around the corner, breaking into a run.

Chapter 31

A
T
8:46
A
.
M
.
THE
following Friday morning, April walked into the conference room off the lobby with her laptop, a portfolio case, and a swarm of butterflies in her stomach. She’d slept four hours out of the eight she’d been in bed the night before and had bags under her eyes so large they wouldn’t fit under an airplane seat. The chill in the room made her shiver. She found the thermostat and cranked it up ten degrees. She wanted her audience to be comfortable. Cold women were unhappy women. Liam wouldn’t care—he was the one who set the temperature in the building, which was why it was arctic—but Rita, her primary audience, would.

After checking her makeup—with a spike of rebelliousness she hoped she wouldn’t regret, she’d gone ahead and worn her usual cobalt-blue eyeliner—she set up her laptop and connected it to the projector. She’d prepared a professional, unemotional slideshow to make her case.

Jennifer was going to have a very bad day.

“I’m not sure you should be smiling like that,” Virginia said, walking into the room. She held out two cardboard containers, each holding four steaming coffees. Behind her, grouchy George from the back door carried a pastry box.

“You guys can’t come in here,” April said, glancing at the clock on the wall. 8:55. “There’s a meeting in a few minutes.”

George dumped the pastry box on the table. “Cool your spurs. We’re not staying.”

Virginia set the coffees next to the box. “We wanted to help.”

“Those are for me?” April asked, unbalanced by the gesture.

“For Christ’s sake, don’t start blubbering,” George said. “It’ll melt that paint you slather all over your pretty face.”

“Aw, George.” April had to chase him halfway out the door to give him a hug. “I owe you one.”

“Empty words,” he said, swatting her away.

When he was gone, Virginia said, “No matter what happens, let’s catch a movie tonight. Would you like that?”

“Deal. It can even be a comic book movie,” April said. Virginia had stopped wearing her cartoon T-shirts to work, but her apartment was still decorated like a nine-year-old boy’s bedroom, with superheroes and video game posters all over the walls. “You’ve been incredibly nice. Even if you did take my hundred bucks.”
 

“Text me when you’re free,” Virginia said. “Now kick some ass.”

Just then Liam appeared in the doorway, Bev at his side. Virginia bolted past them through the door without another word.

“Thanks,” April called after her as she offered Liam and Bev the coffee and pastries. “I didn’t know if you two would be here.”

“I can’t believe it’s come to this,” Bev said. “I don’t approve.”

Liam gave her a loving smile. “Softie.”

“No, it’s good,” April said. “This crap’s been building for months. It’s great to finally get it out in the open.”

“I wish you’d told me about what was going on,” Bev said.

“That’s what they wanted me to do, go crying to you. Then they’d never take me seriously,” April said. “No, I had to deal with this on my own.”

Bev sat down, shaking her head. “There’s no such thing as being on your own.”

“You ordered the donuts, didn’t you?” Liam asked Bev, looking at the pastry boxes with amused disgust.

“I would have, but Virginia and George already had it covered,” Bev replied.

April looked up from the projector, worried she was losing control of the situation. Bev and Liam looked too cheerful, too relaxed. “I hope you two aren’t here to put your thumbs on the scale. I’ve got this.”

“We don’t expect any freelancer,” Bev said, “no matter whose sister she is, to deal with the most impossibly difficult—”

Just then Teegan entered the room, Jennifer right behind her.

“Situations,” Bev finished, clearing her throat. She clasped her hands together on the table and gave both women a tight-lipped smile. “Good morning.”

Teegan glanced at Jennifer before mumbling, “Hi” and averting her eyes.

Jennifer flashed a cold smile of her own before sitting in the corner near the door and pulling out her phone, as if she wasn’t really a part of the meeting. Teegan seemed to look for a chair similarly remote but had to settle for one at the table. She shot April smug, malevolent glances, stroking the tablet in her lap as if it were a Persian cat.

“I hope I’m not late,” Rita said, bursting into the room. She paused when she saw Bev and then helped herself to coffee and a bear claw before she sat down. “I had to do a rush job for Men’s that couldn’t wait.”

At that moment, the creative director for that department, Darrin, entered with his phone at his ear. His new assistant, the charming Hayley, trailed behind him holding a liter-sized bottle of Diet Coke.

Everyone was there. The party could begin. Bending over her laptop, April adjusted the window for the presentation, trying to keep her hands busy as she got a grip. Her nerves were sending up last-ditch alarms in desperation:
wah wah wah, SOS, abandon ship.
Even if Bev, Liam, and Rita believed what she was about to tell them, they might forgive Jennifer’s bitchy shenanigans because of her design talents and her seniority, asking April: what did she expect from a fashion designer, hugs and cookies?

No, she could expect that from Bev, the former preschool teacher.
She
was the nice one—so nice she’d probably forgive Jennifer and Teegan for conspiring against her for months. And if Bev was forgiving, Rita would fall into line. April would have to suck it up. She’d have her job, but so would Teegan and Jennifer, and nothing would change.

“I’ve prepared a presentation,” April said, checking the whiteboard behind her for the projected title page of her slideshow.

Nothing would change…
 

She picked up the whiteboard eraser and wiped off an imaginary streak of marker. The projector lit up her arm with the Fite logo.

How could nothing change when she herself had changed so much?

Zack had asked her to come with him. It hadn’t been halfhearted—he’d really wanted her to. His eyes had lit up like a patrol car chasing a Ferrari going ninety-five in a school zone.

He’d wanted her to come with him. What had she said? Something about
never
.

She turned back to the group of big fish in the little pond of San Francisco fashion, and wondered why she’d ever let them get to her. All those years she’d put half her heart into her job and all of it into having a good time, she’d been right: making money didn’t matter.

He’d wanted her to join him in New York.

Finally, she understood what he’d done. Impulsively, emotionally, irrationally—he’d asked her to run away with him. Yes, he was already living there and would enjoy many conveniences she would lack—but he’d done it. He’d offered his heart. She realized now it hadn’t been planned, it hadn’t been in his notebook or his calendar. He’d broken all of his typically anal-retentive safeguards in asking her.

And she’d thrown it back in his face.

She frowned at the screen of her computer, vaguely aware of all the eyes watching her, her heart beating with renewed excitement.

Holy shit. She was going to move to New York.

If it wasn’t too late.

Chapter 32

Z
ACK
WAVED
HIS
THANKS
TO
Virginia, who had seemed surprisingly happy to see him, and opened the conference room door.

Eight heads swiveled his way: Rita, Teegan, Jennifer, Darrin, Hayley, Liam, Bev… and April.

She stood at the head of the table, her back to him, wearing a turquoise sweater over a slinky black skirt with an asymmetrical hem that brushed her combat boots. She turned her head and looked at him.

His heart seized up for a moment. And because his throat had gone dry, he could only nod at the group, holding up his little notebook as if he were the court stenographer, before silently finding a seat at the end of the table.

Liam caught his eye, sending a tight-lipped warning look that Zack interpreted to mean
not a word
.
 

“Uh…” April said, staring at Zack.

The room fell silent.

“You have a presentation?” Bev asked.

“Yes. Thank you,” April said. She jerked her attention back to her computer. “I do. This presentation has a few interesting data points all of you should be interested in, whether it’s me or another artist you’ll be working with.”

Not wanting to distract her again, Zack turned his gaze to the whiteboard on the wall, where the projector was aiming the show. If his memory was right, the words FITE ART were flickering in the same color palette she’d come to find in this same conference room months ago, when she’d tripped over his feet. He remembered her bright blue jeans, the attraction he’d felt from the beginning, not admitting to himself then that he’d always been a love-at-first-sight kind of guy and had already had his second sighting.

He’d been lost from the beginning.