The Bride (The Boss) (21 page)

“We do have one in stock. I’ll go and get it,” Debra said with fake warmth before heading off to the back.

“Well, this has been quite charming, but I must dash,” Neighbor Lady said with a pleasant smile. “Do enjoy your bag.”

“Yeah. Bye,” I managed. I felt like I’d just been run over by a train. I hadn’t even gotten her name. She was like a malicious purse fairy or something.

“So, you’re seriously looking at a Birkin?” Holli shook her head. “You realize how much those cost, right?”

“Yes, I worked for the top fashion magazine in the country, thank you, I know how much they are.” My face was burning. I felt the weirdest urge to prove something, to someone. I just didn’t know what and to whom. To the neighbor lady, that I belonged in the building because we had matching purses? To Debra, the sales person I would probably never see again in my entire life, that I was somehow cosmically deserving of an astronomically priced bag?

Or maybe I was just trying to prove all of that to myself. But for whatever reason, when Debra returned with the gorgeous, pale alligator leather bag, I knew I was going to buy it, no matter the price.

It was the most beautiful purse I’d ever seen. It was the pale tan of a McDonald’s chocolate shake, or maybe just a touch lighter. The fact that it was such a large bag and made out of alligator skin was pretty impressive; most alligators don’t have enough leather for a presentable thirty-five centimeter bag with pockets. And this wasn’t just presentable. It was a marvel, with its gleaming gold hardware and matching alligator leather sleeve for the tiny padlock that would keep the bag from being opened. I lifted the Birkin from the glass-topped counter like it was a holy relic and breathed, “How much?”

“One hundred and fifteen thousand dollars,” Debra answered without hesitation.

I had to buy it, Neil. I barfed on it.
That was not a conversation I wanted to have, so I fought back the wave of nausea that gripped me at the dollar figure.

“Wow, so, kind of out of anyone’s price range, huh?” Holli laughed.

This was the part where I was supposed to politely decline the bag and slink off, I assume. Maybe later I would run into Neighbor and Anastasia the Yorkie, who probably had her own Birkin, and they would both look at me in judgment as I stood there, a poor girl from Michigan pretending to be a billionaire’s trophy wife.
 

A brief “Barkin” pun burbled up to the surface of my mind at the thought of a dog with a purse, and I laughed, a little crazily.

“Sorry, I just remembered something funny.” I opened my own purse—a Madison East/West Coach bag in purple leather that had cost a measly two-hundred and looked like a Target clearance buy in comparison to the magnificent ex-alligator before me—and pulled out the scariest weapon in my arsenal.

I had an AmEx Centurion card. The fabled “black” card, which Neil had been graciously invited to secure for me after he’d made a few calls. His knighthood ceremony probably had less pomp and procedure than getting the damn black AmEx did. They’d sent the card to me in a friggin’ black leather box.

When I pulled the card from my wallet, Holli made a sort-of strangled, squeaking noise. Debra didn’t even twitch. She took the card, swiped it, and it was done.

I’d just bought a purse that cost more than the house I’d grown up in. More than my college education.

Debra packed the Birkin away in a dust sleeve, and then inside a large orange box before slipping that into a carrier bag. “Thank you very much, Ms. Scaife. And if you need service in the future, here’s my card.”

I took it from her. I guessed she must work on commission.

The moment we left the store, clutching our bags to our chest in the biting New York cold, Holli turned to me with wide eyes. “I can’t believe you just did that.”

“I can’t, either.” My shivering had nothing to do with the icy temps. My knees wobbled. I thought I might pass out. “Should I take it back? Do you think I can?”

“Um, probably not,” Holli said with a raised eyebrow. “Unless you’re willing to never shop at Hermés again.”

At the moment, that didn’t sound too bad. I clearly could not be trusted to make rational decisions in that store.

What was Neil going to say?

On Saturday afternoon, I paced in front of the fireplace in the living room, my phone in my hand.

“You look like you’re waiting to get in trouble,” Emma snorted, flicking the screen of her iPad without glancing up. “Has he found out about your murder bag?”

From the moment I’d walked into the apartment with the Birkin, Emma had been trying out different names for it. Of all of them, “murder bag” was the one that had stuck.

I glared at her, but she was too lost in Candy Crush to care. Though I
was
concerned about how Neil would take me dropping a hundred-thousand on a purse, I was more concerned with how his evening with Emir was going. Of course, I couldn’t tell her that.

“No,” I said with forced cheerfulness. “I’m just missing him. We haven’t been apart since, you know. Hospitals.”

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t even think—” she began, and she looked so concerned, I felt guilty.

It wasn’t as though I’d lied; it
was
the first time Neil and I had been apart since he’d come home from the hospital, and I really was nervous about it. But nothing like the anxiety I’d been feeling since I’d spoken to him a few hours ago.

Neil had called me when Emir had arrived and told him about the text conversation we’d had. Emir had left it to me to break the concept down: that I thought Neil should try submission again, this time with a better partner.

It wasn’t that I needed Neil to switch. I would always want him to be my Dom, and I couldn’t see myself seriously calling the shots in the bedroom, beyond the occasional playful occurrence. But something he’d said on therapy night had shocked me.
I’ve been powerless for a long time. And I didn’t like it.

Neil hated when I tried to make any link between his sexual need for control and his micromanaging in every other facet of his life, probably because it was too close to the truth for him. I had a suspicion that if he let himself be dominated sexually, he might see the link he denied. I didn’t expect it to change those aspects of his personality—I wouldn’t want it to—but I suspected that one of the reasons he was still so shaken by the cancer and his scary hospital experience was that his need for control was so total. If he felt powerless in one area of his life, then he felt powerless in all of them.

I really hated the thought of Neil feeling so bad.

“You know, if you guys want me to take off for a few days and give you some space when he gets back, I could always stay at Michael’s place,” she offered.

As far as I was aware, Neil hadn’t spoken to Emma yet about the living, and possibly moving, situation. But sometimes, when you see an in, you have to take it. I dropped into the armchair. “About that… We had something we wanted to talk to you about.”

She paled, then squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head with a “tch” of embarrassment. She was like a carbon copy of her father sometimes.

“I know, I know.” She swung her legs over the side of the sofa and tossed her iPad onto the cushion behind her, as if she were settling in for a long discussion. “You want me out of here.”

“What? No. Not ‘you’ as in me, myself. ‘You’ as in we. Both of us. But not actually ‘we.’ I mean, we don’t want you to—”

“Sophie, please.” She frowned in annoyance at my fumbling. “I’m not upset. I completely understand. Believe me, if I could get all of Michael’s roommates to move out, I would jump at the chance.”

“Well, yeah, I kinda assumed that you and me and Neil were in the same boat.”

“Not
quite
in the same boat,” she reminded me, with an edge of petty sarcasm I’d come to realize was a sign of her comfort with a person. I suspected Emma only let herself become truly irritated with the people she cared about, because no one else was worth her time.

She folded her arms over her chest and leaned back. “I realize how immature it is to be grossed out by the thought of one’s parent having a personal life, I really do. But you must understand, he didn’t introduce me to the women in his life when I was young. When I was staying with him, he didn’t have overnight guests. Even Elizabeth didn’t sleep here when I was home until they got engaged.”

Wow. That was seriously weird, considering they had dated for two years. Neil sounded way more protective than I’d thought he was… Which was a little scary, because I thought he’d already been acting bananas over Emma’s wedding.

“It isn’t that I don’t like you,” she continued. “Or that I don’t think you’re right for him. You two are lovely together, and I’m thrilled that he’s so happy. I just would rather live in a situation in which his happiness didn’t thoroughly gross me out. Michael and I have been looking at other options, but we don’t want to rely on our parents’ money. I’m having a bit of difficulty…downsizing.”

I could sympathize with her there. Though my old apartment could have fit into this one seven or more times, I’d had a hard time adapting to the Fifth Avenue place after life in the London townhouse. It was strange how accustomed I could get to too much house. I was like a goldfish, my space needs growing in accordance to the size of my bowl.

“You know, your dad and I are actually looking for a place.”
 

“Really? I had no idea.” Either she didn’t know how to take the news, or she was just bothered by the fact that we hadn’t told her before. “Here in the city?”

“No, we’re actually going to look at a place out in Sagaponack on Monday. Nothing set in stone or anything,” I reassured her.

My phone rang.

I looked down at it, then guiltily back to Emma.

“Go and take it,” she said wearily.

I hit the call button and stood, and Emma grabbed the television remote.
 

“Neil?” I asked, which was silly, since I knew who it was already. I had no idea why I always did that on the phone.

When he spoke, he sounded tired. “Yes, darling, it’s me.”

“Is everything okay?” I walked from the room, covering the receiver with one hand to block out the sound of the television as I headed to the bedroom. “How did things go?”

“Wonderfully. It all went wonderfully.”

I let out a quiet breath of relief.

“This trip has certainly given me some new perspective,” he added.
 

Was that a good thing, or a bad thing he was trying to disguise as a good thing through managerial word trickery? I could never tell. He’d built a media empire on his skills at spoken subterfuge and double meaning.

“Wow, I’m glad to hear that.” I remained neutral. I was picking up some of his tricks. “Perspective on what?”

There was a momentary pause, long enough that I would have worried we’d been disconnected, if I hadn’t heard the soft sound of his breath in the receiver. Tension drew up tight in me, like a wire ready to snap. I wanted him to be with me. I wanted to touch him, to curl up beside him and listen to all the dirty details of his evening. And, well, I kind of wished I’d been there, myself.

But then maybe Neil wouldn’t have gotten the “perspective” I hoped he was talking about.

Finally, he said, “I’ll discuss it with you when I come home. I promise. Right now, you need to get your sleep, and I do, too.”

Since when do I go to bed at six?
I chalked that one up to sheer exhaustion.

“When I get my hands on you, we’re going to make up for lost time,” he promised.

It was embarrassing how loudly I squealed at the prospect. I knew we were insanely lucky, not only that he had survived the summer, but that we had this whole new chance to fall in love with each other again. But seriously, I annoyed myself sometimes with how gooey and romantic I got.

“I can’t wait.” I tried for seductive, but I know it came off silly as all get-out.

There was a change in his tone when he said, “I must go, darling. Emir is still here, and I don’t want to be rude. I’ll see you tomorrow evening.”

Emir was still there? Oh, he was definitely going to have to spill the naughty details if he was spending the entire night with him. “I love you.”

“I love you, Sophie.”

After we hung up, I went back to the living room.

“Everything okay?” Emma asked, muting the TV.

“Yup, everything’s fine. We’re just being ooey gooey gross together. You wouldn’t want to hear about it.” She most definitely would not. Though Neil was open with me about his sexuality, his daughter was under the impression that any rumors of her father’s bisexuality were just that. Snapping the conversation back to what we had been talking about before, I asked, “So, you’re not upset that we’re looking for a house? I was worried you might think I was trying to get rid of you.”

“Not at all. Do you know how much simpler my life will be if my father lives two hours away?” She sighed in what I suspected was only slightly exaggerated bliss.

“Do you want me to try to convince him to move to Philly?” I asked with a snort.

“I hear Auckland is lovely, you might try there.” She rolled her eyes. “I love my father. I really do. But he’s so…”

“Overbearing?”

“At times, yes.” She shrugged. “I suppose it makes me a terrible daughter, doesn’t it? I should just be happy that he’s still here.”

“You can be happy that he’s still around and severely irritated with him, too. I speak from experience.” Even though I missed him like crazy at the moment.

“Well, thanks for telling me about the house. And I think I will take off tomorrow for a few nights with Michael.” Emma reached for the remote and clicked the volume on again. “Although I would
love
to see the look on his face when he finds out about that purse.”

* * * *

As it so happened, I did not have to tell Neil about the Birkin right away. I didn’t get the chance. When he came home the next evening, he was wiped out exhausted. He poured himself a drink, wrestled out of his shirt, and dropped into his chair by the fireplace in the living room.

“Turn that on, will you, wife?” he asked, smacking my backside as I walked past.