Chapter 40

• The boutique emptied slowly, but the tension didn’t.
• Even after the last photographer disappeared into the sunlit street, and the quiet hum of conversation faded to nothing, I remained still beneath the chandelier light. The press preview had ended with a polite applause, some murmurs of admiration, and a few raised eyebrows that promised headlines. But it was not the praise or skepticism I remembered most. It was the silence that came afterwards, the way the boutique held its breath once the world stepped back.
• Julian stood across the room, speaking to a staff who nodded quickly and disappeared behind the velvet curtain that led to the back offices. His posture was calm, but the set of his shoulders told me he was still listening for aftershocks. I watched him from a distance longer than I needed to. There was something about seeing him in this space, in our space, that made it harder to guard the parts of myself I had stitched so tightly back together.