The woman’s voice dwindled down to a whisper, and despite my subtle efforts to listen in, I couldn’t hear anything else. Moments later, though, there was a burst of laughter. At my expense, no doubt.
Was I being paranoid? I summoned my courage and turned to look at the women. Maris, the prettiest of them all, was staring right at me. Seeing me confront them obviously stunned her, and she blinked and looked away.
I clutched my champagne glass. This felt like a bad sitcom. What had I done to deserve their wrath? Besides snag their wealthy, totally hot boss, that is.
And speaking of the hot boss, if Derek were to overhear their bitchy remarks, I didn’t think he’d be happy with them. Just a guess. And how rude was it that they were loudly discussing the woman their boss had brought to the party? Did they care about their job security?
I walked as far away as I could get from the group, to the other side of the room. Because if I had to keep hearing their cackling comments, I would be tempted to poke their beady eyes out with one of these ridiculously tight (but very cute) three-inch heels I was sporting.
And there I went again, getting all violent and bloodthirsty. Still, under the circumstances, who could blame me?
Standing near the wall of elaborately scrolled ironwork windows, I centered my energies, aligned my chakras, and took a moment to admire the view of Huntington Park and Grace Cathedral in the distance.
Then I turned back to observe the well-dressed crowd enjoying Derek’s generous spread. Waiters strolled among the guests, serving delectable hors d’?uvres. There were two full bars in the room, with bartenders pouring top-shelf alcohol. Food stations were placed in each corner of the room and featured the four food groups: Italian, Thai, Mexican, and desserts.
Other than the mean girls, this was a fabulous party and I’d been having a good time. Another burst of high-pitched laughter arose from the women’s table, and I watched Derek turn and smile at them with admirable tolerance. They returned his attention with an annoying round of giggling and flirting and—Oh, hell. I was being sulky and petulant, wasn’t I? I was letting them win.
But were they correct? Was I Derek’s flavor of the month? I hated that term, by the way. And hadn’t he just admitted that he’d been thinking about moving here since the first night we met? Didn’t that mean I was more significant to him than a mere passing fancy? Was I going to believe some cackling women or the man himself?
“Flavor of the month,” I muttered. The fact was, I’d been his “flavor” for almost five months now, although we certainly hadn’t dated all that time. To be honest, we’d barely dated at all. Then, all of a sudden, he’d moved into my home. We were living together. I’d turned over half my closet to him. Not that I minded. On the contrary, I loved having him there. I loved the way he kissed and the way he looked at me as though I were the only woman in the world. And I loved doing silly things with him, like racing each other to the corner on the way to the coffee shop, and reading the Sunday paper out loud. I loved talking and laughing with him. I loved . . . him.
“Oh, God, shut up,” I whispered. No way.
I whipped around and stared out the window, knowing my inability to hide my feelings. Anyone who looked at me right now would guess how I felt by simply tracking the path of my overly ardent gaze in his direction. My radish-red cheeks would probably give me away, too.
It was time to be honest with myself. Why would I have allowed Derek to move in and live with me and rearrange my closet space if I didn’t, sort of, you know, love him?
Still, this couldn’t be good. It was a well-known fact that I made bad decisions when it came to love. After all, the first man I was engaged to marry turned out to be gay. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but if I were going to all the trouble of marrying someone, I wanted it to mean more than a lifetime of good fashion advice.
Watching Derek now, in his element, surrounded by friends, partners, clients, and employees, I found it hard not to be impressed with everything about him. He was strong, confident, gorgeous, witty, smart, dangerously sexy, loyal.