“And I didn’t disagree,” Winter interjected. “In fact, I agreed with you. I was just pointing out that the same goes for a woman having a good female role model. Sometimes I feel like women get left out of the equation. We need positive role models just like men.”
“But that wasn’t the conversation. That principal was talking about the program he’d created at his school for young men.”
“Exactly my point,” Winter said, turning her chair, as well. “Why start a program for the male students and not have one for the female students? Why segregate the programs at all?”
“I never said I disagreed with you either. I just pointed out the fact that that wasn’t the current topic of discussion.”
“Yeah, and you pointed it out in front of the eight other people at the table, who laughed and then disregarded my suggestion.”
He placed his hands on his chest. “So you’re mad that they thought I was funny?”
She lifted her eyebrows. “How in the world do you process information? It wasn’t because they thought you were funny. It was because they lost sight of my point.”
“Because they were only focused on laughing at me and talking about my viewpoint?”
“Once again, you somehow made this about you.” She sighed and closed her eyes, the sound distracting him from listening to whatever else was coming out of her mouth.
“Taheim, did you hear anything I just said?”
“Every word,” he said as his eyes dropped to her lips. She must have noticed the change in his mood, because her lips parted with awareness.
“So,” Ajay said, reentering the room and breaking the trance between him and Winter. “Did you guys settle when you’d have your first meeting?”
Winter stood and put back on her coat. “Your brother is the most difficult human being to ever walk the planet.”
Ajay laughed as he looked from Winter to Taheim. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
“Call me at Bare Sophistication when you’re ready to set up a meeting,” she said to Taheim as she left the office.
“She was in a hurry,” Ajay said as he sat back in his desk chair. “What did you say to her? Because clearly, it was the wrong thing to say.”
He glanced at the seat that Winter had just vacated. “When it comes to that woman, what don’t I say that’s wrong?”
Winter’s navy heels clicked on the wood surface in a tempo that matched the hard sound of the rain pounding on the window. It seemed fitting that an early-November rainstorm paired perfectly with her sour mood. A mood that had been one of many ever since she’d heard the news about working with Taheim on the fashion show a couple days ago.
It was a great opportunity, but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t slow her heart rate whenever she thought about working closely with him. She glanced over at an unfinished lace cami that she wasn’t sure she could even complete today, as planned. Her creativity was even starting to suffer because her mind was working overtime trying to figure out how she would handle the situation with Taheim.
Autumn appeared at the door. “Can you please stop pacing? I can hear your footsteps down the hall and you’re giving me a headache.”
She ignored her sister’s comment since evidently, she had no idea how much anxiety she was experiencing. Winter never got anxious about anything, but the end of the year was bringing on quite a few behavioral changes for her.
“You’re the one who came back here to my design studio.”
“Aren’t we testy this evening,” Autumn said as she walked farther into the room. “But seriously, you’re going to put a hole in the floor.”
“I’ll stop pacing as soon as I figure out how to work with Taheim without losing my sanity.”
“I’ve never seen you like this. He must be getting under your skin more than I had initially thought.”
Winter stopped pacing and turned to face Autumn. “He doesn’t get under my skin. He’s more like that irritating itch that no matter how much you scratch, it still itches.”
“How is that any different from what I said?”
“You made it seem like I allow him to bother me more than I’ve ever let any man bother me before.”
Autumn walked over to Winter and placed an arm on her shoulder, which was covered in a navy jacket that went perfectly with her white top and dark jeans.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Autumn replied. “I meant to indicate that he gets to you more than anyone has in the past. Male or female.”
Winter rolled her eyes before walking over to the massive wooden table currently covered in red, silver and black fabrics. “Is there a reason you’re here? I thought you had to help Danni change the fixtures in the store.”
“I do, but I got distracted by this guy asking me if he could discuss business with you. Something about some new design ideas, I think. I’m not sure.”
“Okay, I’ll meet with him real quick.” It wasn’t as if she were getting much work done anyway. Usually on Friday evening after the busy lunch crowd, Winter enjoyed spending time cooped up in her studio turning her creative ideas into a reality. Today she’d barely gotten anything done, so maybe talking to someone about possible business would be enough to jump-start her creative juices.
“Where is he?” she asked as she stepped into the store.
“He’s over there.” She followed the direction of Autumn’s hand and immediately shot her sister a look of irritation.
“Are you kidding me? You made it seem like it was a person I didn’t know.”
Autumn smirked. “I never said you didn’t know him. I only said it was a guy who was distracting me. In this case, that person is Taheim, but what does it matter? You said he doesn’t affect you any more than anyone else.”
Instead of responding to Autumn, she stood there and stared at her sister in silence.
“You can stare me down all you want, but that won’t change the fact that Taheim is waiting to talk to you. Sixty percent of the population lie to themselves in hopes of believing that lie.”
Winter squinted her eyes together. “And you’re telling me this in order to say what exactly?”
“That the sooner you stop lying to yourself about the way Taheim affects you, the quicker you can figure out how to handle the situation.”
“I don’t even know why I asked,” Winter said, throwing up her hands in defeat.
“I do,” Autumn said with a shrug. “You’re delaying seeing Taheim. But time is up and the store is slow now, so Danni and I have to change those fixtures. Why don’t you take him to your office or studio?”
Not that she had a choice, since Autumn was already ushering her to Taheim. She didn’t particularly like the fact that he had dropped by without even calling the store and asking her if it was okay. That’s because he’s used to doing whatever he wants. It wasn’t that she had been waiting on his call. But since they really did have business to discuss, she’d figured he would have actually scheduled a meeting with her.
As she got closer to him, she tried to ignore her nerves. Her palms were growing sweatier by the second. The last time that had happened was her senior year at the New York School of Design when she had to present her final