Page 97 of Dirty Player
The first day had completely blown my mind and I owed it all to Beaux, his faith in me, and the marketing company he’d hired for me to help with the opening.
“I don’t know what to do with all this,” I said as I took another glass of champagne from her hand. It was only my third of the day. I’d been sipping it slowly despite wanting to chug bottle after bottle to assuage my nerves. “This is more than I imagined. I’m going to need help, I think, to keep up with the production.” I slid her a glance. “Know any jewelry designers who could help?”
She shot me a look that was clear. “Hell no. You’re the only person I know who’s this talented. I’m just glad you’re finally seeing it for yourself.”
I shook my head and looked around, awed at the amount of people in my store. It was packed full. Product was flying off the shelves faster than we could replace it.
I was going to have to do something if this wasn’t some rare Thursday fluke.
At least hire someone to help me work in the store so I could spend my time creating.
Needless to say, my time with Oliver had been helpful in more ways than one. He listened to me bitch, he supported me, he gave me ideas on advertising when I was stressed out, and then when I was super-stressed, he found multiple ways, almost nightly, to help me relax. I did the same for him, I knew it. He never hesitated to bounce ideas off me. Some nights we talked plays. Some nights we just hung out in front of the television, barely watching whatever was on and talking about our lives.
I had fallen in love with him quickly, painlessly. So easily that some days I wondered if it was all a dream.
If it was, I never wanted to wake up from it.
Especially not on this day.
I’d made other decisions in the past few weeks, too. While I’d told Oliver that I didn’t want to be in his shadow, with all the support I knew he was giving me, I wanted to do the same for him. Because of that, and partly still out of my fear of failing at this whole running-my-own-business thing, Stamped was only open four days a week. My marketing coordinator, Lacy, assured me we could use that to our advantage. I wanted it closed on Sundays so I could at least make sure I was able to attend home games. We were open from Wednesday through Saturday, when the arts district had its busiest foot traffic anyway.
Based on the day’s opening, it seemed to be working.
I walked around for a few minutes, speaking with customers, unable to keep the thrilled grin off my face before I moved back behind the counter to help Melissa ring up several sales.
“Thanks for being here, by the way.”
She rolled her eyes as she said goodbye to another customer, handing her the hot pink bag filled with purchases. “You’re so stupid. You’ve thanked me a thousand times, and where else would I be? Plus”—she turned to me and wiggled her brows—“I can’t wait for the game this weekend. All those hot, sexy men on the field. Me watching you be a nervous wreck around Oliver’s parents.”
“Don’t remind me,” I groaned and tossed back a large swallow of bubbly champagne.
“It’ll be fine.” She hip-checked me as she came close, wrapping one arm around my shoulder and waving the other out at the sea of people. “And so will this. You’ve done good, amazing things in a short amount of time, and I’m really proud of you.”
Emotion burned the backs of my eyes and I blinked it away. “This feels like a dream.”
“It is.” She turned to me, both of her hands on my shoulders, and stared directly into my eyes. “And it’s your dream, finally come true. Now you get to enjoy it.”
She winked and turned away when her eyes popped open and her mouth dropped. With the sudden quiet in the space, you could have heard a pin drop—and then it changed to quiet, quick murmurs and people reaching for their cell phones.
Oliver and Beaux and Kolby paid none of the women any attention as they pushed themselves into the doorway.
They headed straight for me, all wearing ball caps but clearly unable to hide who they were.
“Hey,” I said, breathless as Oliver sauntered directly to me on the other side of the counter. He didn’t care about the space between us as he reached out, cupped my neck with his hand, and pulled me toward him.
He kissed me quick and hard, pulling back with a large smile. “This place is packed. We had to park blocks away. Good day?”
“Amazing,” I said, breathless from the kiss and the surprise at seeing him. “What are you doing here?”
“You think we’d miss this?” He tilted his head, not giving me much space to back away.
In truth, I did. They had their first home game in a few days and their practices had been brutal. I figured they’d all be too tired to stop by, and I didn’t blame them.
He must have noticed I thought that because his grin faded and he shook his head. “Someday you’ll realize you’re not the only person who will do everything they can for the person they love. Until then, I’ll have to work harder to teach you.”
He kissed me again and pulled back.
I was quickly turned and twisted and pulled into Beaux’s arms. For a brief second, I saw and heard the clicks of flashes from phones.
