I break into a grin of my own, not bothering to hold it back, because this is perfect.
My wife’s moving in. And I’m going to do everything to make her want to call it home.
Chapter 15
Stella
“This place gives me the fucking creeps.”
Glancing up from the dry ingredients I’m sifting together, I shoot Mika a look. She’s sitting on the other side of the marble island, ass planted on a barstool with her casted leg propped up on two more. She’s a haughty queen overseeing her domain—except this is my house and my kitchen she’s in.
“That’s because it’s empty,” I explain. “Most houses feel that way when there’s hardly any furniture.”
And this place will never hold more than what’s already here. This is the house Étienne and I were supposed to live in together after our wedding—a six-thousand-square-foot fully remodeled colonial-style build in Alexandria, Virginia. I was the one who pushed for the suburbs instead of the city, a calmer location to raise our future children instead of smack-dab in the city. Our penthouse in Dupont Circle was beautiful and located a stone’s throw away from several of my businesses, but it wasn’t where I saw myself staying forever.
I started moving my things in here the day the contractor said it was safe to occupy. But Étienne dragged his feet. I seenow why he did. Back then, though, I wrote it off as being attached to the place where we’d made so many great memories together.
How wrong I was. Now I’m stuck with a house that will never feel like home.
“Nah, it just has bad vibes.” Mika shakes her head. “Shitty house juju.”
“Then I guess it’s a good thing I won’t be here much.”
She grins wickedly at the reminder that I’ll be moving in with Thomas in less than two weeks, but it only makes my stomach twist. I’m picking up my entire life and shipping it across an ocean to live with a man I’ve spent practically zero time with.
“Have you told anyone you’re moving yet?” she asks.
I grab the bowl of egg whites I’ve already separated, slowly adding them to the almond flour mixture. I’m back to recipe testing today, working on Stella Margaux’s summer menu. “My board knows. They’re supportive of my desire to expand our reach in Europe.” And thankfully, they were also supportive of my impromptu wedding, if a little surprised. “I’m going to set up an office in London and put together a team.” I raise a questioning brow in her direction. “You want in?”
Mika is the marketing director for Stella Margaux’s North American Division. Some might scream favoritism, but her talent is part of the reason we’re so successful. I only hire the best.
She snorts. “I love you, and I want to be close to you and Janelle, but no. Reason number one.” She points accusingly at her cast. “I’m in this for a few more weeks, and hobbling around a new city sounds miserable. And two, I can’t ask Vaughn to just up and leave. He may be a househusband, but I don’t want to disrupt his life like that.”
I understand, and it was a reach to ask, but I had to see if Icould keep my other best friend with me. “Promise you’ll come visit?”
“Oh, honey, you couldn’t keep me away if you tried.” She shoots me a wink before pushing a little jar of pink food coloring my way. “So the board knows you’re going. What about your parents?”
My lips twist into a grimace. “I was planning to tell them at Thanksgiving.”
“Girl.” The word is a warning. “You’ve got to give them more heads-up than that.”
“They’ll have a few days to process before I leave.” I unscrew the cap on the food coloring jar and add a tiny scoop to my mixer’s bowl. “Besides, I’m a grown woman. I can do what I damn well please.”
“A grown woman who’s scared of disappointing her parents.”
The truth is a pinch in my chest. It’s ignorable enough, even though it comes with a lingering sting. But it’s about more than just disappointing my parents—it’s about disappointinganyone. I’ve been handed so much in my life, all because of the success that those who came before me achieved, and I refuse to sit back and let their wins carry me through life. Raising the bar is my only option to show that while, yes, I’ve been given so much, I’m worthy of carrying the torch. Worthy of the success I’ve found myself.
“Whatever,” I brush off, not as casual as I hoped to sound. “It’ll be fine.”
She gives a noncommittal murmur before letting the silence hang, the whir of the mixer the only sound. I know what she’s about to ask next before her mouth even opens.
“Have you spoken to him yet?”
She doesn’t have to specify whichhim. Her cautious tone says it’s Étienne.
I shake my head, keeping my eyes down. “He hasn’t tried to get in contact, and I haven’t called him either.”
I thought he would say something after news of my Vegas wedding leaked, but it’s been radio silence. We’ll have to speak soon enough to decide what we’re going to do with our properties and other shared possessions. But the fact that he hasn’t sent me a text or a letter or even sicced his lawyers on me? It’s fucking crushing that he could cut me out of his life so easily after so many years together.
