Page 87 of Wedding Season
Alex had slipped past her walls in big and small ways. His innate kindness and the fact that he treated everyone he met with respect and honor. Plus, he didn’t take her crap or allow her to manipulate or scare him off. He seemed to like her just as she was, heaven help them both.
So she loved him, and after the festival, she planned to tell him. He saw goodness in her that she hadn’t recognized and his faith had given her the freedom to discover her own.
Maybe she would agree to work with him at the Fit Collective. It might be fun to spar and create and spend every day together. But if that was too much...if she was too much...that would be okay, too.
They would find a way to make it work. Her faith, at least in her willingness to try, was unwavering.
A commotion at the far end of the tent caught her attention. Amber waved her arms in front of her while Heather and one of the junior designers looked on.
Heather’s expression was one of pure annoyance while the other woman looked vaguely terrified. No matter how her future with Alex’s company turned out, Mariella wouldn’t let some spoiled starlet intimidate his employees or hijack his first show. She would deal with Amber.
“Do you want me to handle it?” Avery was already moving toward the scene.
“I’ve got it,” Mariella told her. She’d spent long enough avoiding Amber and paid her dues for the public scene she’d created—a pound of flesh and then some. Although Amber hadn’t suffered any consequences that Mariella could see for her role in that unfortunate situation, Mariella didn’t care anymore.
The longer Amber was in town, the less sway she held. When Mariella came to stand in front of Amber now, she barely felt anything and certainly not the level of upset she had at the start of the weekend.
“Is everything okay?” She smiled and felt the serenity in it.
Amber must have noticed it, too, because her eyes narrowed even as she flapped her arms wildly in front of her. “Are these clothes lined with burlap?” she demanded. “My whole body itches.”
Mariella gestured to the other models standing in curious clusters around them. “No burlap and you seem to be the only one having trouble. The clothes are made from sustainable fabrics. No one should react to them.”
Amber’s face was starting to turn an alarming shade of red. “I’m having a reaction. Look at me. I can’t go out there like this.” She scratched her chest and arms like a kid who’d wandered into a patch of poison ivy at summer camp.
Mariella felt the first trace of real alarm trickle down her spine. “You don’t look good,” she told Amber.
The woman continued to scratch at herself. Her gaze cut to her put-upon assistant. “Do something. Make it stop.”
The dark-haired girl reached out and scratched between Amber’s shoulder blades. “Does that help?”
“No, you fool.”
The girl snatched her hand away.
“But don’t stop,” Amber whined.
“It’s time for the show to start,” Heather said as if they weren’t witnessing a Hollywood A-lister have a complete meltdown. A bigger crowd was gathering in front of Amber, but Heather didn’t seem to be the least bit concerned.
She was the only one who appeared calm which made Mariella suspicious. She grabbed the girl’s elbow and yanked her out of earshot of the larger group. “Do you know why Amber is struggling right now?”
Heather wouldn’t make eye contact. “I don’t think so. Maybe she’s reacting to something she ate. I couldn’t say.”
Mariella squeezed her arm. “You’re not convincing me.”
“I guess she might not be able to participate in the fashion show.” Heather tapped a finger on her chin. “Oh, darn.”
“Maybe it’s lice or scabies,” she suggested as she turned back to Amber.
Mariella suppressed a sharp snort. There was a reporter from some paper Mariella didn’t know the name of hovering around the edges of the still-expanding crowd.
At Heather’s offhand suggestion, the bespectacled man’s eyes widened. He began to tap furiously into his phone as he hurried out of the tent, likely trying to get better reception to call his editor with the potential story of America’s sweetheart plagued by lice.
Mariella had a feeling Amber was more accurately plagued with Heather’s misguided attempt to put the actress in her place.
“The crowd is getting restless,” Mary Ellen called in a stage whisper as she turned from looking out into the audience. “The thunder sounds closer, so we should start while it’s still dry.”
“You can’t start the show without the star of it,” Amber said, clawing at her neck so hard Mariella worried she might draw blood.
