I froze. Thirty-two years old, a pediatric surgeon, and I couldn’t make my voice work. Vivienne snapped her fingers at the security guard. “Marco, escort her out before she touches anything else.” Marco looked embarrassed but stepped forward. The fur-coat woman lifted her phone and started filming me, laughing. Nobody said a word. Nobody. I felt eight years old again, standing in a thrift store while kids from school pointed. Then the front door chimed. A tall man in a charcoal overcoat walked in, flanked by two assistants carrying garment bags and a tablet. The store manager materialized from nowhere, practically bowing. “Mr. Ashford, welcome back, your private suite is prepared, and the Geneva pieces just arrived—” He didn’t look at the manager. He looked at me. His eyes traveled from my trembling hands to the guard’s grip on my elbow to Vivienne’s smug little smirk. He walked over slowly, took off his overcoat, and draped it around my shoulders. Then he kissed my forehead. “Long shift, sweetheart?” Vivienne’s smile cracked. The manager’s face drained of color. Because Julian Ashford wasn’t just a client. He was the majority shareholder of the entire Bellisario Group, the man whose signature was on every paycheck in that store, and he had just called the woman they were dragging out his wife. Julian turned to the manager, his voice quiet and terrible. “Pull the footage from the last ten minutes. All of it. I want it on my desk in Milan by morning.” Then he looked at Vivienne, who was now gripping the counter to stay upright. “You told my wife she was scaring the real clientele. Say it again. Louder. I want to make sure I heard you correctly before I decide what to do with your career.” She couldn’t. Her mouth opened and closed like a fish. The fur-coat woman had quietly slipped her phone into her purse and was inching toward the door. Julian handed me the silk scarf my mother had loved. “Consider it a gift from the house, Dr. Marlowe. And Vivienne—” he finally said her name, reading it off her gold nametag, “—clear out your locker. Tonight.”
