Truthseeker

“Ah, yes.” Steven nodded, expression deadpan. “After all, he came with hundred-year-old buttons. If he’s recycling that much, he must be very cautious with money, indeed.”

Lara laughed and mimed throwing one of the buttons at him, though she kept it safe in her palm. “The buttons are from his grandfather’s suits, and you know it. It’s not nice to tease me.”

“I tease all my girls.” Steve shifted off the desk and crouched in front of the suit, flicking away imaginary bits of lint as he examined her handiwork. Lara sat back, smiling. He was a master tailor and had four daughters of his own, ranging from a few years older than Lara to several years younger. That, more than anything, was what he meant by “my girls”—she had worked for him since her second year of college and, having watched her grow up, knew he half-thought of her as one of his own. She loved the sense of belonging, and worked harder than she probably needed to, wanting to make him proud.

“This is master class work, Lara. I’m sure you know that, but it’s worth mentioning.” Steve stood up again, lips pursed as he studied the suit. “Mugabwi’s ordered three suits. I’ll want you to make them all. But I also want you to discuss linen with him, when he’s in for his final fitting. These will be perfect for corporate meetings, but a lot of his charity work is done in Africa. He’ll need cooler material, even just for the high-level glad-handing he does.”

“Maybe silk dupioni, not linen.” Lara got to her feet, examining first her employer, then the suit before them, dubiously. “Linen’s crisp and cool, but Mr. Mugabwi’s job is asking corporations for huge amounts of money. I think his suits need a visual warmth that I’m not sure I’d get satisfactorily from linen. I mean, this cloth …” She brushed her fingertips over the fine wool and shook her head. “The depth of color and the elegance of the buttons, when combined with the suit’s fit, are going to warm people toward him instinctively. Wool can do that. So can silk. I’m just not convinced linen’s the right fabric.”

Steve was beaming at her. Lara trailed off, then ducked her head to stare at her feet a moment. “That was a test.”

“And you passed with flying colors. I’ll leave the design of the summer suits entirely in your hands, Lara. You can consider it your master test.”

Heat rushed her cheeks and she put her hands over them. “Two years early?” Tradition expected a seven-year apprenticeship, and she’d only worked for Lord Matthew’s for five.

Steve passed it off with a wave of his hand. “The modern world’s a faster place. Besides, you were nearly at journeyman status when you started working for me, and you know it, Lara. Your portfolio was a lot stronger than most college sophomores’ would be. You were doing body work on suits within eight months, and you know some of the others were still doing hems after eighteen.”

Lara winced, but nodded. She was meticulous and always had been; the work came very close to making music in her mind, as if someone was whispering truth just out of her hearing. When errors were made, they reverberated sourly just as falsehoods did, and so she’d learned almost at the same time she’d begun sewing that it was far more worth doing well than quickly. Her coworkers hadn’t always learned the same lesson.

“All right.” Steve brushed the suit’s shoulder once more. “Choose the fabrics you’d like to present to Mr. Mugabwi and we’ll discuss them before he comes in again. Meanwhile, keep being a genius.”

Lara laughed and waved as he left, then settled back down to work with a smile on her face. Gleaming pinheads marked the buttons’ eventual locations; it was now only a matter of judging which buttons looked the most striking against the fabric. This was Lara’s favorite part of her work, even more than the choosing of fabrics or the discussion of design: the fine details, most of which were invisible to the untrained observer, that finished a suit or gown to impeccable specification.

A knock on her office door pulled her out of her reverie as the last button went on. Pins in her mouth, she mumbled, “Mmm?,” then extracted them from between her lips to blink at Cynthia Taylor. “Yes?”

“Someone’s here to see you.” Cynthia, at barely seventeen, was the only daughter interested in her father’s business. She worked as a receptionist after school during the brief hours the bespoke shop was open to the public, but Lara was certain she would someday be a master tailor.

“Me?” A glimpse out the frosted windows said evening had fallen while she worked. Lara sat back on her heels and moved a cup of tea to be certain she wouldn’t spill it. “I don’t have any fittings scheduled this evening. I should probably already be gone. So should you, for that matter.”

Cynthia rolled her eyes. “You should have told Dad that when he came by earlier. We’re going to be late for di

“I don’t know how anybody could even know to ask for me. I’m only a journeyman. Well.” Lara climbed to her feet, brushed nonexistent dust from her knees, and put the tea on her desk. “Do I look suitable enough to be presented to a potential client?”

Cynthia pursed her lips, taking the question seriously enough that Lara bit back laughter: the girl’s critical examination was better suited to a woman three times her age. “You’ll do,” she said after a moment, then lost her serious demeanor and dimpled. “You look wonderful. But you should probably put some shoes on.”

Lara looked down at herself with a quick nod. She’d changed from rain-soaked clothing to a white silk blouse and gray wool three-quarter-length pants, their wide legs nearly a skirt. She’d been working in stocking feet, but she reached for knee-high boots now, slipping them on and adding another inch and a half to her height. “I don’t have a suit jacket,” she muttered. “I didn’t expect to see anyone today. And my hair’s all frizzy from the rain.”

“Here.” Cynthia scurried from the room, then returned moments later with a round hairbrush. “Brush the curls out and tie it back in a chignon and you’ll be perfect, even without a jacket. Perfect,” she repeated when Lara’d done as she’d instructed. “You look like one of those old paintings.”

“Cracked and split?” Lara flashed a smile, patted her hair one more time, and followed Cynthia out of the office.

David Kirwen waited in the lobby, expression animated over whatever news his cell phone shared. Lara stopped in the archway leading from the private fitting rooms and offices, surprise slamming her heartbeat high. She curled one hand around the door frame for support, and wished, for a moment, that she could retreat and try her entrance again, this time knowing who awaited her. Cynthia slowed, peering at her, and Lara gave her a halfhearted smile of reassurance.

Kirwen looked up from his phone and offered a disarming grin. “Miss Jansen. I’m glad I caught you. I only realized after the fact that we hadn’t set a time or place for di

“I’d noticed that, too.” Lara swallowed against a dry throat and gave Cynthia another smile, this one tinged with embarrassment. Cynthia’s gaze brightened and she turned to give Lara a discreet thumbs-up before scurrying into the back offices and leaving Lara alone with David Kirwen.

He was considerably more handsome dry and smiling than he’d been dripping and cold on the street. That was her first thought: not what is he doing here or how did he find me, but Kelly is right. He really is awfully good-looking. More than good-looking: he bordered on pretty, features sharper and more chiseled than men’s usually were. Men in general suddenly seemed rather blunt and thick when compared to David Kirwen, as if much of humanity were discarded rough drafts to his final sculpture.