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“Babe?” I asked.
Her eyes were glued to where the jewelry was merchandised.
“Those are my designs. She stole my designs,” she murmured, clearly in shock.
Fucking hell.
There were probably a dozen people milling around. I spotted Sophia immediately, recognizing her from a picture Avery showed me. Her hair was ridiculous, red, and piled up in what was supposed to be some sort of updo, but she just looked like she had a snake on her head. Her dress was gold. It looked cheap.
She immediately came up to us. "Avery, what are you doing here?"
"You invited me to the opening. I wanted to come check it out," Avery said. Her voice was serene, as if she couldn't possibly understand why Sophia was out of sorts.
"I didn't think you’d actually come!"
Avery smirked. "Why? Are you afraid I might say something inappropriate? What are you going to do, call security? Oh, that's right, you don't have any."
“You can't come into my store—” she started in an aggressive tone.
Time for me to cut in.
“Be civil,” I said. “Sam Maxwell. We haven’t been introduced.”
She stopped midsentence, folding her arms over her chest. "I’ve heard plenty about you from Avery. I see your taste in women still sucks.”
Interesting. Avery mentioned me throughout the years?I made a mental note of that.Now, Sophia had better prepare herself for my displeasure.
"Really, you're resorting to that?" I asked, cocking a brow. There was another reason I wanted to come with Avery. No one would mess with her if she had the Maxwell name behind her.
I was a hypocrite where the family name was concerned. I always claimed I didn't want to use it, but I didn't mind if it benefited someone else’s situation, especially for Avery's sake. For the first time, I understood why my brothers were so overprotective of their women. It was an instinct. I couldn't help it. I wanted to flat-out protect her from any problems and keep her from harm.
"I see you have investors here," I said. It was an educated guess, considering two of the guys in expensive suits looked like they’d just come from Wall Street.
"Investors, huh?" Avery asked in a high-pitched voice that got the attention of everyone in the room. "Sophia and I used to work together, you know. She swindled me. Can you believe it? I didn’t get another lawyer to double-check the contract, so basically each of us was allowed to take as much money out of the business as we wanted for reinvestment or personal use. I never took one cent except the salary we agreed on. She stole close to a quarter-million dollars from the business. And the jewelry you see on display? That’s my work. My designs."
Sophia gasped. "Take that back. It's not true. I didn't steal anything." But the look on her face said otherwise.
"I have the bank statements to prove that you transferred money to yourself.” Avery looked around the room, gauging the attention of the attendees, then said, “I'm staying at the Plaza for tonight. If anyone needs more information, you can always look for me there. Make sure you have good contracts, legally soundproof and then some. Though even if you do, don’t think that she’ll respect them. She's got a talent for slipping out of any binding situations."
"I can sue you for this, you know," Sophia said.
Avery rolled her shoulders back. "Please. Be my guest."
"Get out of here." I could’ve laughed at the look on Sophia's face.
"My pleasure. I did what I came here to do. I sure as hell won't allow you to steal from anyone else." Avery kept her professional poise, which pissed Sophia off even more. It was amazing.
"Get out," Sophia said through gritted teeth.
"Don't come any closer," I warned.
"I will call the police," she threatened.
"Yes, please do. We're going to have a lovely chat with them," Avery said, shaking slightly. I could tell that, despite her calm appearance, she was seething inside, and I couldn't blame her. She glanced at me when I squeezed her arm.
"Come on, Sam. Let's go. We have a wonderful suite waiting for us."
She held her head high as we walked to the front door. Chatter broke out in the room, obvious panic setting in. Sophia was trying unsuccessfully to quiet it down.
