A Dress to Die For Read Online Free PDF Page A

gathering up her paperwork and an armful of samples. Heidi’s real name was some unpronounceable Romanian word that sounded something like Heidi if you were a three-year-old trying to say the name while swallowing oatmeal.
    Three months previous, Rolf Wente had chained three girls to a boiler in a Washington Heights basement with the intent of turning them into high-class prostitutes. He’d gotten them into the country using Sartorial’s old backer as a shell, as the backer had also invested in Thomasina’s foundation for young Eastern European girls. The upshot was that Rolf had connected the dots: The girls’ papers said they were employed by Laura, and if she denied they worked for her, they’d be deported. So Laura got them hired. Heidi had a little patternmaking and sewing she’d learned from her grandmother. All of her experience was nearly useless, but she had a good attitude, spoke English, and soaked up information like a sponge. Thus, she became a technical designer for Saint JJ and Sartorial imports. Tracy had a knack for people, so she filled a human resources opening, and Julia could draw, so she ended up in the design room.
    “Thanks, Kelly,” Laura said. Then she said to Heidi, “April deliveries go out first so Jeremy and Ruby can see it in Hong Kong.”
    Heidi nodded and took off, attacking her job like a cat on a bird. Laura liked that attitude more than any actual task Heidi performed.
    Laura asked Ruby, “Do you need anything from me?”
    “No.” Ruby didn’t look up from picking at her nail polish.
    “You look like you have the sads.”
    Ruby was having trouble moving on from Thomasina’s death, as they had been lovers in the six months previous. Laura hadn’t known until Thomasina was dead, but once she caught up to it, she became the source of her sister’s comfort.
    “Little bit,” Ruby said. “It gets less and less.”
    “You okay to go to China?”
    “I’m fine. It’s just Hong Kong. Easy. And Jeremy’s taking off for the mainland almost right after, so he won’t be breathing down my neck.”
    Laura didn’t worry about Ruby and Jeremy in the same plane, hotel, or country. They’d both been clear in their own way that there was no interest. Ruby, for her part, was thrilled Laura had a boyfriend, and in their first conversation about him, Ruby had been crystal clear on how she had no interest in attempting to steal Jeremy, as she had Laura’s previous boyfriends.
    “Wait, wait, wait,” Ruby had said over lunch at Valerie’s. They’d gotten the Marc Jacobs table, but the name had faded behind the other names scratched and drawn on the surface. “He slept with you, then surprise, next morning, he’s our backer? That’s how he did it?”
    “And the job offer was part of it. I’m partnered with him on JSJ.”
    “And what? It was an all or nothing deal?” Ruby twirled her linguini as if they were discussing shoes.
    “I can get out of any of them, really.”
    “So you want to work with him on his stupid line?”
    “It’s not stupid.”
    “And you want him to back Sartorial?”
    “Yes.”
    “And you actually want to continue having sex with him?”
    “Abso-freaking-lutely.”
    “Gross.” Ruby held up her hand as if blocking the thoughts coming from Laura’s head. “So he’s your lover now. You can’t tell me that if you two break up, Sartorial won’t be affected.”
    Laura’s face had tingled when Ruby said “lover,” an expression her sister had picked up after switching to breaking the hearts of women, rather than men. It seemed like such an old-fashioned word, but “boyfriend” was infantile, and she could think of no other options.
    “It’s just a job.” Laura leaned forward. “We can use 40th Street, Rubes. The floor’s mostly ours. We’re not getting anything better than that.”
    “Do I have to work for him?”
    “No and yes. He’s our backer, so we’re responsible for making him money. If we don’t, he’s stepping in. Same as