Love Complicates Everything

Chapter 26: All Grown Up (Picture of Alena)

They hit it off quite nicely, considering Reese gushed for a straight hour about how much she adored my Aunt's designs and sense of fashion.

"Definitely red." I said nodding my head towards the swatch on the left hand side.

"Great, I was thinking the same thing." Reese grinned as she spun on her heel and walked out. "Looks like we're going with the red guys!" She shouted out to the team.

My office phone began ringing while I composed a memo on the computer. "Hello?" I answered hitting the intercom button.

"Ms. Debevoise, you have a call on line one." Tessa the receptionist's voice chirped out on speaker. "Want me to take a message?"

"No, it's fine Tessa. I'll get it, thanks." I said while looking down at the alien phone in front of me. All these damn buttons, why did it have to be so high tech?

"Good afternoon, Elisha Stapleton Designs." I prattled off, while my fingers continued typing.

"Hey beautiful, busy?" His sexy voice came through the receiver.

"A little, what's up?" I asked with a smile. My baby's voice always managed to bring a smile to my face.

"I figured since I was in the neighborhood, maybe we could have lunch?" Zac's voice sounded hopeful.

My lips pulled themselves into an automatic pout. "I'd love to go to lunch, but I can't. I just got here Zachy, I really have alot to do."

"I know, that's why I figured I'd bring lunch to you." Zac's voice suddenly sounded louder as he appeared in the doorway to my office, disconnecting the call from his cell phone.

He held up a shopping bag with a grin. "Got your favorite....Thai food." Zac winked playfully at me.

I looked up and couldn't help as the cheesiest smile tugged at my lips. Dammit he looked mighty fine in his navy blue suit! So friggin hot, I thought biting down on my bottom lip.

"So our Moms are drilling me with when we plan on getting married and how soon afterwards they can expect grandkids." Zac muttered while taking a drink of his soda.

I choked on a forkful of pad thai that I was busy shoveling into my mouth. "Grandkids, wh-what?!?" I coughed slapping at my chest to make the food go down.

We weren't even married yet and they were already expecting grandkids?!? What're our moms nuts?

"You ok?" Zac just started laughing at me as he reached over and patted my back in a soothing manner. "Don't worry beautiful, I told them not to expect any grandkids for at least another five years."

I smiled at him with an awkward cringe, five years...ten maybe. I know Zac wanted to get married and soon, but I just wasn't up to planning a wedding until after graduation. There was way too much on my plate right now, I needed things to settle down a bit.

Looking down at his watch, Zac stood up quickly and threw his container in the trash can. "I have to get going, case starts in a half hour."

I stood up and placed my half eaten container on my desk, walking over to Zac I threw my arms around his shoulders. "Thanks for lunch baby, you're the best."

"No problem." He grinned leaning down to peck me gently on the lips. "Don't forget dinner's at seven tonight." He reminded as he kissed me again and pulled away. "Try and enjoy the rest of your day, love you."

"Love you too." I called out after him, my attention turned back to my delicious food.

The gang decided to meet up for dinner tonight to hang out and catch up on everything. I was excited for two reasons.

One being Gemma and Alex were coming up to join us for dinner, it feels like forever since I last saw them. The second reason is we finally get to meet Alena, the girl Chad's been dating for the past two weeks.

I've heard great things about her, her family is from Russia...she's the youngest out of five children. She's a hostess at a restaurant where Chad and Zac go for lunch with clients.

I haven't seen Chad this happy over a girl...ever. In case you haven't noticed, Chad and Aiden aren't really the dating/relationship kind of guys. They're more into living their lives and having their fun.

Things seem to be pretty serious between them and it's only been two weeks, soooo only time will tell. Regardless, I'm excited to a new edition to our little group...we need more girls!

"I'd say things went pretty darn great today, wouldn't you?" Reese shrieked excitedly while walking next to me. We just finished locking up and were on our way to Becco's an Italian Restaurant.

"Things were perfect." I agreed with a smile. "Who knew we'd have so much fun and get paid for it, huh?"

"I know right?" Reese had a slight skip in her step and her voice was extremely chipper as usual. "Hey have you heard from Hunter? I haven't seen him around campus."

Nodding my head, I glanced over at her. We were speed walking over to the restaurant. We were supposed to be there at seven.

It's now seven thirty, Reese and I got caught up having too much fun choosing designs for the upcoming fashion show. We thought it'd be a good idea to have a show to debut some of our designs!

If it wasn't for Zac's text message asking where we were...I'm sure we'd still be sitting in my office working away.

"Yea, we met up for coffee last week. All his classes are on the opposite end of campus this semester, that's why we haven't seen him around." I said looking up, realizing we arrived at the restaurant.

Seated at the table were Aiden, AJ, Gemma, Alex and Zac. It seemed the group was still waiting on Chad and Alena to arrive...see so we weren't the last ones to arrive!

After a few minutes, Chad walked in with a gorgeous blond on his arm. She seemed a bit shy and timid at first, but as dinner passed on...the three of us girls broke her in.

"Alena, do you think you'd be interested in being a model at our fashion show? It'll be held in about a month." I already asked Gemma and she agreed excitedly.

"A model at your fashion show?" She asked curiously with bright green eyes.

"Oh, we forgot to mention...her Aunt is Elisha Stapleton. We're having a show to promote the grand opening of the New York location." Reese grinned sipping on her wine. "Kaila's the boss, I work there too!"

Alena's eyes widened as he mouth opened a bit in shock. "I'd be honored to be a model. This shirt I'm wearing is one of your Aunt's designs!"

The four of us were laughing and talking about everything, while the guys were preoccupied yapping about sports. I felt as though I was being watched, glancing over I noticed Chad observing us with interest.

I nodded my head discreetly and gave him a wink, he was looking for my seal of approval. That was my little way of telling him, Alena would fit in just fine with us and that I approved of her one hundred and fifty percent. 

Yay! A new edition to our group, now our next mission was to find Aiden a nice girl and then we'd be all set!