Thirty Days Is Enough
HANNAH’S POV.
I did not sleep the night before I told my team.
I laid there in the dark with Elijah’s arm draped over me, his breathing deep and even and very peaceful, and I just stared at the ceiling like it had answers written somewhere on it. The ceiling had absolutely nothing. It was just a ceiling. But my brain was everywhere at once, jumping from one thought to the next like it had somewhere urgent to be and kept refusing to settle down no matter how many times I told it to.
By the time the sun started to creep through the curtains I had made my decision. But if I was being fully honest with myself, I had already made it the day before when I told Paige she was going to have her dress. Those words had come out of my mouth before I even finished thinking them and once they were out they were out. There was no taking them back. Not that I wanted to.
I just needed to now tell my team.
Which was going to be, I realized as I sat up and looked at Elijah’s sleeping face, the interesting part.
I called the meeting for nine in the morning.
We were using the conference room at Elijah’s office building temporarily since we did not have a proper space yet and I stood at the front of the room watching everyone file in and take their seats. There were twelve of them, what was left of my core team after everything that had happened. My two remaining seamstresses, Lily and Priya. My pattern cutter, Theo, who always looked like he had not slept in three days regardless of whether he had. My fabric sourcing lead, Sandra, who was already frowning before I even opened my mouth, which was honestly just her resting face and something I had long since learned not to take personally. My junior designers, Kate and Moses, who always sat right next to each other and had a habit of finishing each other’s sentences in a way that was either adorable or slightly unsettling depending entirely on what mood I was in. And then there were the others, assistants, interns, production coordinators, all of them sitting there and looking at me with very different expressions on their faces.
Some looked hopeful. Some looked tired in the bones. Some looked like they were quietly calculating how long it would take to update their resumes.
I cleared my throat.
“Thank you all for coming,” I said, and then I just said it, no big speech or long emotional build up. Just the thing itself. “We are releasing the Mirada collection in thirty days.”
The silence that followed was the type that has an actual texture to it. You could almost touch it.
Then Theo said, very slowly, “Thirty days.”


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