More Than Fashion (20 page)

“Gavin, I love it.” I wanted to say more, but my throat had closed up and it was tough to get the words out. Instead, I pulled him toward me and kissed him, in full view of the other designers. “Thank you.”

“I can make others to go with it later, when this is all over, in whatever colors you want. But I’m somewhat limited while we’re on the show.”

That sounded a lot like making plans for after the show ended, which I knew we should pretend to do for the camera. I’m sure the producers and Kelsey would eat all this romantic crap up. But even if the feelings between us were starting to become real, how could we ever have a future together? We were competitors. We lived in different countries. When this was over, I’d go back to UCLA, and he’d go back to his life in London. Soon, all we’d have were memories.

I ran my fingers over the bracelet, feeling the grooves and smooth curves, watching the way the metal caught the light above us. Even though this would all be over soon, I was glad to have this to remember him. A tiny piece of him that was all mine to keep.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

W
hen Maddie tried on our look the next day, we discovered the tank top was a little crooked and the pants didn’t quite fit her in the butt. The jacket looked great, thank god, although the sleeves were a little long, which was an easy fix. But overall, the outfit was killer.

“I’m obsessed with it,” I said as I helped her take the jacket off. “I love it so much I want to have sex with it.”

“Should I be jealous?” Gavin asked.

“Probably.”

“I’m going to get a new zipper for these trousers,” he said.

I giggled. “Trousers.”

His eyebrows shot up. “Pardon?”

“No one says ‘trousers.’”

“But these
are
trousers. ‘Pants’ are underwear.” He gave me an exasperated look that was really cute, then headed for the fabric room.

Maddie grinned at me. “Wow, not only is he crazy-hot, but he has an English accent. You hit the jackpot.”

“I know. And he’s a good kisser. And he’s good at…other things, too.”

“Now I want
all
the details.”

“I’ll tell you later. Too many cameras here.” I held out my wrist. “But he made me this bracelet.”

“Ooh, pretty.” She checked it out and then studied my face. “So is this thing between you two serious?”

“I don’t know.” I busied myself pinning the sleeves on her jacket.

“I haven’t seen you this interested in a guy since…” She cocked her head and considered. “Maybe never.”

Gavin returned and dumped a bunch of metal rings on our table. “I got some more aluminium, too.” Maddie and I immediately started giggling at his pronunciation. “Bloody hell, what is it now?” He was so hot when he was annoyed. It made me want to mess with him even more.

“Alumin-i-um is not a real word,” I said. “You can’t just add a random vowel whenever you feel like it.”

“We invented the language, thank you very much. I think we get to decide what counts as a real word.”

“I’m not sure you invented it. Isn’t it derived from German or something?”

He rolled his eyes and grabbed his pliers for the chainmail. “I want my bracelet back,” he muttered, but I just laughed.

“I’m surprised they even have materials like that in the fabric room,” I said.

“I suspect they got them because of me. Yes, that sounds cocky, but during my audition, I showed them some chainmail pieces and they asked me if I would be able to do things like that on the show. I said I would, provided I had the right materials.”

Huh. Even from the beginning Gavin was being set up as one of the favorites, given special treatment that would allow him to do well. Of course, was it any different from them allowing me to work with Carla? Or bringing Jeff back for a second season? Maybe we were all given different perks so we could do our best on the show. The producers wanted us to cause drama, but they also wanted us to make interesting and unique looks that viewers would talk about long after the show was over.

The door to the design room opened, and a steady stream of guys began walking in, heading for the other teams’ tables. I stopped everything I was doing to stare. Had my wish for some male models finally been answered?

But then three guys I recognized walked in: Jared, Kyle, and Hector from Maddie’s band, Villain Complex. All three of them were wearing black and looking as good as I remembered. Maddie jumped up off her stool and kissed Jared, then smiled at the rest of her band.

“Hey, Julie.” Jared grabbed me in a hug. He wore faded black jeans and a black T-shirt with Voldemort on it that showed off his tattoos.

“Hey!” I hugged his brother Kyle next, whose dyed black hair hung in his eyes, giving him that sexy emo look, then gave Hector a smile. Hector wasn’t a hugging type, although his strong-and-silent thing had always turned me on. Not to mention, he was both a drummer and an artist, which was pretty freaking sexy. I’d been planning to hook up with him at Comic-Con, but then he’d fallen for Tara, the writer of the graphic novel he’d illustrated, and the two of them were perfect together.

“What are you doing here?” I asked them.

Before Jared could answer, Eva walked in. “Hello, designers. I’m sure you’ve noticed that you have a few more people at your table today. We want you to make a corresponding outfit for one of your client’s band members for their concert tonight. But here’s the catch: you won’t get any more money or time. You can, however, use one piece they’re currently wearing and design around that. Good luck!” She gave us a sympathetic smile at our groans and then walked out of the room.

“Bollocks,” Gavin muttered.

“So which one of you are we doing the look for?” I asked.

“Jared, definitely,” Kyle said, and Hector nodded.

“Fine with me,” Jared said, sliding a hand around Maddie’s waist. “You always look gorgeous, but I’m really digging this chainmail top on you.”

“All the credit for that to my partner, Gavin.” I introduced him to the guys in the band, and they all shook hands.

“I’ve never done menswear before, have you?” I asked Gavin.

“I’ve made a few things for myself,” he said. “I can take point on this one, if you’d like.”

I nodded, and he grabbed his sketch pad and began asking Jared questions about what he preferred to wear on stage. While they talked, I turned to Maddie and the other guys. “How’s it been going with the tour and all that?”

“It’s been great,” Maddie said, her eyes dreamy behind her glasses. “Every time I get on stage, I’m always amazed that so many people have come to watch us play.”

Kyle brushed his hair back and grinned. “We even got an offer to tour with Gold Rush Standard next summer, but Jared said the lead singer is an asshole so we turned it down.”

“Yeah, I heard from our manager he’s a cokehead and sleeps with a million girls,” Jared added.

Hector shot him a pointed look. “So, like you?”

“Hey, I’m not like that anymore! And I’ve never even tried that shit.”

“How’s Tara doing with her new job?” I asked Hector. Tara had gotten an offer to work as a writer for a new superhero TV show while at Comic-Con, which involved her moving to LA. Luckily that put her in the same city as Hector, so they could finally be together after being online friends for years.

“She’s great,” he said. “She really likes it. I can’t wait ‘til our tour is over so I can see her again.”

“I’ll have to take her shopping when I get back to LA.”

He gave me a rare smile. “I'm sure she’d like that.”

We decided to keep Jared’s faded black jeans, since making a new pair of pants (or trousers, as Gavin said) for him would take too long. Instead, we’d create a shirt made from the black fabric we were making Maddie’s pants out of, and Gavin would trim the edges with a touch of chainmail.

“Too bad we couldn’t find a way to keep your Voldemort shirt,” I said to Jared, while we took his measurements. “Can you believe Gavin has never read
Harry Potter
?”

Maddie looked horrified. “How is that possible?”

“Sorry, not sure we can be friends anymore,” Jared said to Gavin. “Nothing personal, but…”

“Don’t worry, mate. Julie already told me she’s going to give me the books when the show is over. I promise to read them immediately.”

His words instantly had an effect on the others. Jared raised one eyebrow, Hector studied me with an unreadable expression, and Kyle gave me a thumbs-up.

“Did she now?” Maddie asked with a smug grin.

Okay, they didn’t need to make such a big deal about it. I wasn’t actually going to do it. “Gavin doesn’t even know which house he’d be in,” I said, hoping to get the focus off me. “At first I thought he’d be a Slytherin, like me, but now I think he might be a Gryffindor.”

Jared gave Gavin a high-five. “Welcome to the best house, my man.”

“No way,” Kyle said, grinning. “Hufflepuff is where it’s at.”

“I’m a Ravenclaw girl,” Maddie said, then turned to Hector. “What about you?”

“I’m a Hufflepuff, too,” he said.

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me,” I said.

Later, after the band left and we were finishing up our two looks, Gavin folded a piece of paper and pushed it over to me.
Why Gryffindor now?

I considered for a moment. I’d changed my mind because he wasn’t as cunning or as arrogant as I’d originally thought. He wanted badly to win, but I didn’t think he’d stab someone in the back to do it. Me, on the other hand…well, I was firmly a Slytherin, in both the best and worst ways.

But I didn’t want to say that. So instead I wrote,
You’re daring, determined, and annoyingly chivalrous. Like a true Gryffindor.

He arched an eyebrow and scribbled back.
Is that supposed to be an insult or a compliment?

Both. Neither. Simply an observation that you’re one of the few gentlemen left in the world.

Being a gentleman never goes out of fashion
, he replied.

As long as you’re not a complete gentleman in private.

Trust me, love, you’d never know it in the bedroom.

That a promise?

Better win the challenge so you can find out.

***

Maddie and Jared walked down the runway together, and I clutched Gavin’s hand, holding my breath. Maddie looked freaking amazing, like a true rock goddess. The pants fit her perfectly, the black leather jacket was smoking hot, and the chainmail tank top hung nicely on her. This challenge meant so much to me—not just for the win, but because I wanted Maddie to look and feel great. That was the whole point of fashion. It was not only to make pretty clothes, but to make clothes that empowered the person who wore them. I wanted Maddie to wear this outfit on stage and feel confident and beautiful while she played guitar.

Jared looked hot, too, wearing his own jeans plus the new top we’d made for him with the chainmail trim. It was a perfect complement to Maddie’s look, and I could totally picture them on stage together with the rest of the band in their black clothes.

Dawn and Jeff had made a bouncy, high-low dress in white, with a bright pink underside and accents. It was cute and perfect for their young country singer Lacey, who strutted down the runway and tossed her long blond hair. Beside her, the band’s drummer wore a big white jacket with pink fringe that didn’t fit him right. It was clear neither Jeff nor Dawn had any experience in menswear.

Trina and Nika, on the other hand, hated each other so much it was a miracle the Brazen singer even had a finished outfit. Not to mention, Trina’s androgynous aesthetic and Nika’s trashy one didn’t exactly fit well together. They’d created a bodysuit that was so revealing it bordered on the obscene, then covered it up with what looked like a man’s suit jacket. The Brazen bassist wore a matching jacket over his jeans, which wasn’t nearly as bad.

All three of our teams got a brief critique, and then the judges went backstage to make their decision. With only six designers left, no one was safe, and for this challenge they didn’t tell us who was in the top or the bottom. We were all in danger of going home and we all had a chance of winning. Even though Gavin and I had nailed the challenge, I wasn’t sure they’d pick one of us as the winner. It was hard to tell what the judges would do, even with Eva judging instead of Lola. I’d been burned too many times before.

I leaned over to Gavin. “Who do you think will be sent home?”

“I’m not sure.”

“I’m worried it might be Trina.”

He squeezed my hand. “Me too. At least Eva is judging instead of Lola today.”

I nodded. Last night I’d told Gavin about my conversation with Eva, but neither of us knew what, if anything, we could do about Lola.

The judges returned only a few minutes later, making it the shortest deliberation so far. “Thank you for waiting,” Eva said. “I’m sorry I have to do this, but the designer going home…is Nika.”

I almost let out an excited squeal, but Gavin’s calm presence beside me reminded me to keep it inside. I couldn’t stop from grinning though. Nika’s drama couldn’t keep her on the show any longer, not with her questionable taste levels.

She cast daggers at the rest of us as she stomped off the runway. I gave her a little wave. Good riddance.

Eva watched her go and then turned back to us. “Gavin, you are the winner of this challenge. Congratulations!”

Gavin exhaled beside me, and I threw my arms around him. Sure, it would have been nice if I had won and gotten that $1,000, but it didn’t matter. Maddie and Jared would wear our looks at their concert tonight, and the private suite was ours.

He squeezed me back and whispered, “Are you going to join me tonight?”

“Like you even have to ask.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

I
t was late by the time Gavin got back to the Loft after his winner’s interview. The other designers were already in bed, and the place was quiet and dark. I’d been dozing on one of the sofas in the living room, but jumped up when I heard the elevator doors open. He stood inside, looking tired but so handsome it made my chest hurt.