The Princess And The Criminal

4

NOAH

I adjusted the halter crop top I was wearing. Viper Smith, my boss, had sent it over the weekend.

Viper claimed everyone in her business had to be fashionable. But the fashionable she meant was her clothing line.

Most of the employees were sent clothes every month. Since I was her personal assistant I received them every week. Usually two tops and a skirt or dress or pants or shorts.

The pencil skirt she had sent with the top matched, surprisingly. But one thing I had learnt since I started working for Viper was to never question her sense of fashion.

"And the models will arrive in two hours."

I nodded and tapped away on my ipad screen, moving meetings that could wait to create time for the models.

I loved my job. My dad thought Viper was a cunning snake, which she kinda was. But that cunning had gotten her brand where it was. Although it had also made her family hate her.

I glanced at her step son. He was... annoying. He was as young as the youngest Brun, just completing high school.

Since Shepherd had mandatory weekends with his mom he and Jo had a connection. Sure, Shepherd thought Jo had a stick up his ass, which he kinda did, but Viper loved him like he was one of her sons... and he loved her too, just not in the way he was supposed to.

He had watched way too much stepson, stepmom porn.

And this brings me to the point. Viper knew very well that her stepson was literally in love with her, and she used to exploit her husband at every turn.

There was no one more calculating than Viper. Sometimes I admired her for it, other times I remembered what a terrible mother she was.

"Send him away." Viper whisper in my ear and glanced at Jo. I didn't want to even breathe the same air at the kid, but it was literally my job to do as Viper said.

"Hey Noah." He smiled in a way that may have been cute if I didn't know the disgusting things that ran through his head.

"Could you return early? Some models are coming over and Viper would love if you could help set up."

If he had a properly working brain he would have known we were trying to get rid of him. But Jo was as perverted as he was dumb.

"Sure, anything for my mom."

I winced when I turned back.

Viper sighed in relief when he left and waved over the tailor pinning cloth on a mannequin. "That pinning is creating the wrong folds at the arms."

The tailor smiled strained and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. "Mrs Smith, the sketch you gave is exactly what is being emulated."

Viper frowned and walked around the mannequin. She hummed. "Release the pins on the shoulder, perhaps that could work. We'll need a mock on a model to see if it works in a practical sense."

I couldn't help but smile as I watched Viper work. When she got lost in designing she looked inspirational, angelic maybe.

Sawyer had once said when she was sewing she was a goddess.

I frowned. Why was I thinking of Sawyer. Of course I thought of Sawyer, almost every day. But since she'd been released it had become so much worse. I missed her, five years of no contact was a lot of course. No contact I had initiated, but I still missed her. Her lean muscles, her half smile. Her pixie cut. I wondered if she still looked the same.