Given the firm’s struggles, she knew they must have thought it odd when a few months earlier she had hired Jules. Her yoga instructor. Jules wasn’t tasked with any significant responsibilities. Managing the office, ordering pens and Post-its and other supplies, doing errands. She was good at her job, and things did seem to work more smoothly with her around. The agents were happy they no longer had to run out for their own coffee. They weren’t complaining. Certainly not to Claudine directly. Never. In private, though, they probably assumed that Jules’s hiring had more to do with the one-on-one midday yoga sessions she gave to Claudine in the smaller conference room that was never used. The staff knew their boss well, taking Jules off the market assured her the best personal trainer in town. She didn’t like to share.

At least they knew one of their bosses. Henry, on the other hand, not so much. Claudine knew they saw him as an enigmatic artist—nice enough but shy, introverted, a bit socially awkward. Their jobs called for little interaction with him. Recently he remodeled the office, putting his office on the other side of the space from Claudine’s. Sometimes the agents could go an entire day without seeing him. Since he’d come back from his health scare and grown even more withdrawn, they were giving him a wider berth than usual.

Except for Jules. She and Henry had a connection. In the weeks prior to the hospital and the Flynn deal imploding, she had been staying at the office late, helping him with paperwork for the project. Claudine was surprised. Jules didn’t seem like Henry’s type—the antithesis of herself. Sweet, smiley, and zero style. She wouldn’t deny she had a slight twinge of jealousy, even though Henry was certainly within his right to stray, what with her and Steve. She knew he wouldn’t. He preferred his self-pity and self-righteousness to a fleeting office tryst. And Claudine was glad for that, because that self-loathing was what made his work so damn good. His designs were fueled by those feelings. The worse he felt, the more attention to detail there was. It was the only thing that offered him an outlet. An escape. Especially after he gave up drinking. Now, since the hospital, it didn’t. He wasn’t able to work at all. And so, more than feeling jealousy toward his connection to Jules, Claudine felt relief that Henry had a new distraction. A harmless flirtation to keep him from spiraling too deeply into whatever was going on in that brilliant head of his. But he was off. What was he thinking, just that morning talking about leaving Aspen for good? It was foolish. And on this day of all days, with Zara in town and the fate of the company at stake.