When Love’s In Fashion

You can read When Love’s In Fashion free below.

Blurb:

A billionaire, interracial, whirlwind romance novel. Nothing else matters more to blogger Elmira than fashion. Especially if it means that she gets worldwide recognition for her passion! When the absolutely gorgeous CEO Sven hires her to cover fashion week, she can hardly believe her luck.

And the romance that develops between them amidst the glamour of fashion week is a fairy tale come true. Yet as their love begins to blossom, Sven is now contemplating marriage. And now with her parents in the equation, Elmira’s insecurities suddenly come crashing down on her.

When they face the clash of their two very different worlds, will Elmira and Sven prove that love conquers all? Or will their differences be too much for their relationship to work? Get answers in this WMBW romance book by Cher Etan.

Chapter 1

There were twenty or thirty people gathered in a circle around Elmira. They were watching her perform her now renowned Get Me Bodied dance routine made famous by Beyonce… The dance floor was cleared for her and she strutted up and down. Her trendy boots clicked rhythmically as she swung her ample hips from side to side. Ivy Park athleisure outfit hugging her full figure faithfully. She ended the routine with a split which elicited enthusiastic applause from her devoted fans slash college mates.

As she headed to the drinks table to quench her thirst, she was accosted by no less than three frat boys; a blonde entitled sophomore, followed closely by a hopeful red head she recognized from her history of government lectures. The brothers kept their distance though; too busy chasing Becky’s tail to bother with her big round ass. She didn’t mind too much; it’s not like she wanted them. She looked around the room but no one really caught her eye. So she shrugged her shoulders, took her drink to go and left the party to do something more fun; update her blog.

In the morning she woke up, Sascha groaning in the other bed, a redhead she’d gone after earlier attached like a barnacle to her bosom.

Elmira opened her eyes blearily managing to lift her eyebrow sardonically.

“She awake?”

“Girl, I’m not awake yet.” Sascha replied.

Elmira nodded and slipped out of the room quietly, leaving Sascha to scrape the redhead off of herself and out of the house.

By the time Sascha stumbled downstairs, almost, but not quite, pushing the girl out of the door, Elmira had showered and was on her second cup of coffee.

“House is empty.” Sascha noted while tossing the number Chancy, or Candy, or Chandra, or something, had given her. She took the mug of coffee Elmira offered gratefully.

“They’re all tying up loose ends. You got sh*t to do today?”

Sascha shook her head. “One final at two, and then I’m done.”

“Yeah, I’ve got a required attendance at senior seminar. Meet you back here at five?”
Sascha nodded; dry washed her face and stumbled, in a baseball shirt and black socks, back upstairs, presumably to shower.

*****

Elmira sat in the large lecture hall reserved for all of two dozen students taking this senior seminar. The professor mumbled on and Elmira started making a list of people she needed to call.

There was polite clapping.

She looked up, eyes widening in surprise. Sitting on stage was Debbie Simpson, CFO for the Boston Consulting Group. Elmira sat up straight to listen. She knew they’d been hired by the New York Fashion Week to make suitable changes concomitant with the growth of social media. If Debbie Simpson was on campus maybe they were recruiting. This just might be her ‘in’.

 Her future on a plate.
Class let out and Elmira slung her backpack over her shoulder. She was halfway to the door when one the aides on stage with Debbie, Charlie something, called out her name. Elmira turned. “Me?”
“Hello Ms. Olivette, we’re here as a favor to professor Patel, but I would have come anyway. I’ve been following your work for a while now.”
“Wow, you really must be bored if you don’t have anything more interesting to read than a senior thesis on the impact of cultural dynamics on the clothing industry.”
Cliff laughed and Elmira immediately felt a little insecure; why was he laughing at her?

“Your blog, I’ve been following your blog.”

“Oh, yeah…who hasn’t? Look, I’ve gotta…” she gestured with her head.
Cliff’s hand remained on Elmira’s elbow.

“Have dinner with me.”

“What?”

“It’s not a date, it’s a discussion.”

“Yeah, sure. Give me your number and…”

“Tonight, six thirty, Daniel.”

Elmira shrugged. “Sure. Free food.”

“Clear priorities. I appreciate that.”

*****

 Sascha’s eyes widened at the news, which was actually a cool thing to see when it happened. With her cat eyes and this enigmatic squinty tortured girl thing she had developed in freshman year- when she found it reeled in the girls- it was a rare thing to see her eyes so round. It seemed like it was so long ago that they’d both forgotten how young and wide-eyed-innocent Sascha had looked once.

“Stop making such a big deal about it.”

“He’s taking you to ‘jacket required, French dining’ Daniel. This is a huge deal. What if he wants you to cover fashion week?!? This is like all your dreams come true in one fell swoop!”

“I think we both need to calm down and not get ahead of ourselves. We don’t know what they want with me or if this guy just wanted a date. For all you know he wants to fu*k me that’s it.”

“You and that ‘managing expectations’ thing El. You gotta live a little sometimes; dream a little.”

“Whatever. Everyone but you, me and Julius will be gone tomorrow. Did you get me a budget?”

Sascha handed her a folded and stained sheet of notebook paper.

“We’re good and leaving a lovely legacy to the next class.”

Elmira nodded. Sascha may be capricious, slightly crazy, and the stereotype of the lesbian wanting to have s*x with your bicurious girlfriend, but her numbers were never wrong.

She circled some numbers and handed the list to Julius, “Get a repair crew, a cleaning crew, and some painters in. Try to get guys who need community service time. Then we can count it towards our com-serv time. Gotta go.”

*****

Sitting in what could be considered a romantic restaurant with Cliff was a little awkward and a little annoying.

“So…” she began as Cliff looked at her expectantly.

She raised an eyebrow and finished her beer. “Why do you care about what I have to say?”

“I don’t.”

Elmira put her beer down and gave a half smile. “At least you’re honest.”
Cliff sat back.

“Your blog, ‘Fash Ho’ is well written and it boils the technical aspects of fashion down into manageable views. But you could be reviewing the new Fall TV shows for all I care. What I need are your ratings. You get between two and three million hits on new entries. People are still reading your older entries. As you know, two or three of your pieces have gone practically viral with the way they were quoted.”

“ And what? You want your own non-paying gig?”

Cliff laughed again.

 “I’ve got a paying gig. I’m in charge of creating an online presence in the ‘youth market’ he used air quotes and rolled his eyes, “for our client.”

“ And which client is that?”

“ New York Fashion Week.”

“Well slap my ass and call me Sally…”

“Yep.”

“ And what does my blog have to do with your client?” Elmira felt like her heart had stopped beating.

“We want to invite you to cover New York Fashion Week as an independent correspondent. You get to sit in the front row at all the shows, receive complimentary items from designers, backstage passes and after party access. Is that something you’d be interested in?”

Elmira sat back.