Daughter of the Alien Warrior - Honey Phillips Page 0,48
under Cassie’s eyes, and the young woman looked exhausted. For once, her daughter Angel wasn’t present.
“Is everything all right?” she asked softly.
“I don’t know,” Cassie snapped. “Have you been extending any more unwelcome dinner invitations?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know you didn’t want Sentu to come—”
“Of course you don’t know what I want!” The other woman stopped abruptly and rubbed her eyes. “Just go clean out the stockroom.”
“I did that yesterday. Maybe I can help out with the customers today?”
“What customers?” Cassie flung her arm out towards the front window, and they both watched as two Trevelorian women glanced casually in the window and kept going.
Jade bit her lip before she provided what she was sure would be unwanted advice and started straightening the shelves. One side of the store was stacked with a variety of fabrics, many of them dyed with the amazing Trevelorian dyes to create shimmering, iridescent effects in bright jewel tones. The other side held some tasteful displays of premade clothing and a comfortable seating area for clients.
As the morning wore on, only one customer entered and Cassie’s mood grew even darker. After they both watched a well-dressed matron pass by without a second look, Jade had had enough.
“Look, I know you don’t want to hear from me, but I do have a lot of experience with selling clothes.”
Cassie snorted. “On a strange planet populated by bird aliens? What good is your experience here?”
She thought back to the market on Driguera, not to mention what she had seen here on Trevelor.
“Retail is retail,” she said firmly. “You’re not getting any customers because your windows are too cluttered and your shop looks like every other shop.”
“I was doing just fine until you came along.”
“Really? Business just died off in the past few days?”
Cassie’s glare turned even fiercer, but Jade saw the betraying color high on her cheekbones.
“It’s been going down over the past couple of months,” the other woman finally admitted.
“My guess is that when you opened up, the shop was something new so people were interested—”
“And now they’re not?”
“It’s not that they’re not still interested. You have a group of regular customers, right?”
Cassie nodded.
“The problem is that you need to recreate that same excitement that was there when you opened.”
“But I’m not new anymore.”
“No, but you’re still unique.” Jade walked to the front of the store and pointed at the store window. “You’re not showing how special your clothes are with a window that looks like every other window on the street.”
“That’s what the Trevelorians want to see.”
“Maybe—from other Trevelorians. You should take advantage of the fact that you’re different.”
“What do you mean?”
“Get rid of all the clutter. Put no more than three outfits in the window and use a plain backdrop to set them off. Not all of them should be designed for Trevelorians. This town has lots of different species and seeing a variety of designs would let them know what you can do.” Cassie was still scowling so Jade softened her tone. “You’re very talented, Cassie. You just need to let people know that you have more to offer than the same outfits that anyone else could make.”
“What makes you such an expert anyway?”
“This is what I did back on Earth.”
Cassie scoffed. “Design shop windows?”
“Yes. And sewed and ran a cash register and acted as a buyer and did marketing and worked in our e-commerce division.” A reminiscent smile crossed her face. “My grandmother believed that I should know every part of the business.”
“And what was the business?”
“We have—had—a line of clothing stores. Forever a Lady was the most popular brand.”
Cassie’s mouth dropped open but before she could say anything, Inzen appeared at the back of the store with Lily in her stroller. Jade’s lips curved into a happy smile at the sight of her family—Inzen’s heated gaze reminding her of their night together and Lily waving cheerfully instead of scowling.
“Greetings, my letari,” he said, running his eyes over her with equal appreciation. “I thought perhaps we could walk to the market and pick up some lunch at the stalls.”
“That sounds wonderful.” She shot a quick look at Cassie, who was still looking stunned. “Is it all right if I leave now?”
“Yeah, okay.”
Jade could feel the other woman staring after her as they left.
“Is there something wrong?” Inzen asked.
“I hope not.”
Revealing her past had been somewhat of a gamble. There was a good chance that Cassie would reject her even more now that she knew that she was the former owner of the popular