by L. L. Muir
KISS THIS
By L.L. Muir
AMAZON KDP EDITION
PUBLISHED BY
Lesli Muir Lytle
www.llmuir.weebly.com
KISS THIS © 2013 L.Lytle
All rights reserved
Amazon KDP Edition License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. The ebook contained herein constitutes a copyrighted work and may not be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or stored in or introduced into an information storage and retrieval system in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the copyright owner, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and reviews. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
This ebook is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
ALSO BY L.L. Muir
Christmas Kiss
Blood for Ink
Bones for Bread
Lord Fool to the Rescue
Ruffles and Rawhide
Going Back for Romeo
Not Without Juliet
Wicked
Somewhere Over the Freaking Rainbow
Where to Pee on a Pirate Ship
DEDICATION
For my florist friends
and floral designers everwhere…
who put their own lives on hold
day after day
year after year,
to help make the most important days
in strangers’ lives
beautiful.
CHAPTER ONE
“No problem,” Mallory said into the phone, hoping her smile showed in her voice. “Talk to you soon.” After she hung up, she screamed.
London poked her head through the office door, not nearly as concerned as she should have been. But then again, she had a ribbon tucked in her teeth while her hands were occupied taping a corsage together. Wedding orders took precedence over everything, even disasters.
“What now?” she asked. Or at least, Mallory thought that’s what she’d asked.
Mal took a deep breath and leaned her chair back, then brought her hands behind her head. She wasn’t relaxing, just stretching before she had to get back out there to the design room and help with the rest of the corsages and boutonnieres. It was going to be a wicked long night, especially since she would now have to pause every five minutes to kick herself in the butt.
“You know how I told you I wasn’t going to pay the helicopter retainer until I had another check from Pemberly Adams?”
“Uh, oh.”
“Yeah. Well, I paid that today. It was either pay it or let it go to someone who wanted to heli ski the day of the wedding. There’s not another chopper available in Utah, so you can’t really blame me. Leaving the reception in a helicopter was the first thing on Pemberly’s dream list.”
London let the corsage unravel and took the bow from her teeth. “And now they’ve cancelled?”
Mal knew just what London was thinking. Eating a thousand dollar helicopter retainer would mean they’d make even less on their biggest wedding of the winter season, and they needed every penny if they were going to move to the new location before Valentine’s Day. But the move would happen only if they made enough profit by the 17th of December. If they didn’t, their business would disappear in a cloud of dust—the charming little house their business currently occupied had a date with a wrecking ball at the end of January.
If they weren’t re-established by Valentine’s Day, they’d be through.
“Please say she didn’t cancel,” London said. “I’ll give you twenty bucks to tell me she didn’t cancel.”
Mal smiled. “She didn’t cancel.”
“Liar! She cancelled!”
“No. She didn’t. At least, not yet anyway.”
London sighed and put the bow back between her teeth, then started twisting the corsage again. “Okay, good. So what do we do to make sure she doesn’t?”
That’s why Mal loved her business partner. London didn’t dwell on bad news. She just brushed it off and moved on to the solution. It was an excellent talent to have when you’re an event coordinator-slash-florist. Events never went down as planned. The trick, in the end, was to make it look like they had.
“You know how her big brother is supposed to be paying for the wedding?”
“Yeah,” London said between gritted teeth.
“Well, apparently he’s going to come down to chat about the order—”
“Damn!” Her partner’s head dropped back for some major groaning. “Who knows how much he’ll want to cancel?” It had already been a long day and London’s unnaturally blond hair tumbled out of the back of her clip. Each time she groaned, a little more fell out.
“Pemberly didn’t say that. She just said that we need to...sell him on everything.”
London took the wired bow from her mouth and added it to the corsage, her fingers flying. “Great. He’s probably going to cancel half the order. Too bad he didn’t wait until Monday to call. He would have missed the deadline for changes.”
“I know, right? He’s coming down tomorrow. So... If you want me to do the set up for the Crowshaw wedding—”
“Oh, hell no. That wedding’s mine. I’m going to set it up, and you can entertain Big Brother.” London smiled. “It might help if you wear something tight.”
Mal snorted. She’d do no such thing and London knew it. She stood and stretched one more time and headed out of the office. Tomorrow’s disaster would have to wait for tomorrow. Big Brother hadn’t ruined their lives yet.
Too bad it was totally in his power to do it.
~ ~ ~
Mallory hadn’t slept more than an hour. They’d worked on the Crowshaw wedding until two in the morning, until they were moving like snails. That’s when it had been decided, they’d be more productive by coming in early. But she hadn’t been able to unwind enough to sleep, which left her in a daze. She was just going to have to hope for a reasonable conversation with Big Brother, then close up shop early and go home, hang a sign on the window blaming it all on the wedding job. She could hear her bed calling her already.
At 10:30 a.m., London headed out the door with the tool kit loaded with knives, pruners, wire and tape—everything a floral designer would need to bend the world to her will. The vans were already loaded with the blue and white wedding, along with the rest of the employees. There wouldn’t be a lot of set up, but there would be a hundred little trips to unload, since there were seven pieces for each table collection and about fifty more with which to decorate the country club.
Mal jumped when London stuck her head back through the doorway. Her pale hair was already trying to escape the clip on the back of her head. But the florist wouldn’t need to look perfect—only the flowers.
London cleared her throat. “I know...that you know...how badly we need to make money on the Adams wedding. So I won’t remind you. I’ll just say good luck and hope that you will remember that the customer is not necessarily always right. Not when it’s not his wedding. Don’t let him change Pemberly’s vision, Mal. Even if we don’t make more than gas money, even if it ruins us, don’t let him ruin it for her. And... And try not to lose your temper.”
&n
bsp; Then she was gone.
London was right. They’d dedicated their careers to making sure brides got prettier weddings than they ever dreamed of—or at least as close as possible—while helping them stay within their budgets. Most of the time, she and London were able to blow a bride’s mind with their originality.
Of course, when Bridezillas came through their door, they got exactly what they asked for—too bad they asked for some pretty scary stuff.
But every once in a while, a mother, or a mother in law, would try to make the wedding everything they’d dreamed for their sons or daughters. It was Mal and London’s job to stick up for the wedding couple. They’d never before needed to give an attitude adjustment to a brother, however. Too bad she didn’t have a shovel to do it with.
If there had been a breakdown in communication and the guy really couldn’t afford as much as Pemberly had ordered, they would just make the best of what budget they were given. She and London weren’t the type of women who could enjoy a hard-earned buck if it meant making that buck from someone who didn’t have it. And they could never enjoy the new roof over their heads if they’d had to gouge customers to get it.
She was a reasonable person, at least most of the time, so why would London worry about her losing her temper? She was a professional. She was going to negotiate a contract, not debate politics.
The work room was a mess. They’d been designing since seven o’clock and hadn’t had time to worry about where the stems landed. It looked like someone had picked up the giant boxes they used for garbage cans and dumped it all out on the floor again. There were stems and foliage a few inches deep. Every step made a crunch.
Mal couldn’t see the broom, so she grabbed two sturdy dustpans and started scooping. Most of it was too heavy for a broom to move anyway. There’d been five hundred extra-long Columbian roses and most of those stems had been cut off. If she wasn’t careful, she’d end up getting her fingers stabbed with thorns the size of nickels.
She was bent over with her butt in the air when a man cleared his throat. She laughed and stood up, then tossed the dustpans on the huge worktable in the center of the room.
“Sorry about that. Welcome to Ivy and Stone. What can I do for you?” She struggled to keep the words coming since her jaw was trying so hard to hit the floor. Her new customer was tall, intense, and gorgeous and dressed like James Bond. Too bad he was probably there to order flowers for his girlfriend. Or his wife.
“I have an appointment with the owner, Mallory Mayhue, I believe.”
Heaven help her, he even had a British accent, and his voice was smooth dark chocolate—the kind that’s so expensive that it’s bad manners to talk about the cost. And the way he’d said Mayhue, with an emphasis on the hue, made a nice deep breath necessary.
Appointment?
Mal’s stomach dropped. She looked at the clock. He was twenty minutes early. And he was being way too formal. She didn’t do formal, so she slipped into her make everyone comfortable mode and held out her hand.
“I’m Mallory. You must be Pemberly’s brother.”
The way he looked down his nose at her hand had nothing to do with the fact that she stood in a room that was lower by two steps from the rest of the old house. He just leaned against the archway and never took his own hands out of his 007 pockets. Then he looked back at her face like he really wanted to say, “Are you out of your mind?” But he held his tongue.
She looked at her hand. It was covered with green smears and dead leaf slime. A few dirty fingernails made it look like she’d been digging up flower beds. No wonder.
“Oh, my gosh. I’m so sorry. I’ve just been—”
“Scooping debris. Yes. I bore witness.” He stared her down, not blinking, not smiling.
How can you say a word like scooping without smiling?
Scooping.
Well, maybe if he felt the need to call garbage debris, he didn’t smile easily.
“Yeah. Well. We had a big wedding today and it was more important to get it all there on time than to stop and clean up.”
Why am I explaining myself to him?
“Shall I come back after you’ve...” With his chin, he gestured to the mess.
What an ass hat!
She should have said, “Sure, come back later.” It would make it less convenient for him. But she was afraid she’d just get pissed off in the interim. She did not have a temper problem, but she was tired and grumpy and she’d probably blow his little insults way out of proportion before he came back again. Besides, she would have better luck negotiating if she could just swallow her pride a little. Surely, she could bite her tongue and smile for half an hour.
“Oh, no,” she said sweetly. “This mess can wait. If you’ll just go into my office, through the blue door there, I’ll wash my hands.”
He looked down at her pale apron of green and white stripes, then gave her another blank look. His blue eyes were intense, assessing. Just what in the hell was he expecting?
She resisted the urge to look down and refused to make any more apologies. He finally shrugged and turned toward the office. She tried not to appreciate the way he walked away.
The apron looked worse than her hands, just like she knew it would, but she was going to leave it on. She wasn’t going to admit that he’d made her uncomfortable. If there were stray stems in her hair, they’d stay too.
“Ass hat,” she said under her breath and headed to the sink.
Big Brother started coughing. He’d probably found a little dust on his chair, poor thing.
~ ~ ~
People always seemed to expect a designer to live in beautifully decorated rooms, but few did. When you create gorgeous things all day, you really can’t wait to get them out of your face. And Mal’s problem was, if she looked at an arrangement of flowers, or even furniture, long enough, she’d always see something that needed to be changed. If there was a flower in her office, it was artificial and in a box, on hold for some order.
No. She saved her creative juices for decorating the show room. Her office was a haven away from all that stimulation. That was, until Big Brother sat down behind her desk. He was all the stimulation—er, decoration—a room needed. If he could just keep his lips shut, he’d make a lovely permanent fixture. But it was just as well. The building was going to be flattened soon anyway.
“So, would you like to go over each line item first,” she asked as she walked into the room, fiddling with her floral knife. The little red handle tapped between her pinkie and her thigh while she tried to cover her shock once again. “Or would you like me to show you some pictures and explain what we’ll be trying to do for your sister?”
He’d moved the extra chair around, behind the desk. For her, presumably, since he sat in her nice leather chair, like he was Bloody Chairman of the Board or something. He probably thought she needed his business too badly to complain about it.
And he’d be right.
Or maybe he thought she’d be thrilled to sit beside him while they went over the order. If he hadn’t been such a snob, she probably would have. Either way, she wasn’t going to suck up. Mallory Mayhue sucked up to no one. And she wouldn’t pretend she hadn’t noticed his little maneuver. She wouldn’t say anything, but she wasn’t about to take the empty seat either.
She walked around the desk, then backed up and lifted her butt onto her half, before putting her shoes on the seat of the crappy chair. Then she gave him a big smile.
Let him be uncomfortable this time.
He pointed to her stem-smeared tennis shoes. “Wouldn’t you prefer to sit?”
She lifted an innocent brow. “I am sitting, but thank you.”
He cocked his head. “Right.” His eyes were an amazing shade of ice. They were absolutely mesmerizing. “First, let me say that you’re charging an exorbitant sum if you merely plan to try to do something for my step-sister.”
That phrase, “I’ve never been so insulted in my life,” seemed pretty inadequate to describe Ma
llory’s emotions after never having been so insulted in her life. And the snob thought he was going to get away with it.
He opened a thin valise and slipped out a copy of the order/contract. She reached around and picked up the file she’d already pulled from the drawer preparing for the appointment. She took out her copy and set the file down. Normally, she would have picked up a pen, too, but she realized she’d sat on it.
“You’ll need a pen,” he said. The edge of his lips twitched. She had to give him credit for not actually looking at her butt. They both knew the pen was under it.
She looked around the small area of desk not covered by her derriere, praying there would be another one. She found a green lid that luckily was still attached to a pen from the bank.
She gave herself a mental high five and smiled at the ass hat.
“Your move,” she said, narrowing her eyes a little.
He cocked his head, then seemed to appreciate the fact that they were about to play a game of chess. He’d already made his opening gambit when he’d insulted her, but she’d make him pay for that later. For now, she wanted him to believe her on the defensive.
“Line item number one,” he read aloud in that sexy accent. “Linens.”
Mal reached for the folder again, pulled out the sketches that showed where every table and every linen would be placed. But when she opened her mouth to speak, he cut her off.
“I have no issue with the number of linens ordered. Black seems appropriate, but I do have an issue with the color electric lime. This is to be an elegant affair, Ms. Mayhue, not an event at Disneyland.”
Okay. That was it. She couldn’t bite her tongue or pretend to be polite any longer. But she did take just a second to search for a professional way of telling him he was S.O.L. When nothing came to mind, she snorted. Then she laughed. Then she laughed so hard she lost her balance on the corner of the desk and fell off it.
