by Meredith, MK
God help him. She thought the web with his name spelled in it was clever.
Another woman with a crazy halo of brown curls, and a decidedly better read on the situation, stood close by with narrowed eyes. “This doesn’t look good, Sage.”
Staring straight at him with a dreamy smile on her face, the woman called Sage whispered, “The hell it doesn’t.” Then, she snapped her mouth shut and dropped the sign.
Ignoring her own whispered statement—which Parker found all too interesting despite the warning bells clanging in his head—she stepped forward with a dreamy-eyed look on her face and thrust out her hand.
“Welcome to the The Van Buren Tribune. I’m Sage Mathews, the cartoonist and granddaughter to the late Horace Rosewater. I have such great ideas for you.” She jerked her chin in the direction of her companion. “And Alora, here, is a marketing genius. I know we can get this thing turned around.”
With a looming dread, he took her hand, surprised when she squeezed firmly. There was nothing that drove him crazier than a limp-dick handshake. But with the feel of her silky palm against his—as loudly as his brain told him to steer clear of this too-eager brunette beauty with the elevated expectations, and the never-knew-a-stranger smile—his body told him that one thing was already for certain, nothing about this woman had ever caused anything to go limp.
Which could be a problem.
The other woman stepped up, extending her hand and breaking the weird over-the-rainbow spell he’d been under. “I’m Adora...er, I mean, Alora…Kingsley.” She was so tiny, he had a hard time figuring out how she supported such a mop of curls without toppling over.
He raised a brow. “You don’t know?”
Funny, her handshake was pleasant enough but not distracting in the least. Feeling a bit more himself, he released her, enjoying the furrow in her brow.
“Not enough coffee...” She waved her hands in dismissal. “Anyway. Not important. I’m Sage’s cousin. Well, second cousin.” She looked at Sage. “How does it work?”
Sage stared at her for a second, then shook her head with a WTF look in her eyes. “I don’t know, however many cousins it works out to when my grandfather is your grandmother’s husband’s sister’s late husband…second? Third?”
He watched them in wonder over familial genetics. Until hearing the two talk, he’d never pair the long legs to heaven with the petite bohemian firecracker as cousins any day. Listening to the two blather on left no room for confusion, but his head was still spinning.
Rubbing the back of his neck, he swallowed a sigh. He had a sinking feeling Sage Mathews was going to be a much bigger problem than his grandfather any day.
If the saccharine look of hope in his welcome party’s eyes was any indication, Tiny Town just got a helluva lot more complicated.
Chapter 2
Sage paced the length of her art studio with one pencil behind her ear, a second securing her hair on the top of her head, and a third held at the ends by both hands. One of the perks of working for the paper was her super awesome corner office art studio that happened to have a fantastic view of the fire station.
Snap!
Alora jumped. “Okay, calm down.” She slid from the stool in front of Sage’s expansive drawing desk and moved to the window. “Tell me exactly what they said.”
Sage tossed the offending pencil into the trash can, pretending it was an arrogant, unoriginal, and now disappointingly sexy, Parker Edwards. “His way to save the paper is to go digital. And I have to show him around Cape Van Buren to help him get a feel for the community and the kind of events we cover. She slid onto her stool, allowing the smooth seat to calm her sizzling nerves.
She was most herself with a pencil in her hand and the scent of graphite in the air. Pulling a long sheet of drawing paper in front of her, she secured it to her desk.
“I hate to say it, but he might not be wrong,” Alora said.
Sage threw her pencil at her.
“Hey!” Alora batted it away. “You could poke my damn eye out.”
“Oh well, it’s not like you read the paper anyway.” Sage blinked rapidly, determined not to let her disappointment get the best of her. “How can you say that? You knew Grandpa Horace, and how much he loved bringing the news of our community into the homes as if we’re one big, happy family. Digitizing it will only turn it into one of the millions of generic news streetwalkers let loose on the interwebs, and we’ll simply be its pimp.” Her shoulders fell. “Not to mention, the comics aren’t the comics without the warm smell of newspaper ink and the relaxing texture of the newsprint between your fingers.”
She stared out the window lost in memories. Grandpa Horace would pat his leg every Sunday morning as soon as he saw her wild bed-head walk into the kitchen. At the table would be her orange juice in a crystal tumbler and his coffee in a favorite, Don’t bother me or you’ll end up in my newspaper mug. She’d sat on his lap until she got too big and had to sit on the chair next to him. His laugh echoed in her head, leaving a heavy weight in her chest.
“I don’t think it would work out quite like that, Sage. Maxine and the North Cove Mavens, hell the South Cove Madams too, are all on Snapchat and Instagram, and God help us all, a new mature dating sight called Kindling. It’s supposed to be all the heat but none of the assholes. They don’t got time for that.” She repeated the tag-line with a shudder.
The North Cove Mavens were a group of ladies who lived north of the Cape and sparred good-naturedly over superiority with the South Cove Madams. Something about two sisters who had lived on opposite sides of the town and the one boy who had captured both their hearts. The feud’s history was as old as the town itself. Sage didn’t know them well enough to trust they’d save anything.
“It would work out exactly like that, and you know it. As it is, half the people in this town stroll the sidewalks barely missing the lampposts because their noses are nostril-deep in their cell phones. This world’s going to hell in a handbasket.”
Alora rolled her eyes and walked over to the desk. Cocking her head to the side, she turned the comic Sage was working on to face her. “First of all, you sound like you need to join Maxine and the North Cove Mavens talking like that. And second...” She dropped her voice to the one that had accused Sage numerous times of stealing her favorite pair of earrings whenever they spent the night together at Grandie Evette’s, “What the hell is this?”
Pulling her shoulders back, Sage gave a stiff shake of her head. “Surely, I have no idea what you’re talking about. This is simply a new comic concept I’m working on.”
“It has a gorilla stomping through the Tribune building with the name tag ‘Edward’ on his chest. That’s not very subtle.”
Sage opened her mouth to defend herself but snapped it shut. The next few days had been planned out so perfectly, that was until she found out her too-sexy knight-in-shining-armor was unforgivably tarnished. During the board meeting, she’d tried to offer ideas on a proposed growth agenda, insight on advertising that she’d gleaned from Alora, and even offered her own janitorial volunteer services to help offset some of the cost until the Tribune was on solid ground again.
But all the damn silver-tops just stared at her as if they wondered who invited her to the meeting, and Mr. New York had joined them with his damn square jaw and take-your-dress-off eyes. She wasn’t stupid, the paper needed to make some changes, but if they thought digitizing the very thing that glued the community together was the answer, they were all seriously blinded by their own self-important bullshit.
Finishing out the drawing to her satisfaction, she examined it from a few different angles, then held it up for Alora to look at. “Good. I wouldn’t want the big, dumb animal to get confused.”
Alora put her arm around Sage’s shoulders. It was both supportive and judgmental at the same time. “You know…they say you catch more flies with honey than vinegar.”
“I don’t want to catch any damn flies.”
“But what about finding yo
ur long-time-coming love match in Cape Van Buren?”
Sage lifted one corner of her lip in a scowl. “Well, it certainly won’t be with Mr. Parker Edwards. I can’t abide ignorance.” She flicked her hand at the rows of glass windows that made up her office wall. “I’ll just have to keep my eyes peeled for the right fire-boy.”
Alora sucked in a breath. “Dayummmmm.”
Both ladies straightened, then leaned over the desk as far as they could. There, on the patch of groomed lawn between the station and the paper, was a firetruck getting a sponge bath.
By six of Cape Van Vuren’s finest.
They were overgrown with mounds of muscle that certainly would need a good evening rubbing and fine-chiseled features that made Sage’s lips curl into a smile with all the dream potential. She grinned. “I just need to get me one of those.”
Alora’s nod was slow and slack-jawed. “Now, I know why you don’t want the paper to digitize...with this view, ‘hot off the presses’ has a whole new meaning.”
* * *
Parker clenched his jaw to keep from saying what he really wanted to his grandfather, deciding to begin with the one word that couldn’t cause him any trouble. “Grandfather.”
“Mr. Edwards, for God’s sake. We’re at work, not the county fair.”
Parker wouldn’t be surprised if his teeth crushed under the tension radiating from his jaw. No one else was even in the damn conference room, or at the paper, for that matter. The day’s edition had been printed the evening before and sat ready to go. The decline of the The Van Buren Tribune had nothing to do with the work ethic of its employees.
It was six o’clock on Friday morning.
And business hours weren’t until eight.
But to his grandfather, business never stopped, never paused, and never ended. For anything.
Period.
So, he was there to work, which meant Parker had to be as well.
“Mr. Edwards.” He enunciated his name slowly. “I understand the board feels it’s necessary that I research the town with Miss Mathews, but I’m confident that I can handle it on my own.”
His grandfather tossed the paper he was looking over onto the long, oval table, then folded his hands in front of him. “Well, apparently they aren’t.”
“I didn’t see it that way at all. I feel they think they’re helping, but she’ll just get in the way.”
His grandfather pushed up from the table. “You do understand that you aren’t here because of me, but because of the board’s misguided loyalty to myself and Horace. I would have gone in another direction. Used someone completely clear of the family.”
The shame that always accompanied Parker’s conversations with his grandfather crawled up his back, vertebra by vertebra. “I’m sure you would have. Putting family first has never been your priority.”
Consistent with his grandfather’s true form, he gathered all of his self-righteous rage behind his blue eyes, but kept his face serene. “You will follow the board’s wishes, and that’s final. One problem. One misstep. That’s all I need to suggest we find another consultant.” The only clues he was upset were the slight shake in his deep voice, the intensity pushing from his gaze, and years of being on the receiving end of the man’s verbal lashings.
Parker snapped the back of his patent leather Italian dress shoes together and saluted the old man. “Sir, yes, sir.” Sometimes, he wondered why he even tried. He was so much like his father, there was no way his grandfather would ever really see him as anything but a constant reminder of the old man’s failings. And if Banon James Edwards I felt like he was failing, he made everyone around him pay.
Not waiting to be dismissed, Parker grabbed one of the papers from a stack on the table and headed down to the large front lobby to take advantage of the early-morning silence. It didn’t have the privacy of an office, but it was about as far from the conference room as he could get. He worked on refining his strategy of data-gathering to ensure the recommendations he made at the end of next week were not only spot-on but inspired—both satisfying to the people of Tiny Town and the board members’ budget constraints.
The sun continued to climb and, finally, he pushed back from his laptop to stretch, resting his arms along the back of the sofa. The Friday edition of the Tribune rested next to him on the pewter, herringbone-patterned cushion. He eyed the paper as if it were the cause of all his problems.
Let’s see what Tiny Town has to offer.
Spreading the paper on the coffee table before him, he devoured each page.
The usual nuptials and deaths were listed, but so were birthdays. There was no crime to speak of, unless you counted a boat-napping that was actually just a prank from some guy named Ryker Van Buren against Mitch Brennan over something that had to do with a moose.
What the hell?
Parker chuckled as he read through the story. He and his brother were friendly. They spoke on holidays, birthdays, and any time they had to sign documents pertaining to the Edwards empires, but they weren’t friends. The idea of it all was a bit over-the-top, making him yearn for the sequin-dipped sidewalks, dirty skyscrapers, and compromised dreams of New York.
But then, Sage’s hopeful smile popped into his head, and he had to shake her out.
This whole town seemed to be drunk on romance and fat on love.
He flipped the paper over to the back, finding the day’s comic along the top edge.
“Sonofabitch!”
Shoving his laptop into his bag, he grabbed the damn paper like it was a cobra ready to strike. Dropping the bag strap over his shoulder, he marched out of his new glass house.
Thanks to the local events section, he knew exactly where to find the little brat.
Down the sidewalk and around the corner was as far as he had to go. The Cape Van Buren Fire Station was having a pancake breakfast to raise funds, and one Sage Mathews was running the griddle.
With the front doors wide open, he could already hear the laughter and merriment brought on by too much sugar downed with too much caffeine. He worked his way through the crowd until he found the legs he was looking for visible behind a tall buffet table set with three portable griddles. Sage ran through the lines of pancakes like she was flipping cards at a poker table.
“Can I help you?” His field of view was suddenly blocked by a man the size of a damn lobster boat, with the name tag “Mayor Marth”. But where Parker’s size was grown fiber by fiber at the gym, this guy’s appeared to be a freak of nature, if the sheer breadth of his shoulders in the well-tailored suit were any indication.
“No, man. I’m just here to have a word with Miss Mathews.”
The guy grabbed his shoulder and steered him toward the opposite side of the large, open room. “The names Sebastian, I’m the Mayor. I hear you just got to town and met with Sage and Alora, something about saving the Tribune.”
The feisty bright-colored sprite could be seen loading pancakes onto pink and red paper plates next to Sage. He nodded. “I have.”
“Look, I only want to help, and I’m telling you…the last thing you want to do is go talk to Sage...” He waved toward Parker’s face. “With that I-wanna-kill-someone-or-something look on your ugly mug when she has her girls all around her.”
Parker studied the guy for a beat, noting both his humor and sincerity, then dipped his chin. “I appreciate it, but I also feel like if I give that woman an inch, she’ll take a mile.” Then, with a handshake and a thank you, he set off toward the sweet smell of pancake batter and the telltale scent of newspaper ink.
“You’re right, and she’ll hang you with it.” The Mayor laughed but didn’t try to warn him off again.
Parker understood. They were a small town, all the wives were friends, they all had Sunday dinners together and kid’s birthday parties, but he wasn’t from here. So, the last thing he worried about was a bunch of pretty women.
That thought completed itself as he stepped up to the buffet table, and he faced the cousins. Another woma
n—who looked more like Sage’s cousin with her long, dark hair than Harper did—joined them. How the hell did one little town have so many hotties in such a small square mile?
These fine specimens would make the ladies in New York run to check their make-up and change their clothes three more times before being seen in the same room.
“Miss Mathews, we have a problem.” He slapped the paper onto the table, noting that it would not be going back with him. Not now, when it was surely caked in batter splatter.
Sage’s eyes barely flicked toward the paper, then locked on his, and the friendly energy from yesterday was replaced by a laser-focused chocolate ray of dislike. “We most certainly do, Mr. Edwards. So, why don’t you do us a favor? Since you’re so good at fixing things, why don’t you take care of our problem and get your backstabbing ass out of our fire station?” She finished on a sweet note of sarcastic respect.
He shoved his finger onto the gorilla’s chest. “What the hell kind of game are you playing with this comic?”
She rolled her eyes. “It’s a comic, Mr. Edwards.”
He hated how she said “Mr. Edwards.” It sounded too damn much like how he said it when he was speaking to his grandfather.
Wiping her hands on a pink towel that read, if it’s too hot in the kitchen, call Cape Van Buren’s Fire Department, she leaned over the table with a very distracting display of cleavage peaking from the top edge of her apron, her tone all but dripping over the pancakes, “A comic strip’s purpose is to tell an amusing story. Big, dumb animals are amusing.”
He looked over the drawing’s big, goofy-faced gorilla with the name tag “Edward” on his chest, smashing the newspaper building. There was no mistaking the story she was telling. His grandfather would have a stroke. It was all the man needed to have Parker fired.
“You need to knock off the childish tactics. We’re supposed to be working together, in fact, you welcomed me with open arms yesterday.” Even to his own ears, his tone was rising from accusing to a hint of demanding. He cleared his throat.
