Until Mani

by Paige, Rochelle

  Talk about a perfect answer. “Wow.”

  “How about we try this again?” I nodded quickly and enjoyed the satisfied grin he flashed me. “Would you like to meet up with me in the morning for breakfast?”

  “Why breakfast?” It was an odd choice for a first date—assuming tonight didn’t count as one—which was why I’d misunderstood his intentions.

  “You’re going to make me explain before you’ll give me an answer, aren’t you?”

  “Only if you want me to agree,” I quipped with a smile, I lifted up the bag filled with to-go boxes and gently shook it back and forth. “Otherwise, I’ll be on my way and taking the sweets with me.”

  “Then I guess I’ll just have to promise you as many desserts as you want so I can make sure you keep coming back.” He laced his fingers through mine and started to lead me towards Jayce’s car. “And in the hope that you’ll meet me for breakfast tomorrow, I’ll explain that my work schedule means we’ll have to get creative with our dates. The restaurant is open Tuesday through Sunday. I normally come in at noon, and I don’t leave until around eleven on weekdays and not until after midnight on the weekends.”

  Those were some serious work hours. His suggestion suddenly didn’t seem as odd as it did before. “So breakfast is pretty much your only option for dates?”

  “Unless I’m willing to wait until Monday, which I’m not okay with”—he gave my hand a gentle squeeze—“it’s either that or we meet up here whenever you’re available. That works for me as long as you don’t mind my staff staring at us the whole time.”

  I slowed my steps as we got closer to Jayce’s car. He had his hands full getting Lyla buckled into the passenger seat, so I had a little more time to wrap up my conversation with Mani. “Your employees like to be nosy when they see you with a date?”

  “It’s more like they’re going to be shocked to see me on a date,” he chuckled.

  I took him in from head to toe again and shook my head in disbelief. “How is that even possible? A guy like you can date pretty much anyone he wants.”

  “Ah, but I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone capable of distracting me from the restaurant”—his thumb slid against my palm, sending shivers down my spine—“until you.”

  Another perfect answer. I rose up on my toes and brushed my lips across his cheek. “That earned you breakfast with me tomorrow.”

  Chapter 5

  Mani

  Most mornings, I had to drag my ass out of bed and hunt down a pot full of coffee to get moving. Today wasn’t most days, though. The promise of time with Vivi had me rolling out of bed before my alarm went off. The sun was just starting to stream through my windows as it rose in the sky, but that didn’t stop me from fucking whistling on my way to the shower. I was more excited than I’d been about anything in years, and I owed it all to meeting Vivi last night.

  My anticipation turned out to be good for the restaurant, too. I channeled my unusual burst of morning energy into getting some work done after I finished getting ready. During the two hours until it was time to head out to meet Vivi, I accomplished more than I did when I was in the office most afternoons.

  The head start on my day had an added bonus—I didn’t need to rush my date with Vivi to get into the restaurant. I was more than willing to get up at the ass crack of dawn every morning if it meant I got extra time with her. She was my boom, which made her worth whatever effort it took to claim her as mine. I finally understood what James Mayson had meant about earning all the brownie points even if you didn’t need them.

  If I had any doubt in my mind about who Vivi was to me—which I didn’t—it would’ve been obliterated when I spotted her standing outside the family-owned diner in town where all of the locals went for breakfast. Wearing jeans, a loose fitting sweater, and sneakers, she looked just as beautiful as she had last night in her little black dress and heels.

  “Morning, sweetheart.” I brushed my lips over hers, barely resisting the temptation to slide my tongue inside when they parted on a surprised gasp. Her pretty blue eyes went wide at my greeting, and she let out a little snort of disbelief that made me chuckle. “You didn’t think I’d be put off because you didn’t get dressed up for our date, did you?”

  “Maybe,” she grumbled with a little pout.

  “Sorry, but you’re not going to be able to get rid of me that easily.” More like not at all, but I didn’t think that was something she needed to hear right at that moment. Not until I figured out what had made her so skittish in the first place. The last thing I wanted was to send her running in the opposite direction.

  Her attempt to play down her looks didn’t do much good. I was still able to stare at her ass as Connie, the waitress who’d worked at the diner for as long as I’d been coming there, led us to a back corner booth. And when she scooted into the booth, her sweater dropped off her shoulder and revealed a lacy pink bra strap. I lifted the material back in place as I slid in next to her, savoring the feel of her soft skin.

  “Thanks.” She glanced up at Connie, who was grinning at us, and her cheeks turned pink.

  “Coffee?” Connie’s question was aimed at Vivi since she already knew that’s what I wanted. When she got a nod in response, she tapped the menus in the holder on the table. “I’ll be back in a few with a couple of carafes since I know how greedy this one can be with his caffeine in the morning.”

  Since it was nine o’clock on a weekday morning, we had the diner mostly to ourselves while everyone else had already finished their breakfasts and headed to work. There were a couple of old-timers at the counter, and a few women with young children in a large booth on the other side of the room. But other than that, it was just the waitress and us. It was a big part of why I liked stopping into the diner for coffee and a bite to eat a few mornings each week before I headed across town to Bryson’s. It also didn’t hurt that Connie let me order off-menu whenever I wanted.

  I handed a menu to Vivi. “Their omelets and waffles are exceptional, but my favorite is a breakfast sandwich I talked Jerry into making one morning a couple of years ago. Now he lets me keep goat cheese in his fridge because he knows I’m going to order that sandwich nine times out of ten when I come in for breakfast.”

  Vivi looked up from her perusal of the menu to ask, “Jerry?”

  “Jerry owns the place. He’s a whiz when in the kitchen when it comes to breakfast.”

  “I bet that’s high praise coming from you since you’re a chef with a successful restaurant.” She wrinkled her nose. “But goat cheese on a breakfast sandwich?”

  “Hey, don’t knock it ‘til you try it. You ended up loving my portabella mushroom stacks last night, and they had goat cheese on them,” I reminded her.

  “Hmm.” She tapped the menu and smiled. “You might be right about the goat cheese then. Those were one of my favorites, along with the steak bites.”

  “Don’t tell Jerry I ratted him out, but he’s been known to dip into Mani’s stash of goat cheese a time or two,” Connie confessed as she set our carafe of coffee on the table.

  “See?” I flashed Vivi a big grin. “It took me a while, but I managed to convert Jerry into a fan of my favorite breakfast sandwich. For all we know, he might even add them to the menu.”

  “I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for that to happen,” Connie advised. “But since it’s only Wednesday, I’m willing to bet there’s enough goat cheese for Jerry to make up two orders if your girl would like to try it.”

  Your girl. Damn, I loved that description. Vivi’s cheeks filled with pink again, but she didn’t correct Connie. I loved that even more.

  Vivi put the menu back in the holder and smiled up at Connie. “I think I’ll go with a waffle instead.”

  “Do you want berries or whipped cream on top?”

  “Both please.”

  I grinned at Vivi’s answer as Connie nodded and walked away. “Remind me to make you my world-famous triple chocolate Belgian waffles sometime.”

  “As a
chocoholic who loves waffles, that sounds amazing.” Vivi poured herself a cup of coffee and stirred in some sugar and creamer before leaning against the back of the booth. “But you talking about the future so casually means I have to ask...what exactly are we doing here, Mani?”

  I cocked my head to the side, confused by her question. “I’m not sure what you mean?”

  “Dear Lord, even your cluelessness makes you more attractive,” she groaned. “You have every reason to be cocky, but the differences between us don’t even seem to matter to you.”

  I reached for her hand and laced my fingers with hers. “I’m not sure what you mean by differences, sweetheart.”

  “I grew up on the wrong side of the tracks in a very small town. Not a day went by when someone didn’t remind me that I’d never get out of the trailer park. The only time guys like you talked to me in high school was when they wanted to see how true the rumors about me were. Unfortunately for them, they learned the hard way that I didn’t earn a single one of them.”

  My body tightened, and my fist clenched at my side, as I thought about how she must’ve been treated by the young punks she went to school with. I bent my head low and gritted out, “I’m not like them, Vivi. I swear.”

  “I know you’re not.” She offered me a weak smile. “But that doesn’t mean we don’t come from completely different worlds. I’m the first person in my family to go to college, and the only way I managed it was a combination of scholarships and loans I’m still paying off. I was recently fired from my job. I’d be homeless if Lyla wasn’t willing to let me sleep on her couch. I don’t have a car because I couldn’t afford the payments anymore, so I sold it for just barely enough to cover what was left on the loan for it. I’m a year older than you were when you opened this place and my life is a mess. The bottom line is that I really don’t get what you see in me.”

  I figured she thought her list of the things wrong with her would convince me of how wrong we were for each other, but it impressed me instead. “The only world I’m interested in is the one with you in it.”

  Her expression softened, and she sighed, “How is it that you always seem to have the perfect answer?”

  There was no way I could tell her we were so well-matched because of the boom, so I focused on everything she’d rattled off instead. “Being the first person in your family to go to college is impressive, especially without financial help from your parents. I’d have school loans too if it weren’t for the inheritance from my grandfather. I’m not sure why you lost your job, but it was lucky for me because I wouldn’t have met you if you were still in Florida working. Staying with Lyla means you’ve got great friends who care about you, which says a lot about the kind of person you are. It sounds like selling your car was the right decision to make.”

  “Very smooth.” She propped her elbow on the table and rested her chin on her fist. “What’s next? Are you going to find me a job, too?”

  Hell yeah, I would. With me. Judging by what she’d told me about her college education and last job, she’d be perfect for a project I’d been thinking about for a while. “You want to help me update the restaurant’s website and social media? I’ve been meaning to get to it for months, but I keep putting it off because I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m great in the kitchen but not so much with marketing stuff.”

  She perked up at the offer. “In this case, being opposites might work out for us because I’m horrible in the kitchen but great with marketing. I’m sure I’d be able to whip your website in shape and get you set-up with a social media calendar that would make it easier for you to manage going forward.”

  “It sounds like you’re the perfect person for the project.” And now I had a handy excuse to spend more time with her. “Come with me to the restaurant when we’re done to work out the details?”

  “Sure.” Her plump lips turned down at the edges. “But if I work for you, then we couldn’t go out on any more dates. There would be too many rumors, and I’ve learned the hard way how gossip can ruin a person.”

  I offered her my best charming grin. “Ah, but I wouldn’t be your boss. You’d be an independent contractor who I’m paying for your marketing expertise. That’s completely different.”

  “Yeah, well...the truth doesn’t always matter when it comes to scandals. I wasn’t sleeping with my old boss, but that didn’t stop his wife from destroying my life.”

  Chapter 6

  Vivian

  Crap. It looked like my bad habit of inserting my foot in my mouth had struck again. I hadn’t planned to share that tidbit of information with anyone, let alone Mani of all people. Too many of my supposed friends back in Florida had believed the accusations without bothering to ask for my side of the story. Heck, I hadn’t even known I had a story to tell for most of the time the gossip was swirling around me because nobody had bothered to fill me in. They’d all assumed Susannah, my boss’s wife, was the last to know about the affair—not me, his alleged mistress.

  The entire thing was baggage I’d wanted to leave behind me in Florida. Since I couldn’t depend on my own friends to defend me, I figured that people who didn’t really know me would also assume the worst. But Mani surprised me by wrapping his arm around my shoulders and asking, “What happened?”

  I felt safer than I had in a long time, like Mani was sheltering me from any possible threat. After sipping my coffee to help swallow down the lump in my throat, I took a moment to compose myself before starting my explanation. “I got a job for a great advertising agency right out of college. It was just a position as an executive assistant, but I still counted myself lucky because the pay was good and it let me get my foot in the door. They had a reputation for promoting from within, and it turned out to be well-earned. I’d been working there for a little more than a year when an assistant media planner position opened up. There were so many applicants from colleges better than mine that I thought there wasn’t a chance I’d get the job, but I was wrong. Chris, my new boss, told me I’d earned a reputation for being a hard worker and that’s what clinched it for me.”

  I saw the waitress approaching our table with a tray. I didn’t want anyone to overhear, so I paused my story. The food looked great, even Mani’s, but I’d lost most of my appetite thinking about the past. My stomach was twisted in enough knots that I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to handle even a couple of bites of the fluffy waffles covered in sliced strawberries and whipped cream.

  When the waitress left us alone again, I nodded at Mani’s plate. “Go ahead and dig in. I wouldn’t want you to miss out on your favorite breakfast because of my problems.”

  Picking up his fork and knife, he cut off a piece and lifted it in my direction. “Only if you have a taste, too.”

  I was surprised by how tasty the ingredients were when combined together. His English muffin was slathered with goat cheese and topped with a thick slice of tomato, some arugula, and a poached egg with a sprinkling of salt and pepper on top. But no matter how good his breakfast sandwich looked, I knew I wouldn’t be able to enjoy it until after I finished my story. “Let me get this out first, and then if you still want me to try it, I will.”

  “I’m not eating without you.” He set his silverware down and pushed his plate forward. “And my opinion of you isn’t going to be worse when you’re done. From everything I’ve seen and heard so far, my guess is it’s only going to keep on getting better.”

  “Well, damn. Another perfect answer,” I sighed. It was also exactly what I needed to hear to ease the knots in my stomach. I picked up Mani’s fork and took the bite from it. “No wonder your restaurant is such a success; you definitely know your food.”

  He reclaimed his fork and nudged my waffle in my direction with a wink. “You haven’t seen anything yet, sweetheart.”

  All the time we’d spent together so far involved food, so his quip made a soft giggle slip past my lips. I never thought I’d see the day when I’d be able to laugh while thinking, let alone talking, about what Su
sannah had done to me. Mani was a miracle worker.

  We ate in silence for about five minutes before I started my story up again. “At first, the new job was great. Chris was a good boss, willing to take the time to teach me the ropes. There were times when our workload was worse than others, but Chris always made sure I got paid overtime for any extra hours I put in. After my three-month probationary period, he gave me a raise. He slowly increased my responsibilities, until we got to the point a couple of years in where I was working on media placements for the firms biggest clients. One of my coworkers, a guy a few years older than me who had an MBA, wasn’t happy to be assigned to less important customers with smaller budgets. He was even less thrilled for me to be working the jobs he wanted.”

  Mani pushed his empty plate away and reached for the carafe of coffee. “Let me guess, he hit on you and went down in flames?”

  “Yup, a few times.” I put my hand over my cup when Mani went to refill it. If I had any more caffeine, I’d get jittery. “Chris knew about it. I’d told him a couple of months earlier. I didn’t file a complaint or anything like that, but I thought it was smart to let Chris know what was going on since we both worked for him. He promised to keep an eye on the situation, and he did. But he also started treating my coworker differently, which he of course blamed on me. I’m fairly certain he’s the one who started the rumor about Chris and me sleeping together and that being the reason why I got all the plum assignments.”

  “Fucking asshole,” Mani rumbled, his hand clenching tight.

  I wrapped my palm around his fist. “Don’t worry. He paid for his part in the trouble he caused. He was so focused on being bitter that his work suffered, and Chris fired him. But by then it was too late. The damage had already been done, although neither of us knew it at that point.”