Chapter One
“WELL? WHAT DO YOU think?” Myles Stewart sat across the table, trying to read the inscrutable face of his lunch companion.
Simone chased the bite of muffaletta with sweet tea and lifted her arm to get the attention of their waitress.
Corinne wandered over, more sass in the sway of her hips than she’d had when Myles moved to Wishful seven months before. He hadn’t gotten the story on her yet. “Get you a refill on that tea, hon?”
“I’d like to speak to the cook.”
“Something wrong with your sandwich?” Corinne asked.
“I’d just like to speak to the cook,” Simone said evenly.
With a worried frown, the waitress headed back to the kitchen.
“What are you doing, Simone?”
She just lifted a sardonic brow and continued to sip her tea.
Myles glanced back to the kitchen where Mama Pearl Buckley, Goddess of Pie and Gossip and owner of Dinner Belles Diner, stepped through the door. Her brows drew down in thundercloud formation as she looked Simone’s way.
Oh, this is not good. Not good at all.
“Seriously, if something’s wrong, they’ll fix it. There’s no need to call Omar out.”
“Omar, huh?”
Omar Buckley, master of the kitchen and Mama Pearl’s youngest son, pushed into the room, a grease spattered apron stretched across abs that were just as flat as they’d been when he’d played on scholarship as running back for Ole Miss eight years ago—before the knee injury that blew his football career. Myles had heard that sad tale over coffee several months back. Omar’s face was a twin of his mother’s, and he had the shoulders and arms to back up his displeasure.
Shit. The last thing Myles needed was Simone making enemies her first day on the job. Myles could see the headline now. Out-of-Towner Earns Buckley Wrath—Banned From Diner for Life.
The lunch crowd went silent as Omar’s shadow fell over the table. Everyone waited with bated breath to see how things would unfold.
“Somethin’ I can do for you? Ma’am.” This last he added after a pause.
Simone tipped her head back, blatantly scanning him from head to toe and back again, her lovely, mocha-colored face absolutely deadpan. “Omar, I presume?”
“Yeah.”
“I just wanted to shake the hand of the man who made the best damned muffaletta I’ve had outside the French Quarter.”
Myles released an audible breath.
The tension in Omar’s face smoothed into a grin. “That a fact?”
“I lived there for close to ten years, so I’m in a position to know.” She offered her hand. “Simone Grayson.”
Omar took it, his bigger palm swallowing Simone’s. “You visiting?”
“New in town. Glad to know I’ll be able to satisfy at least some of my culinary cravings for N’Awlins.”
Now that the threat was past, Omar made his own lazy survey of Simone, ending with an expression that said he’d be happy to satisfy any craving she had, culinary or otherwise. And Simone wasn’t shutting him down. Wasn’t that interesting?
As the silence stretched out between them, charging like a freaking Duracell, Myles fell back on old social training for proper introductions. “Simone’s the new full-time reporter for The Observer.”
“That right?”
“Omar does a bi-monthly food column for the paper. He rotates out with Tom Thatcher from The Spring House.”
“I look forward to testing out some of your recipes.”
“You do that. And if you have a hankering for somethin’ in particular, you let me know. I might can do somethin’ about it.”
Simone smiled, and Myles was put in mind of a cat that’d cornered a particularly tasty form of prey. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks.”
As Omar headed back to the kitchen, Simone dove into her muffaletta in earnest.
“You need a cold shower?” Myles asked. “Because I’m pretty sure you just cranked up the temperature in here a good fifteen degrees.”
She shrugged. “Let’s just say I’m more than a little glad I let you talk me away from The Times-Picayune.”
“And I consider that one of my greatest coups. I told you you’d love it here.”
His phone dinged, signaling a reminder. Myles slid it from his pocket and glanced at the screen. Call Piper up for a date.
Myles couldn’t stop the grin from stretching ear to ear.
Finally.
He’d met Piper last September, during auditions for the Wishful Community Theater production of White Christmas. As Bob to her Betty, he’d held her, kissed her, spent hours with her on set and off. And he’d gone more than half crazy for her in the process. But the lovely and talented Piper Parish did not date her co-stars. Some B.S. about the false intimacy of the stage, which had seemed reasonable at the time he’d agreed to it. He’d been waiting three months. Months where they didn’t get to hang out or talk more than the occasional text. Well, and the monthly karaoke night up at Speakeasy Pizzeria. The woman loved her karaoke and damned if he hadn’t gone and learned half the music from Broadway just for the chance to sing with her. But that was more a group thing, not a one-on-one hang out opportunity. So he’d kept waiting. Ninety long, lonely days for her self-imposed edict to pass. And now, time was up.
Hot damn.
Maybe he could swing by the clinic where she worked to ask her in person before he headed back to the paper.
“You’re looking awfully happy.”
“Why wouldn’t I be happy? I stole one of the most talented reporters I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with from one of the best papers in the country, I’m having a damned fine cheeseburger for lunch, and the paper is finally turning an actual profit.”
“A good thing, too, as I’d like to actually get paid.”
No sooner had Myles shoved the phone back into his pocket, then it beeped again, this time with an incoming text. He fished it out and read the message from his general Jill-of-All-Trades, Patty Hamilton, who he’d inherited when he bought The Wishful Observer.
Patty: Your investor’s attorney is here.
Myles frowned.
“Something wrong?” Simone asked.
“Not sure.” He texted Patty back. Did we have a meeting scheduled?
Patty: No. He won’t say what it’s about.
He? Not the usual woman?
Patty: No. Never seen this one. According to his card, he’s one of the partners from her firm in Atlanta.
That was…odd and more than a little disconcerting. What could he want?
Be there as soon as I finish up lunch.
Looked like he wouldn’t get the chance to swing by the clinic to see Piper after all.
Because he didn’t want to wait, he thumbed a quick text to Piper. Time’s up, Buttercup. When can I see you?
Like some love-struck teenager, he stared at the phone, hoping to see the little gray bubble with dancing ellipses that would indicate an immediate reply. But there was nothing. And hell, the clinic could be under a rush with God knew what. They were smack dab in the middle of prime-time sinus infection season. She wasn’t about to be texting when she was supposed to be taking blood pressure or temperatures or giving somebody a shot.
Calling himself an idiot, he put the phone away and finished inhaling his lunch. Simone got the rest of hers to go—which came complete with Omar’s number scrawled on the Styrofoam box—and they hot-footed it across the town green and down the street to the humble offices of The Wishful Observer.
Myles didn’t let himself get uptight or worried. His investor probably just wanted another progress report or additional explanation of some of the expansions Myles wanted to make. The hot-shot lawyer out of Atlanta was probably just stopping by because he was on his way to somewhere else.
Right, because Wishful is so on the beaten path?
By the time he stepped through the doors, Myles was willing to concede he felt a little bit nervous about the drop-in meeting. Those infantile nerves turned into awkward tweenagers at the sight of Patty’s face.
“What?” he asked her.
“He’s in the conference room. Just sitting there like an extra in a Terminator movie.”
“Are we talking T-800 here or T-1000?”
“Tough call. I wasn’t brave enough to try to kosh him over the head to see if he liquefied to fix himself.”
Simone looked impressed. “You know Terminator?”
“Please. I have three sons. I don’t know what he wants, Myles, but be careful in there.”
Wanting to reassure her, he squeezed Patty’s shoulder. “It’ll be fine.”
Stepping into the small conference room, Myles thought perhaps this guy should’ve auditioned as an extra for The Matrix. He looked like a better dressed Agent Smith, and Myles half expected to see an earwig partially covered by the perfectly cut brown hair.
“Mr. Stewart.” When the words didn’t come out with the same measured tone as Mr. Anderson, Myles was almost disappointed. This guy had a cultured, country club Southern drawl—the kind of accent Myles could imagine him practicing in front of a bathroom mirror, while quoting Atticus Finch.
“That would be me. I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage, sir.”
“I’m John Bondurant, from Bondurant, Meadows, and Leach. I’m here on behalf of your investor.”
He didn’t offer his hand to shake, so Myles dropped into a chair. “Of course. What can I do for you, Mr. Bondurant?”
“My client has reviewed the latest progress reports you forwarded on and is, quite frankly, disappointed in the profit and loss statements.”
As unease slithered through him, Myles wished desperately they were in his office, where his desk was covered in toys he could pick up to occupy his hands. What he would give for a Slinky just now. “I realize the profit margin is a bit thin right now, but I’ve had less than a year to get the paper turned around. Some of the equipment needed updating, and I’ve had to expand my staff to accommodate the increased workload.” If you could call moving from three employees to four and adding a high school intern a real staff expansion.
“Nevertheless, my client is concerned that your rather...ambitious plans are more optimistic than realistic.”
“Change takes time. And businesses of any variety require solid investment before they really have an opportunity to grow.” How many times had he heard that refrain growing up? Damn it, he knew business, and he knew newspapers. What he was doing here was working. Rome wasn’t built in a friggin’ day.
Mr. Bondurant pulled a folder from his shiny leather briefcase. “My function today is as messenger, Mr. Stewart. You needn’t justify yourself to me.”
Eying the folder like it would bite him, Myles slowly reached out and took it. There were only a few sheets inside. He pulled his reading glasses from his inside jacket pocket and read through the papers, feeling his cheeseburger congeal and harden with every word.
“This is insane. I can’t possibly have the full payment on the loan by then. That’s not even two months! This isn’t what we agreed to.”
“On the contrary, my client is exercising the right to pull out of the investment. In light of last quarter’s returns, my client is well within rights according to the original agreement.”
“Well, we need to revisit the damned agreement, then. This is ludicrous. I want to talk to your client. Directly.”
“That’s not possible. My client deals only with proxies. I’d be happy to take your counter offer back and present it, but I advise you, Mr. Stewart, to begin looking for other investors. The loan payment is due at the end of the forty-five days or you forfeit ownership of the paper.”
* * *
“They’ll make such beautiful babies, with her pretty face. Better hope for a boy first because those girls will be so pretty, they’ll need a big brother to beat the boys off.”
Why did I let Mom and Leah talk me into this?
Piper Parish sat in the middle of a long table at the Wishful Country Club, as black-and-white clad wait staff wove around the bridal party, removing the salad plates—spinach and strawberry salad with poppyseed dressing, of course—contemplating whether it might be more enjoyable to stab herself in the eye with her salad fork, as she listened to her Great Aunt Beatrice extol the virtues of the bride-to-be. Carrie Jo was a jobless, twenty-two-year-old, barely out of college, who had no actual aspiration in life beyond getting her MRS degree, which she’d be achieving on Saturday. She was also Piper’s cousin, which was exactly how Piper had been roped into being part of the bridal party. Considering she had actually changed Carrie Jo’s diapers, that was a little bit demoralizing.
As the main course appeared—nothing but chicken salad would do for a bridesmaids’ luncheon—Piper wondered if she could get away with ordering a mimosa or three in the name of celebration. Given this was the Southern Baptist side of the family, she thought not.
More’s the pity.
“I heard Richard wants her to stay home so they can go ahead and start trying for a family.”
Yeah, that’s because they already got started on that part.
Not that Carrie Jo had mentioned it. But as a nurse, Piper was well-attuned to the signs. That glow sure as hell wasn’t wedding happies. She wasn’t showing yet, and Piper was reasonably sure no one else in the family knew or suspected. Considering the holy hell that would break loose if they found out—at least before Saturday—Piper wasn’t about to be the one to reveal that secret. Let Carrie Jo have her day with as little drama as possible.
“So, when are we going to be hearing wedding bells for you, Piper?” Aunt Bea asked. “You’ve already let Leah beat you on that one.”
Piper sipped at her sweet tea and muttered. “Last time I checked, marriage wasn’t NASCAR.” Not that anybody in her family recognized that fact. Her baby sister had beat her in the race to the altar three years prior, at the ripe young age of twenty-four. And she’d delighted the entire family by immediately providing the first grandchild a year later. A boy, Preston, who, Piper was forced to admit, was cute as the dickens. Leah was winning points left and right.
The remark earned her an aggravated look from her mother. It was an expression Piper was intimately familiar with.
“What’s that, dear?” her great aunt asked.
“Nothing. No wedding bells for me any time soon, Aunt Bea.”
“Oh, that’s a shame. But surely there’s someone special?”
Because the idea that her life could revolve around something other a man certainly didn’t compute.
Before Piper could think of a snark-free reply to that, her phone vibrated. It was purely verboten that she had it out of her purse at all, but if she was caught, she had the excuse of being on-call at the clinic. Not that she actually was today, but they didn’t know that.
She slid the phone from beneath her napkin and swiped to unlock the screen.
Myles: Time’s up, Buttercup. When can I see you?
Piper’s cheeks warmed, and she had to fight back the grin tugging at her lips.
Speaking of someone special.
The new-in-town and very sexy Myles Stewart had been her unexpected co-star in last fall’s production of White Christmas. He’d been at auditions to write a story about the show and decided to audition himself just for the chance to meet her. She’d spent the last months of autumn fighting the zing between them, sticking to her self-imposed rule about not dating her romantic lead. He hadn’t blinked when she’d issued a cool-down period so that whatever intimacy engendered by the show could fade. Instead, he’d spent the entire three months sending her outrageous texts and a daily notice of the countdown. She’d done her best not to respond too often, encourage him too much. But those texts had been the highlight of her days, keeping that zing alive and well and impatient. And then there was karaoke night. She lived for the chance to sing with him. They’d been carrying on the subtle flirtation through song all these months.
And now the wait was over.
Thank God.
Her thumb hovered over the screen, prepared to tap out a reply—Is now too soon?
“Piper!” The sound of her mother’s voice almost made Piper drop the phone. “Are you on your phone?”
“No ma’am. I was just checking in with the clinic.” Reluctantly, she slid the phone back into her purse beneath her mother’s disapproving eye. She’d be hearing about this later.
Just as well she hadn’t answered yet. Between work and all the wedding events, she wouldn’t actually be free until after Saturday. Maybe Saturday night if the reception didn’t run too late.
“What were you saying about who you were dating?” Aunt Bea asked.
Of course she hadn’t lost that line of questioning.
Piper considered saying something about Myles, but the last thing she wanted was any of her nosy relatives going to bother him at work to find out who his people were. Besides, they weren’t dating. Yet.
“I haven’t had a lot of time for dating lately. We just recently wrapped the production of The Mousetrap.” She didn’t usually go out for the non-musical roles, but she’d needed the distraction to keep from giving in to the temptation to blow her rule all to hell and jump straight into things with Myles—which, given the level of that zing, would likely have led straight to bed, thus breaking another personal rule. “Were you able to make it out to see the show? We got rave reviews.”
“That’s nice, honey, but you really should devote more time to finding yourself a husband. That biological clock is ticking and you don’t have all that much time left.”
“Right, because my ability to pop out babies is my only valuable attribute as a woman, and, at twenty-nine, I’m ancient and my uterus is populated by dust and cobwebs.”
“Piper Elizabeth!” Her mother’s middle name invocation brought all conversations at the table to a screeching halt. Nearly a dozen pairs of eyes fixed on her.
At Twyla’s look of censure, Piper ducked her head. “Sorry, Mama.”
This was her longest standing and most challenging role to date. Pretending to give a damn about what the rest of her family thought she ought to be doing with her life. Because certainly what she actually wanted didn’t matter to any of them. God forbid she be anything but the traditional, dutiful, meek Southern daughter.
Carrie Jo’s mama jumped into the conversational breach. “Piper, I’m just going over some last-minute details with the caterer,” Jolene waved her own cell phone and nobody got on to her. “I think your reply card got lost in the mail. Do you have a plus one for the reception?”
This just keeps getting better and better.
She nearly said yes. For two long seconds, Piper considered asking Myles if he’d be her plus one. She doubted he’d say no and, God knew, his company would make the wedding less of a misery for her. But then her family would know about him. And he’d know about her family. Neither of those things seemed likely to lead to a desire for him to spend more time with her. Better to suck it up and admit the truth.
“No ma’am, I don’t.”
“Oh, that’s a shame.”
Piper called on all her acting chops to keep her smile fixed in place and set in polite rather than feral lines.
Carrie Jo’s Aunt Rae spoke up. “I could set you up with Forest Langford. He’s getting out again since his divorce.”
“What about Quincy Blackmon?” Libby Newsom, the maid of honor, suggested.
Piper lifted a hand to stop the commentary and offers of pity dates. “No, really, it’s all right. I avoided having a plus one on purpose.”
They all stared at her as if she’d sprouted a second head.
“I just thought I could be of more help if I wasn’t having to entertain a date. There’s so much to manage, after all.” A blatant lie, but it effectively turned the tide of pity.
“Well, isn’t that just the sweetest thing?” Jolene declared. “Since you’re…unencumbered, can I get you to—”
As Jolene took advantage of Piper’s slip up to pile on additional wedding duties, all Piper could do was grin and bear it.
Three more days. Three more days and this insanity is over.
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