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It’s amazing what a few dollars can do.
Also, he’s not the only one feeling lighter. I actually crack a smile as I pass under the flickering sign and drive back to the office.
* * *
She doesn’t bringthe damn order.
Emmy, the girl with the dark hair and glasses that slip down her nose when she’s driving, shows up and hauls it inside while I watch. Three boxes bulging with shit I can’t choke down to save my life.
Fantastic.
“Thanks for your order,” she tells me nervously, eyeing me like I’m about to bite her face off.
“Plan on another visit,” I clip.
Everyone in the office will love me, at least from Sylvia the secretary to the service reps and interns running on a steady diet of caffeine and pure sugar.
So will Juniper by proxy.I fucking hope.
“Oh, wow, really? Okay!” Emmy says, her smile widening as I sign the receipt and write in a large tip. “Any idea when you want the next?”
“Tomorrow.” It’s not like I have much time to waste in the convincing department.
“Oh, great. See you tomorrow, then!”
Dammit, I want the order, but not this bright-eyed kid.
“Actually, I hoped you might send Miss Winkley personally next time instea—”
“Bye!” With a quick flip of her hair, the door swings open. She bolts to the van like there’s a pack of angry Dobermans behind her.
I stand there with my jaw open, too slack-jawed and stunned to curse.
There it is.
Proof positive that the universe means to pay me back horribly for my foot-in-mouth disease and nothing—absolutely nothing—is going to go as planned.
* * *
I give it three days.
Three whole days of impatiently ordering food I despise and waiting for her to show up in the flesh, only for Juniper Winkley to freeze me out like the arctic ice witch she is.
By day four, I’m done waiting.
I’m done trying to talk nice with her, too.
If she won’t meet me while I’m paying a princely sum for her pastries, then I’ll say what I need to in a letter sweetened with a check.
A disgustingly large check worth more than any big wad of sugar ever churned out of her shop.
I almost reconsider this idiocy, but I can’t.
There’s no talking my way out of an engagement I flippantly announced to a man with our future in his greedy hands.
If I blow this deal with Forrest Haute, his big mouth could easily do collateral damage, too. Word gets around in this biz, especially when you’re rising stars in the Kansas City rental market.
So I seal the damn envelope with the check and stick it in my car. She has to come out of that store sometime, and when she does, I’ll be there.
