3. Vincent
3
VINCENT
W hy did the worst driver in all of Manhattan have to be so damn… sparkly ?
It was bad enough she’d dragged me to a table in Siberia instead of where I was supposed to be, at the main table with the rest of the guys. Piper should’ve been toward the front as well, but for some reason, she’d apparently asked to be seated at a table filled with bit players and third cousins once removed rather than with her parents and stepbrother. We were so close to the kitchen I could see the harried chef inside every time a waiter brought out a tray.
But rather than acting like someone banished to the equivalent of the kids’ table, the woman was downright effervescent, chatting like she’d known our fellow diners for ages. We were joined by a grey hair couple who seemed charmed by her, an outgoing pair who were both in some Broadway show, and a solo middle-aged guy who had to be an accountant, and probably would’ve spent the meal monopolizing Piper if I wasn’t beside her. Not that I was paying much attention to any of them. I was here to support Paul—not to make small talk with a bunch of randos. As soon as we were seated, I had my phone in my hand and my inbox open.
I spent the appetizer course trying to work through a series of bad news emails about the heliotrope blight. That should have been enough to hold every ounce of my attention, but every time Piper laughed, I couldn’t look away. I’d thought she was stunning even after she’d smashed her junker into my work of art, but tonight, in a black dress? I had to fight to keep from staring.
Piper, on the other hand, treated me like I was invisible.
Whatever. After tonight, I’d probably only see her once more, at the wedding. It was for the best, since we clearly didn’t get along.
“Vincent. Did you hear me?” Piper demanded.
I looked up to everyone at the table staring at me. “I’m sorry, work.” I held up my phone. “What’s happening?”
“We’re going around the table talking about our favorite places to escape the world. You’re next.”
I frowned. “What was your answer?”
She rolled her eyes at me. “If you’d been listening, you would’ve heard me talk about the wedding I shot in Antigua. It was long before we were dating, sweetheart .” She quirked an eyebrow at me.
The guy next to me handed me a phone. “These are her photos from the trip,” he explained.
I started to pass the phone on but stopped and actually scrolled through them once I caught a glimpse. Her work was surprising, not only because the photos weren’t the typical I’m-in-a-tropical-location fare, but because they were good . She had an artist’s eye, and if she were anyone else, I would’ve told her as much.
Seeing as the woman turned her Toyota into a battering ram, I refrained.
“So what’s your favorite location, Vincent?” the older woman asked me.
There was something in her face that reminded me of Nana Dee. Maybe it was the way the corners of her eyes crinkled up when she smiled, like she’d spent a lifetime wearing a grin.
“Jamesport,” I answered.
I’d traveled the world and stayed in every luxury location imaginable, but the one place where I felt happiest? Nana Dee’s bayfront home.
“Long Island?” the grey-haired woman laughed at me. “Well, that’s adorable . And it’s an attainable getaway, since it’s right up the road!”
“It’s a very special place to me,” I snapped at her, offended she thought my answer was funny.
She might vaguely resemble Nana Dee, but she sure didn’t act like her. Nana Dee would never laugh at me.
The woman’s face fell. “Oh, I wasn’t suggesting it was a bad choice, we love that area.”
“I’m happy for you,” I shot back as I refocused on my phone.
Piper gasped.
“Wow, rude much?” she muttered under her breath to me. She turned to the couple. “Jean, where do you and Joe go to escape?”
I didn’t even flick my eyes up as the woman started to speak, because the latest email from R&D suggested that we give up on the distilled heliotrope oil and go with the synthetic version.
Fuck . I started banging out a carefully worded email that would convey my extreme displeasure at the news, since I couldn’t actually say there was no fucking way we were giving up.
“Joe and I are very blessed to have a home on Kauai. It’s a lovely little farm.”
The man laughed. “Jean, I’d hardly call twenty acres ‘little,’ especially on an island like Kauai, where land is so precious.”
I tried to relegate the conversation around me to no more than a dull hum as I finished my email. I was so upset my fingers couldn’t punch the letters quickly enough.
“Hawaii is on my bucket list,” Piper said. “I’d love to pick your brain about the best places to visit.”
“Well, if you ever make it, please plan a stop at Sugarview Farm. We have plenty of guest rooms. And if you can time your trip when the heliotrope blooms, I swear you’ll think you’ve died and gone to flower heaven,” the woman laughed. “It’s the reason we bought the place.”
I froze with my finger hovering above my phone. “I’m sorry, what ?”
It had to be the combination of the scotch I’d downed and unblinking stare from the woman sitting beside me throwing me off my game and making me imagine things.
The woman frowned, confused by my sudden interest. “I said we bought the farm because of the flowers.” She glanced at her husband. “They’re my favorite.”
“Heliotrope,” I repeated, locked onto her.
Was it possible my luck was turning around?
The older man leaned in protectively. “That’s what she said. Is there a problem?”
My pulse quickened. I was on the hunt and getting closer. “I don’t know, you tell me. Are your blooms healthy?”
“What’s this about?” the man frowned at me.
“Do they have blight ?” I sighed. How were they not understanding what I meant? Blight was a gigantic issue for heliotrope blooms this season—they had to have heard about it.
I could feel Piper glaring holes in the side of my head.
“You mean that disease? No, blight didn’t make the jump to the islands. We have one of the few remaining healthy farms in the country.”
“And how many acres did you say you own?” I asked.
I realized too late that perhaps my tone was a touch brusque.
Piper jumped out of her chair and grabbed my arm. “Honey, Paul is calling for us, we should go see him.”
I glanced over at the main table and saw Paul engrossed in conversation with Trent. “What are you talking about? He’s not even looking?—”
She wrenched my arm in a surprisingly strong grip. “We’ll be right back, folks.”
I got up and allowed her to slide her arm against mine. She led us out of the private dining room and into the restaurant’s main dining space, in a nook close to the host stand. I craned my neck to see if Maya was in view and spotted her ebony bun across the room. Hopefully she wouldn’t glance our way.
“What the hell?” Piper hissed at me. “Why are you interrogating those nice people?”
“I wasn’t interrogating them. I was asking questions,” I insisted, trying to hold on to my temper. Did she have any idea how important this was? Their heliotrope crop could be a game-changer for me, and like hell was I going to just walk away from that.
“Do you work for border patrol or something? For fuck’s sake, Vincent, you were so rude to them.” She looked so genuinely exasperated with me that I was taken aback for a second. Was it…possible that she had a point?
I mentally replayed how the conversation had gone and had to fight back a wince. Okay, from an outsider’s perspective, I supposed I could see how my excitement might have been misconstrued as rudeness.
Shit. Did that mean that I wouldn’t be able to close this deal after all?
“I’m in desperate need of heliotrope, and they’re the key,” I explained.
She screwed up her face like I was speaking another language. “Huh?”
I sighed. How was that not clear? “They have something I need, and I’m going to get it.”
She gave me a deeply unimpressed glare. “Yeah, that’s not going to cut it. I’ll need more of an explanation before I let you interrogate them again.”
Part of me wanted to ask who the hell she was to tell me what I could and couldn’t do—but then I remembered the glare the man had given me as Piper and I had gotten up from the table. A glare aimed just at me and not at all at her. If I came back to the table without her, there was a very real chance the couple wouldn’t bother to give me the time of day.
“I’m the CEO of Summit Fragrances, and I need the flower growing on their farm in order to create my next fragrance.”
Piper laughed in my face. “You really think they want to give you anything ? Jean looked like she was about to cry, and Joe looked like he was going to use his cane to crack you over the head. Good luck convincing them to give you the time of day.”
Damn it. She was right.
“Can you just keep quiet and let the rest of us have a nice evening?”
“But I need?—”
“Ah, ah,” she chastised, wagging her finger at me. “Tonight isn’t about you, remember? And you’ll never convince them to do anything for you if you keep acting like an entitled asshole.”
“ Excuse me?”
She shrugged and scrunched up her nose, which I would’ve admitted was adorable if she wasn’t so exhausting.
“Just calling ’em like I see ’em,” Piper said.
I heard a commotion across the room along with a cringingly familiar laugh and realized Maya was on the move and headed our way. That was the last thing I needed right now. I slung my arm around Piper’s shoulder and started back toward the private room.
“Wha—?” she sputtered at my closeness. She pushed her elbow against my ribs in an attempt to create a buffer.
“Incoming,” I leaned down to whisper in her ear, then nodded toward Maya. I caught a hint of Piper’s perfume, which, based on the alcohol vapors, was a cheap vanilla-lemon scent. A woman like Piper deserved to be in a top-shelf fragrance, not some watered-down drug store scent. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was so much less than what she should have. I could already imagine how the top notes of Evermore would linger at the nape of her neck.
Dammit , I scolded myself, get it together, Vincent.
I timed our entrance back into the private room perfectly, right as Maya was close enough to spot us but not close enough that she could corner me. Thankfully, Piper relented, sheathed her pointy elbow and relaxed against me.
“Now be nice ,” Piper whispered as we finally untangled.
I forced myself to smile as she took up right where we’d left off, asking the Broadway couple about their getaway location. Jean and Joe relaxed, probably because I nodded along agreeably as everyone chatted. Piper led the conversation like a conductor, and little by little, the tension evaporated. She even managed to get Jean and Joe laughing again.
The band kicked off the dancing portion of the night, and the couples from our table excused themselves to the dancefloor. Larry, the lone solo guest, headed for the bar, leaving me alone with Piper. It was the perfect opportunity for the big ask I’d just worked out.
There was no way she could refuse me—it was perfect.
I leaned over to begin my pitch, and she glared at me.
“Do not ask me to dance.”
I jerked away reflexively. “Don’t worry, I wasn’t going to. I don’t dance.”
She eyed me up and down, silently judging me. “I can tell.”
“What do you mean by that?” I asked, offended but not sure why.
“You’re too cautious. You’re a watcher, not a do-er.”
“You’re wrong about that. I’m both. And I’m about to do something that’s going to change your life.”
The corner of her mouth kicked up. “Cocky, aren’t you?”
“The word ‘cocky’ suggests arrogance. I’m confident. There’s a difference.”
Piper stared at me for a beat like she was weighing if I was correct. I liked the way she watched me, as if she was searching for weakness and coming up blank.
“I need them,” I said simply as I pointed to the elderly couple on the dancefloor.
“And why would I care?” She smiled sweetly at me.
“Those two hold the key?—”
“Jean and Joe Sullivan,” she interrupted. “Might be nice if you used their names instead of treating them like items on your to-do list.”
I sighed. The way she could knock me off course! I felt like I was debating her, not having a conversation.
“As I mentioned, I need to strike a deal with Jean and Joe to harvest their heliotrope for my new premier fragrance, Evermore , and that’s where you come in.”
She slow-blinked at me. “There is absolutely nothing you can say to me that will make me help you badger those lovely people. Face it, you already blew it by being aggressive. They don’t like you at all.”
I ignored the insult. “But they love you!”
She shimmied her shoulders triumphantly. “Who doesn’t?”
Me, for one.
“Help me then,” I insisted. “Put in a good word, mention how lucrative this might be to them if?—”
“Were you even paying attention?” Piper sighed. “These two don’t need your money and, if I had to guess, the last thing they want is some profit-chasing jackass wreaking havoc all over their farm. And, again, they don’t like you .”
“Oh, come on.” I rolled my eyes. “I wouldn’t ruin their farm. We know what we’re doing at Summit.”
“I still don’t care.”
“Piper, you’re not getting it. I really want?—”
“We can’t always get what we want.” She smiled innocently. Damnit, was she having fun at my expense?
“Come work for me,” I blurted out. Maybe that was a desperate move, but these were desperate times. “If you were to reach out to the Sullivans as a valued member of the Summit team?—”
“ Excuse me? You don’t even know what I do for a living.”
Her side-eye game was lethal.
“I know all about you,” I said quickly, realizing too late that I now sounded like a stalker. “That is to say, my security team did a quick background check on you. You’re a freelance photographer, and based on what I saw in your Antigua shots, a good one. Summit doesn’t have a staff photographer, so you could come on board in that capacity until you secure the Sullivans.”
Her mouth was hanging open at my info dump and offer.
“So how much would it take for you to come on board?” I asked her, trying to ignore the way her lips looked.
Damn, they were luscious.
“The number doesn’t exist.” She emptied her champagne glass and smiled sweetly at me.
“So you say, but what about this ?” I pulled out my phone, typed a number, and held it out to her, waiting for her eyes to bug out of her head.
Piper shrugged. “That’s cute, but no thanks.”
The woman could play hardball, but so could I. I punched an even higher amount on my phone and held it out to her again.
“Thoughts?”
Piper leaned closer to scrutinize my phone. “Looks like you need to wipe your lens clean. It’s hazy, which means any selfies you take will come out blurry.”
“The number,” I said through gritted teeth. “What about the number ?”
“Oh, that?” she said. “Interesting, but my answer is still no.”
“What is your problem?” I seethed. “I’m offering you the opportunity of a lifetime!”
“No, you’re offering me money to come do your dirty work!” she snapped back at me. “You’re a controlling egomaniac, and there’s no way I could ever work for you.”
At least I’d finally cracked through her facade and gotten a real reaction out of her. Now I could negotiate.
“I’ll guarantee you six months of salary no matter how long it takes to secure the Sullivans. And I’ll pay you a bonus on top of the salary once you make it happen. Then you can quit. As an extra bonus, I’ll set you up with all my contacts. The freelance roster of your dreams. Does that work?”
She crossed her arms and stared out at the dancefloor. “It’s a start.”
If I wasn’t so thoroughly frustrated, I’d have to laugh. Forget a photography gig—I should hire her to negotiate contracts for me.
“What’s your final offer?” she nodded toward my phone. “Including the bonus.”
I was so close to a yes, and I knew I needed to pull out all the stops to get to it. I typed a jaw-dropping sum and showed it to her.
Her expression didn’t change as she looked at it.
“Guess I’ll be seeing you Monday,” she finally said.