Chapter 2
Marisa hadn’t made it two steps outside the partition before she was spotted by the catering manager, Angela, who had been speaking to another member of the waitstaff.
Angela swung a finger in her direction. “There. Marisa’s free. Give them to her.”
“Sure thing, boss lady.”
The sound of Marisa’s name punching through her single-minded focus on Monica was almost as grating as hearing boss lady spoken alongside it.
Seriously? Did every position of power held by a woman need to be gender-qualified?
A tray was thrust under her nose. “Here you go. Angela wants you to take these over to that group of guests hovering by the charcuterie display.”
“I’m a little busy at the moment. Excuse me.” Marisa had begun to push Joey—Johnny?—out of the way, but her strongarm was blocked by the man’s regrettably immovable girth.
“You’re too busy for work? Isn’t that what you’re here for?”
“I’m on break,” she gritted out.
“Not according to the schedule, you’re not. I’m overdue my fifteen minutes, and Angela just approved it, so here.”
Owing to the client’s insistence that all the serving trays be silver plated, along with the precariously balanced crystal stemware and greasy food fare perched on top of it, Marisa had two choices: drop it all and make a run for Monica before Angela fired her and had her removed from the premises, or waste precious minutes serving guests before Monica’s date came back.
Four minutes, girl. All you need is four minutes.
“Fine. I’ll take them over.”
The server—Jerry? Giovanni?—scraped his forearm beneath his nose, sniffed deeply, and tunneled his hands beneath the starched polyester covering his beer gut to rest where she presumed a belt lived.
“Of course you will. And when you’re done, head on back to the kitchen.
I’ve got a few more trays ready to go out that I haven’t gotten to yet. ”
She’d never worked with this guy before and desperately needed to never do so again.
“How is that my problem?” she hissed. “Why are you so backed up?”
“Like I said, just because I was overdue my official break didn’t mean I wasn’t entitled to some personal compensatory downtime of my choosing. I showed up half an hour early to this gig, and as long as Angela sees me when I need to be seen, it’s all good.”
“It’s all— Did you just say it’s all good? Seriously? After giving me shit for taking a break?”
“I’m always serious. And it’s always better to give shit than to take it. First rule of gig work.” Jerome—Geoffrey? Geoffry! That was it!—snorted again, this time against the back of his hand, and strode back toward Angela, who was staring intently at Marisa.
Oh, she needed to get the hell out of here. Her soul and soles couldn’t take it anymore.
Marisa white-knuckled the silver tray and speed walked toward the charcuterie table, all the while keeping an eye on Monica, who still stood blessedly alone, admiring the ice sculpture.
If she were fast, she could offload the goods and answer the obligatory bathroom location questions in about twenty seconds.
Given the thickness of the crowd and the pockets of guest clusters, add on another thirty seconds to make it across the ballroom, which would leave her with exactly—
A towering form shifted in front of her only direct path to the display table.
With lightning-fast reflexes born from years of working with molten sugar, Marisa somehow managed to rock back on her heels and shelter the stemware behind the cage of her forearm.
The drinks jostled slightly, but the drops that had spilled onto the tray were barely noticeable. Likewise, the food had been spared.
Too bad her senses hadn’t.
In a ballroom where the finery often wore the guests, the same couldn’t be said for the man before her.
Dressed in a deep huckleberry suit filled out by a toned thickness not often found outside MetLife Stadium, he stood a good head taller than anyone around him.
Unlike those in attendance, however, the courteous expression on his face was mixed with a tinge of boredom that only those expert in observing the misery of corporate event attendees could decipher.
Nothing about this man belonged here. Not the closely cropped dark hair that ended in a widow’s peak above his wide brow, nor the charming dimples protruding above a thin beard that hadn’t quite managed to shake hands with the mustache haloing it.
Those weren’t ordinary dimples. Those were dimples born only of forced politeness and sardonic grinning.
She should know because she had a near-matching set, except hers loved to show themselves after the fourth cup of wine during her parents’ seder.
That was when her dad liked to play it a little too fast and loose with the pours while always making a decidedly unfunny joke about how Jews have sensitive tummies.
All this, of course, right before her Aunt Gail liked to remind everyone that Marisa’s little candies weren’t sugar free.
Marisa slowed her steps in time to the stranger’s uneasy shuffle from foot to foot.
God, he didn’t want to be there any more than she did.
Around him, a cadre of suits were laughing and clinking similar glasses of amber liquid while the stranger merely bobbed his wide shoulders on a single tense chuckle and let his boredom-glazed eyes drift over the shellacked heads of businessmen.
Until they landed on her and took in the not-so-subtle fact that she’d been staring at him. Like, a lot.
Marisa sucked in a breath and backed up a step.
“Ow! Watch it!”
The shrill cry was so loud, Marisa’s first instinct was to hover a hand over her tray to make sure the crystal stemware hadn’t shattered from the high-pitched resonance.
Her second instinct, upon seeing the blooming stain of honey-mint sauce that was meant to coat the lamb skewers she carried but, instead, coated a guest’s yellow chiffon dress, was to grovel. Profusely.
“I am so sorry. Oh my goodness. Here,” Marisa said, placing the tray on a nearby table already overrun with dishes, “let me help.” She grabbed a discarded cloth napkin that looked mostly free of stains, dunked it in what she hoped was club soda, dropped to her knees, and began to blot at the smear on the woman’s skirt.
“Uh! You’re only making it worse.”
“If I can just get enough of the carbonation on the stain, most of the green should lift, and it’ll blend better. Almost there.”
“I don’t want it to blend. I want it to be gone!”
Marisa’s hand stalled out mid-swipe and hovered over the quickly-fading-but-not-fading-enough blemish as her mind landed on the tone and tenor of that word.
Blend.
She’d heard it before. Kind of hard not to when the ad’s slogan and its owner had bombarded her social media feed every time she went to research recipe videos.
Blending brilliant care with botanical flair! Scan this QR code for your free estimate on our in-home plant nursery service. But don’t wait too long. Holiday season bookings are filling up fast.
Marisa shot to her feet, stain forgotten, and was met with a glare that could wilt the most carefully maintained topiary.
“Plant Nanny,” Marisa breathed.
The woman shook out her red hair and lifted the stained corner of her skirt in one hand like a ballroom princess gearing up for a waltz.
On anyone else, it would have given trying too hard, but on her, it trilled distressed damsel open for takers.
“Just go, all right? I’m sure there’s something you can do to make up for your clumsiness.
A complimentary glass of wine with an exceptional vintage, perhaps?
Be sure to have someone else bring it over, though. ”
Marisa had never been simultaneously dismissed and employed, but with the woman’s back turned to her and the blatant cloud of disgust and expectation fuming around them, there was nothing left for her to do but shake her head as two thoughts held Marisa still.
I just spilled a drink on the Plant Nanny.
I just spilled a drink on the Plant Nanny and missed the opportunity to also stab her with a lamb skewer.
The party guests shifted and pulsed around her, choking out the available air until all that remained was enough to narrow Marisa’s focus on the last time she’d seen the Plant Nanny’s offerings.
Which had little to do with plants and everything to do with running Marisa’s business out of town.
The icy dousing had come in the form of a text from Eden. A single social media post featuring a picture of new customer appreciation gift baskets the Plant Nanny would leave in client homes.
None of that would have been a problem if the baskets also didn’t include gourmet plant-based candies and plant-themed treats that had West Meadow residents clamoring for more.
Last Marisa heard, the Plant Nanny had been thinking about launching a branch of her business dedicated to the candies and chocolates alone.
And the woman was here. Nearly elbow-rubbing distance from Monica.
If Marisa were looking for a faster way for her small business to die a miserable death before it had a chance to truly live, she’d be hard-pressed to find one.
It wasn’t a long shot to surmise there might only be room on The List for one candy maker in town, at best. At worst, well . . . she wasn’t ready to think about that just yet.
Marisa caught Eden’s eye over at the bar. Her friend was holding up a cocktail shaker and jutting out her chin toward Monica’s date, who Eden had just begun to serve. Slowly.
Crap.
Eden had galactic speed when it came to mixing drinks. If she was intentionally putting the brakes on the process just to stall, time was running out.