Spiced Read online

  “The pencils in the bottom of the filing cabinet? I took those upstairs last week.”

  “Dammit. Now I have to waddle back upstairs.” She propped her hands on her lower back and steered her belly toward the door.

  “Text me next time. If you need something down here, one of us will run it up.”

  After Nat left, Pepper physically unplugged the internet from her work computer and showed Gran how to play solitaire before ducking out to check on the customers and bridal consultants on the floor.

  She loved the boutique and had from the first moment she’d seen it almost two years ago. Rows and rows of dresses, satin and lace, bustles and tiaras and veils. Large dressing rooms surrounding a viewing area with a floor-to-ceiling mirror and ivory Victorian couches for the bridal parties. The lingering scent of wedding cake added an ambiance the other boutiques in Bliss couldn’t replicate, thanks to the bakery next door.

  The bridal consultants were well-trained, and many had been with the boutique since before Pepper had become Nat’s partner, back when Nat was a single mom struggling to fit in on The Aisle. So much history here, so much warmth, so much excitement from brides embarking on their next stage of life. Not just in the boutique, but in the entire town.

  Pepper popped back into the office to check on Gran as an ominous thump sounded upstairs.

  She took the stairs two at a time and burst into the brightly lit, multi-mirrored alterations room to a sight that she honestly wished was more unusual.

  “Ladies!” she yelled over the pandemonium. Nat held her belly, eyes bulging as though she were trying to suck in enough air to continue giving the two bridesmaids a talking-to. Usually, she would’ve had a mouthful of pins and still have been able to talk down any emotional or irrational members of the bridal party, but today, her gaze swiveled to Pepper with an undeniable help written in her expression. The two on-staff seamstresses were nowhere in sight.

  “Let’s all take a deep breath and—” Pepper started.

  A pincushion bopped her in the cheek.

  “She is too a gold digger!”

  “If you don’t stop saying that about my mother, I’ll—”

  “Oh, shove it. I didn’t say they don’t deserve each other.”

  “Stop! You’re about to be sisters.”

  “I will never call that judgmental sack of crap my—”

  Pepper stuck her fingers in her mouth and gave a shrill whistle. The three women paused, one with a handful of ripped peach satin, another with a fabric pencil clenched in her fist, the bride with eyes brimming.

  “Save the drama for the wedding, ladies. Our job is to make you look good, not give you a practice run for the reception. And we’ll be happy to add any damages to your bill.”

  The younger bridesmaid—a brunette in a floor-length peach satin dress gaping about her chest who was probably in her mid-thirties, if not older—pointed the fabric pencil at the bride. “She’s marrying my father for his money, but she’s not going to get a single penny of it.”

  Pepper stepped between the two of them and plucked the fabric pencil away. “Far better money than love. At least you won’t picture them having sex.”

  The bride’s daughter squeaked.

  “Oh, gross,” the apparent future stepdaughter whispered.

  “That is none of your business,” the bride, a pleasantly plump lady with forehead wrinkles beneath stylish short hair, informed Pepper primly.

  Maybe not, but they’d stopped terrorizing the alterations room before they got to the scissors or the mirrors. “Put that fabric back where you found it, please. And you—if you’re in a dress, you need to stay on your block. Nat, where do you want them?”

  She turned to her partner, looking for further guidance.

  All the blood had left Nat’s face. Her lips were parted, hands clenching her belly, eyes pinched in pain.

  “Pepper?” she whispered. She glanced down at the floor. “My water just broke.”

  3

  Tony should’ve known this was coming, but the commanding knock at his front door shortly after nine still took him by surprise. Lucky, his gray tabby rescue cat, streaked through the kitchen to hide behind the grumbling fridge. Probably needed to replace that soon.

  The fridge. Not the cat.

  He lowered the heat on his sautéing veggies, tossed the cast-iron skillet with his steak into the oven, and headed to the door. The worn wooden floors creaked, much like his bones after a long day on his feet. He’d been spending so many hours at Pepperoni Tony’s, he hadn’t worked out in two weeks. Hadn’t eaten much more than pizza in four days, and last night, he’d almost shredded mozzarella into the cat’s food bowl and topped his slice with kibble.

  Hence the real dinner tonight followed by an early-ish bedtime.

  Not on the menu? Sharing it with the woman standing on his porch, arms crossed, toe tapping, lips set in a grim line.

  So much for that gratitude she’d shown him earlier.

  “Pepper, such a pleasant surprise.”

  She wasn’t in a coat, so either she wasn’t staying long, or she was assuming he’d invite her inside.

  “We need to make a deal.” Not a question. Not would you like to make a deal? Nope, Pepper Blue simply decided something needed to be done, and that was that.

  It set his teeth on edge. “I believe the words you’re looking for are thank you.”

  Her shark smile shouldn’t have stirred his dormant parts, but there it went, sitting up with interest. Dammit.

  “I believe the words you’re looking for are Why, yes, Pepper, I’d like to stay in business in Bliss for years, so I’d be happy to talk to you about a deal.”

  “Business is fine, thank you.”

  “Then maybe the words you’re looking for are I’m so sorry I’ve been pulling your ponytails instead of just telling you I like you, Pepper.”

  “Amusing, but wrong.”

  “Suit yourself. By the way, Billy Brenton was in town today. Lindsey specifically asked him not to go to lunch with her. She’s waiting to see how you fit in with the locals before she lets him put his stamp of approval on your pizza.”

  She turned to go, and despite his ego’s objection, he called to her. “Wait.”

  That expectant, go on, tell me you’ll give me what I want look was annoying as hell.

  But even without dangling the Billy Brenton stamp of approval over his head, he knew she was right. He needed to get in better with the locals if Pepperoni Tony’s had any chance at all of surviving here.

  And the only thing he knew for damn sure was that he didn’t want to go back to Willow Glen. Especially as a failure.

  He’d failed enough already.

  He kicked the door open wider. “You had dinner?”

  She didn’t smirk—exactly—but she didn’t smile either. “I have, thank you.”

  “Since you’ll probably send your grandmother over next if I don’t let you in, I guess you can watch me eat.”

  She stepped inside his house and glanced around the living room. No doubt judging his bachelor pad, complete with sectional sofa pointed at the big-screen TV, Cubs posters on the walls, old magazines on his listing coffee table, and scattered cat toys on the floor.

  “Gran’s busy,” she said. “There was a catfight in the alterations room at the boutique this afternoon, and Nat’s water broke right in the middle of it, so Gran’s at the hospital, waiting.”

  Obviously her game was to confuse him until he agreed to something horrible. “Her…?”

  “Water broke. Right there in the middle of the alterations room. One minute, the alterations room is in chaos because the grown daughter and future stepdaughter of the bride are at each other’s throats, and the next, Nat’s standing in a puddle of amniotic fluid.”

  Retreat. Run. Truck. Drive. Forever scrub the image of any woman’s water breaking from his brain.

  He hadn’t needed the unwelcome memories of what had happened to him in a labor and delivery room. Felt like
yesterday, even though he knew the kid had turned a year old in December.

  Without waiting, she followed the smell of food to his kitchen and settled herself at the small wooden island that served as both kitchen table and spare counter space. He went back to his vegetables, ignoring the searing ache in his chest.

  “Your deal’s about a woman in labor?” he asked.

  “My last fifteen boyfriends have married the next woman they dated after me. Gran’s scheduling me for double dates from now until my sister Tarra’s wedding in two weeks because she’s convinced she can break my streak. Unless you agree to continue this ridiculous charade you started at lunch today. Which I’m very grateful for, by the way, even if it was the most insane idea I’ve heard in months.”

  She made his divorce sound normal and totally cured that dancing in his pants with just a few little words. “You sweet-talker you. How’s a guy supposed to turn that down?”

  “Have no fear. I probably won’t even need you the full two weeks. And since it’s fake, there’s little danger you’ll actually marry the next woman you meet. Although, given the rate you go through women, you’re sure to find one sooner or later.”

  “Better and better with every word.” Why had he let this woman in his house again? And why had she been watching his house closely enough to see how many women he had coming and going since he moved in?

  “In return, I’ll spread word among Bliss’s movers and shakers that you’re a decent guy with a good product and that Pepperoni Tony’s is worthy of being added to our preferred restaurant list.”

  He pulled the steak out of the oven, speared it with a fork, and slapped it on one of his mom’s old Polish pottery plates. “And?”

  “And what?”

  “And what else? You’re asking me to give up dating”—ha, dating, he had the world fooled, didn’t he?—“and go to a wedding and probably kiss you in front of your family, and all you’re going to do is say a few nice things about me.”

  “I could say not-nice things about you and get you blacklisted.”

  “But you wouldn’t do that, because you’re secretly a cream puff in a shark suit.”

  “Don’t try me, pizza man.”

  “You want to, don’t you?” He set his plate on the island, loaded down with steak and bread knots and sautéed beans and julienned carrots, and leaned his elbows on either side of it to put his face closer to hers. “You want to kiss me.”

  If she did, that desire was buried under about forty-eight layers of you wish, gag me, and no. “That line might work on your usual type, but I have absolutely no interest in engaging in any physical activity with you beyond the necessities to convince my grandmother to stay the hell out of my dating life for the next two weeks.”

  He was going to have to kiss her, if for no other reason than to annoy her.

  Hoped he remembered how.

  “And, unfortunately,” she continued, “Gran’s sharp. We’re probably going to have to feign deeper intimacy.”

  That party in his pants went into full rave mode while a string of his favorite foul words echoed through his head. The last year, he’d taken out friends’ sisters, his sisters’ friends, random chicks he’d picked up at the bar. Blondes, brunettes, redheads. Short, tall, curvy, slender. Waitresses and teachers. Scientists and business owners.

  Better off single anyway, the men in his family had said. Who wants one woman their whole life? Not a Cross man, that’s for damn sure.

  A different woman every night was what his brothers expected, even if it made his sisters roll their eyes. But not a single woman he’d taken out had done for him what this obnoxious woman was doing right now.

  He sliced too hard into his steak.

  “I can handle my grandmother if lunch today was a onetime deal,” Pepper said. “Whether we do this or not is your call. You have way more to lose. But since you started it…”

  Maybe he was looking at this wrong. Maybe he should be glad his equipment was coming out of hiding for Pepper. Wasn’t any chance he’d get attached. He could kiss her. Might even sleep with her. Take some pressure off.

  All the physical perks, none of the heartache.

  He dropped his knife, and it clattered to the plate. “We should practice.”

  Now that eyeball she was inspecting him with wasn’t quite so cocky. “Being nice to each other?”

  “I’ve met your sisters. I highly doubt they expect us to be nice to each other.”

  She laughed, a buzz went through his veins, and his groin throbbed so hard he might’ve flipped something vital inside out.

  “An unfortunately fair point,” she conceded. “We should get a contract drawn up.”

  Screw that. He stalked around the island. She was pretty, when she wasn’t harping at his cat or looking down her nose at him. He could do worse.

  “Chicken?” he asked.

  “Revolted,” she replied cheerfully.

  He didn’t believe her. And now he wanted to taste her. For the first time since he’d discovered just how much Tabitha didn’t love him, a woman was honestly intriguing to him.

  He wasn’t stupid—commitment and good taste in women didn’t run in his family, at least not on the male side—but a kiss wasn’t a promise of love and forever. She didn’t want either of those from him.

  She wanted an excuse.

  He hooked his hand behind her neck, watching those green eyes search his, wondering what she was thinking, what secrets she was keeping, and which one of them would regret this in the morning.

  She didn’t stop him.

  No, she tilted her face up and closed her eyes. “If we must, I suppose we must.”

  He brushed his lips across hers, a feather-soft touch of his sandpaper to her velvet. The air moved against his skin when her lips parted in a sharp inhale. Her hands settled at his waist, hesitant fingers barely touching his shirt. He cupped her smooth, hot neck, all that thick, silky hair teasing the back of his hand.

  She was warm and pliant, which he hadn’t expected at all. Gentle kisses to the corner of his mouth. A brush of her breasts against his chest.

  A groan rumbled in his throat, and he claimed her mouth like a savage beast.

  He’d missed kissing. Touching. Mating.

  Instinct demanded that he claim her. Mark her. Push her against the nearest wall and own her.

  Brand her with his kiss. Ignite her skin with his touch. Pleasure her until she was ruined for anyone else. So she’d never kiss another man. Never love another man. Never fucking look at another man.

  Never betray him.

  Never leave him alone.

  Never break him.

  She gripped him tighter and whimpered into his kiss, a mewling more sound that sent savage fire through his veins, but which also sent reality crashing into his chest.

  Not real, he reminded himself.

  A distant memory of a laugh trickled through his head. Not his own laugh. Tabitha’s laugh.

  He broke the kiss with a muffled curse.

  Pepper’s eyes were black as night, her lips swollen, her chest rapidly rising and falling. “Okay then,” she said. “Glad we got that out of the way.”

  His skin itched. His hair itched. His heart itched.

  He couldn’t do this.

  Not if he wanted to stay whole.

  She stuck her hand out, and on instinct, he took it.

  “Pleasure doing business with you,” she said. “I’ll call you tomorrow to discuss the details.”

  He blinked, and she was gone.

  Funny.

  Same thing had apparently just happened to his sanity.

  * * *

  Pepper was on her tiptoes, reaching for her hidden bag of chocolate chips and trying to forget Tony and his kiss and the suddenly overcomplicated task of pretending she liked him.

  That they were dating.

  Intimate.

  This was not what she needed to be doing right now. She needed to be taking it easy. Not stressing. Not adding crazy h
ormones to the mix.

  But she hadn’t been kissed in months, and she probably wouldn’t be kissed again for years, and if she had to give up kissing, that was quite the kiss to go out on.

  Probably good that it came from Tony. If it had come from a man she could’ve actually liked, she might’ve been in danger of wanting more.

  How many times in the last fifteen years had she gotten so wrapped up in a kiss, so wrapped up in a man, only to discover he hadn’t felt the same? In her early twenties, she’d dated older men. Responsible men with solid jobs who owned their own houses and drove dependable cars, because those men would make good husbands and fathers, and there was nothing she’d wanted more than to have her own babies.

  Not the way her parents had—crowded, rambunctious, and on a tight budget. Yes, there had been love. More than enough love and acceptance and encouragement. And she appreciated each of her siblings—even Cinna—more now than she ever had. But she still liked stability. Comfort. Excelling.

  In her late twenties, she’d begun to date men closer to her own age. She’d been working at a big-box bridal store in St. Louis, and while she’d done well there, she’d known something was lacking in her own career.

  Then, two years ago, she’d come to Bliss for Saffron’s wedding and ended up falling in love with The Aisle. This was the professional home she’d been looking for. Her boyfriend—the one she’d been sure had been the one, and whom she hadn’t taken to Saffron’s wedding just in case—had asked casually a week later if she minded if he asked one of her friends out, and the sudden shock of having it happen again had been what she’d needed to make the leap.

  She’d come to Bliss, asked around, discovered Nat’s father was talking about selling Bliss Bridal, and she’d never looked back.

  Except to occasionally wonder about where her love life would be if she’d put less emphasis on financial success and the image of the perfect life, and paid more attention to what her heart was telling her.