All Shook Up

by Ashley Bostock

  In a business sort of way.

  Although…physically being under him wouldn’t be bad.

  Like, not bad at all.

  “She belongs in an adult novelty store – not a lingerie boutique. Is she the buyer? She needs lessons, girl.” Arabella leaned into Jillian’s side and slung her arm across Jillian’s shoulders. “You’re going to have to show her the ropes. Number one on how to dress more fashionably.”

  “Oh, stop. She wasn’t that bad.” Jillian burst out laughing. “Okay, she needs some lessons in fashion and maybe in how to run a store.” Jillian admitted. Of course she was being prematurely judgmental. She didn’t know how well Rebekah ran Lacie’s Lingerie. She only caught a glimpse the few minutes they’d been inside.

  But the red plaid tank top and leopard-print pants Rebekah wore proved she needed help in the fashion department.

  The girls laughed together and Jillian loved how good it felt to be around Arabella. The Arabella she was when Derrek wasn’t around. The funny, light-hearted, I-don’t-have-a-care-in-the-world, loving Arabella.

  “I hope you aren’t too mad that I took you over there,” Arabella said on their walk back to Jillian’s.

  “No. I’m not. It hurts. Seeing the place and how he decorated it and repainted it – it’s beautiful. But the way the colors—”

  “Wait. Who is he?” Arabella asked.

  “Cole Carrington.”

  “You’re seriously giving him props? Your heart holds no grudges.” Arabella raised an eyebrow.

  They arrived at Jillian’s and she unlocked her door, ushering Arabella inside. She glanced at the clock above the sink to ensure Arabella would still have plenty of time to get home.

  “Fine,” she groaned. “The man is smoking hot. Like the drop-dead kind that you only see on the cover of magazines. And even though he kicked me out—well, technically didn’t renew a month-to-month—I sort of haven’t been able to stop thinking about him. And no, I’m just not into the blaming and holding grudges thing. He didn’t have to renew my lease. That’s why you sign leases so the option is available to renew or terminate.”

  “Have you Googled him?” Arabella asked with a wicked glint in her eyes as she made herself comfy on the couch.

  “No. Because he made it pretty clear that we weren’t going to be seeing each other after that one day. What good would it do?” she asked Arabella, who already had her phone out, tapping the screen. And now he was going to be her boss’s boss. Her boss.

  “Whoa, whoa. Forbes top-ten.” Arabella jiggled her phone in her hand toward Jillian.

  “Scoot over.” Jillian jumped onto her loveseat next to her sister, trying to catch a view of the striking man.

  “Hmmm. Looks edible. He’s rich. Oh, he owns Vintage Violet’s? Get out! I love that store!” Arabella exclaimed. “I shop there all the time.”

  “And Apple Bottoms! I had no idea,” Jillian said a little breathlessly. “How did he get into women’s fashions?” Then she looked at Arabella, who suddenly looked serious too.

  “Is he gay?” Arabella asked at the same time Jillian did.

  “Don’t tell me he’s gay,” Jillian grumbled as her shoulders sagged with despair.

  “Let me see. Won Women’s Wear Designer of the Year. Blah blah blah. Fashion Design of the Year Award. Nothing about relationships.”

  Jillian pulled her hair up into a ponytail and lay sideways on the couch, nestling her feet on top of Arabella’s lap.

  “No,” Jillian said. “He’s definitely not gay. Not with the way he looked at me. Not with the way he caressed my lingerie. He kept fingering it like he could envision some lucky woman wearing it.”

  “Bi?” Arabella squawked.

  Jillian looked at the ceiling in thought. “I don’t think so.”

  “Ah, wait. Right here. Mr. Carrington has not been seen with his usual arm candy since the unfortunate and untimely death of his sister Francesca Carrington.”

  “Oh, no. What happened to her?”

  “It doesn’t say.” Arabella darkened her phone screen. “I have to get going. Thanks for not being too mad at me over today. Call me and let me know what your first day is like, okay?” Arabella said.

  “I’m not mad. Believe it or not, I’m hoping it might actually teach me a thing or two about why my business was a failure.”

  “What? It wasn’t a failure. You didn’t close it down because you weren’t making income.”

  “No,” Jillian said. “But I didn’t have enough of a cushion to relocate. Shouldn’t that be a given for any successful business? To have a cushion?”

  “Who knows? Call me tomorrow.” Her sister leaned in and kissed her, pulling her in her arms.

  “I love you. Call me if you need anything. Take care of yourself, alright?” Jillian released Arabella and watched her as she walked outside and down the front steps. Arabella turned and gave a small wave.

  “Life’s been good lately. Talk to you tomorrow, Mom.”

  Jillian rolled her eyes and watched Arabella head in the direction of the Light Rail. Jillian hated the bad feeling she got in the pit of her stomach from her sister’s parting words.

  Somehow, all good on the home front, meant that it wasn’t going to be good for long.

  Chapter Four

  “Seriously. Can you tell it’s me?” Cole asked Michael, as he looked out the bank of windows in Michael’s office, trying unsuccessfully to see his image. Michael Vilander was the founder of Together.com – a highly successful matchmaking business and he and Cole had been friends since college.

  “I told you already. No. I still don’t get why it has to be you that has to go undercover. You realize how hard this is going to be?” Michael asked, as he looked at Cole with a critical eye.

  “It can’t be that difficult. That TV show does it all the time and no one ever knows until the end.” Cole walked over and studied his reflection in the mirror.

  His new reflection, that was.

  He’d darkened his hair so it wasn’t his usual light brown and had completely grown out his facial hair. His personal shopper had bought an array of newsboy caps for him to wear every day he was on the job, as well as a wardrobe that he generally wouldn’t be caught dead in, but Carlos had insisted the style was all the rage. Cole’s brown-colored contacts hid his most-recognizable feature – his one-of-a-kind green eyes. He’d added a pair of reading glasses and donned a fake pair of earrings on each lobe. He thought he looked different; wouldn’t someone who didn’t know him very well not be able to recognize him at all?

  “Yeah, but you’re going to have to be someone else,” Michael said.

  “True. But I don’t have to work too hard at it. I’ve met Rebekah only a handful of times—Raymond hired her—and she has since hired a new assistant. It should be a breeze.”

  “Surely, you have better things to do. Your time is more valuable than this,” Michael said. Michael didn’t agree with Cole’s plan to go undercover in Lacie’s Lingerie as a way to see what needed to be done to improve sales. There were two locations—the one in LoDo and another in North Denver—that were struggling and Cole wanted to give them a chance before shutting the doors on them.

  “My time is valuable but so is my money. It’s my duty to see what the hell is going wrong in there. It can’t be the locations. The one in LoDo has excellent foot traffic as well as real traffic, every damn day. I can fix this.” Cole sprawled himself out on one of Michael’s office chairs and kicked his feet up on the other man’s desk.

  “Are you bored?” Michael came around and sat on the other side. He leaned back and laced his fingers together, covering his eyes. “Maybe you’re burnt out.”

  “Dude, I’m not bored or burnt out. It’s something new. But it’s also something that I’m determined to fix. A new challenge.” Yes, his job came easy to him and now that it was as big of a corporation as it was, he had people that worked for him. He was looking for a new challenge to spice up his monotonous days of dealing with problems. Wh
ere were the days when he got his hands dirty?

  “When do you have to be over there? I can’t keep looking at you. It’s creeping me out.”

  “Ha! So it is working?” Cole smiled.

  “Yeah,” Michael admitted. “It’s working. You didn’t have to add the earrings, did you?”

  Cole reached up and touched his earrings. “Carlos said it automatically alters one’s opinion about you. So these will throw people off right away.”

  “Then I applaud Carlos; it’s throwing me off. Have you heard anything about the complex?” Michael asked changing topics.

  Cole sighed. “I was going to wait until our meeting Friday. But since you asked, I’m getting a shit-ton of crap from the city. So far nothing good. As a result, everything has been put on a temporary hold.”

  The pussy-footing around infuriated Cole to no end. It was as if no one in that damn Zoning and Planning department could make a decision. As such, the city didn’t seem to care that there were women out there needing a place like this. Right now. Yesterday. But his hands were tied. Mostly. It didn’t stop him from calling every day to push.

  “How long of a temporary hold?” Michael’s voice rose an octave.

  “Not long.” Cole vowed. “Ross said he’d be happy to look into it. I’ll let you know if I hear anything in the meantime. Otherwise, see you Friday.”

  Cole walked out of his office and saw Regina, Michael’s grandma—who was also his secretary—was sitting at her desk. “Hello, Regina.” He tipped his cap at her and her eyes widened. Had she nailed it?

  “Have a nice day, sir.”

  Nope.

  He winked at her. “Will do.”

  He knew this undercover thing was going to be easy. He’d thought about it a lot, too. He’d been hesitant at first – for all the obvious reasons. He didn’t want to get caught. He genuinely wanted to figure out what was wrong with Lacie’s Lingerie. Not all the designs were the company’s, but usually having a mixture of women’s lingerie—from racy to subtle—was always a hit because any woman could shop and feel at home.

  Another thought that kept niggling at him, was the fact that Jillian Winters didn’t seem to have a problem with her lingerie store there. Granted, she had told him that she didn’t have the financial resources to relocate into a similar location, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t any good.

  He’d looked in to it.

  She’d made enough to support the store and take home a paycheck. She’d also had a part-time assistant when she couldn’t be there constantly. But there was nothing unusual that she had done and what he was trying to do.

  Except for the toys, perhaps.

  He groaned as he walked the few blocks toward Lacie’s. Jillian’s toys. That had a nice ring to it. The thoughts the term evoked in him was something he wished he could have been able to explore with her. She was the first woman in a long time that got his head spinning.

  Something fierce.

  It wasn’t like she had a lot of toy products for sale. The ones she did were efficient though. She hadn’t gone overboard on stocking it with smaller, less saleable items. She’d stuck to the basics.

  Maybe that was his problem.

  He shuddered a little.

  Lacie’s Lingerie was built on a certain reputation and hot pink dildos that mimicked the size of what was in his pants, wasn’t part of that equation. He’d have to find other ways to make Lacie’s bottom line positive.

  He studied the outside of the store front. It looked great. The paint made it pop but still echoed the feeling of sultriness. When the place had been empty just after Jillian had moved out, he’d come in and had made a list noting the changes he’d wanted done. He didn’t like the vinyl lettering—too small—and he immediately pulled his phone out and typed in a note to get them changed.

  The woman expecting him today, Rebekah Cannon, had run the Lacie’s Lingerie in North Denver for three years. At the time she had been hired as the store manager, she had been the mother of one of his new trainees, Rocky Cannon. Rocky had gotten caught stealing from Deluxe Posh and as a way to help him out, instead of firing him and turning him into the police, Cole had hired Rocky on permanently. Cole hadn’t wanted to turn him over to the system. Once Rocky claimed he stole because he was trying to help his mom since she’d lost her job, Cole then hired her, too.

  After that incident, Rocky hadn’t so much as gotten a traffic ticket the entire time he’d worked at Deluxe Posh. The kid had since gone to college and was now the general manager for a local fast food store and Rebekah still worked for Cole.

  If it was her that was mismanaging the store, then he needed to know. Raymond hadn’t thought so when Cole asked. Raymond had nothing but good things to say about Rebekah. But that was the problem in business.

  People had a way of making themselves look good when their performance wasn’t up to par. That was how good, unsuspecting people got away with embezzlement.

  Cole pulled his hat tighter to his head and stilled his beating heart. Rebekah was expecting him – well, she was expecting Levi Clark. He quickly ran through what he’d rehearsed. He was Levi Clark. His job at Lacie’s Lingerie was part of an internship with another company in Nevada. His boss, Norman Coldwell, had collaborated with his best friend Raymond and decided Levi’s placement would be best here. What was his placement for? He was in training. He was going to open a franchise of Norman’s in Reno and Norman wanted him to get the experience of what it was like to work at other stores – to gain a broader understanding of the retail industry as a whole as well as the lingerie business.

  Solid.

  He hoped.

  Cole pushed the door open and immediately noticed there wasn’t anyone at the register. A quick glance told him there wasn’t a soul anywhere. What the hell? Elvis Presley’s sultry voice drifted from the sound system as he sang “Trouble” not to be confused with his other song “T-R-O-U-B-L-E” and Cole bit his tongue forcing himself not to sing along. It wasn’t like he was a diehard Elvis fan and he wasn’t proud that he knew the difference between the two songs, but the only reason he knew the song playing was because of his mother and her affinity for the motion picture King Creole. The door swooshed shut—no bell—leaving him slightly unsettled. If you weren’t at the register, say if you had to run to the bathroom, then how would you know if a customer came in? How would you recognize a potential threat if you hadn’t been aware anyone came inside? Rule number one in retail for him or least near the top, if not rule one.

  He carried himself with ease so his footfalls were quiet against the wooden floor as he ventured inside. Cole moved around the storefront first and finding no one, which was irritating him even further, he began to ascend the stairs when holy shit!

  The one woman who’d had his thoughts tangled up for the past two months came rushing down the steps in a flurry of heaven-sent beauty carrying a box in her hands.

  Jillian Winters.

  What in the hell was she doing here?

  Her hand flew to her chest. “Oh my gosh! You scared me. I’m so sorry. I hope you weren’t here long,” she said in a rush as she passed him and made her way to the front counter. “I need to put a bell on the door.”

  “Not long,” he said equally annoyed and amused.

  “Oh, good. I’m sorry again. It’s just been crazy here the past two days and I’m trying to figure everything out.”

  “No problem,” Cole answered. It was difficult not to ask the questions that were on the tip of his tongue. First being, you realize this isn’t The Peekeasy, right? Secondly, what was she doing here and what did she mean by “crazy here the past two days?”

  Of course he didn’t ask anything though.

  She started taking a variety of panties out of the box, setting them on the counter. She glanced up at him, her grey eyes swirled with a mixture of stormy colors and he couldn’t describe how thrilled he was to see her again, even if it was under these circumstances.

  “Is there something I can help y
ou with?” she asked.

  Good. She didn’t recognize him. Or if she did, she was acting like she didn’t.

  “I’m Levi. I’m here to help Rebekah.”

  Thankfully, he’d taken drama in high school and still remembered the vowel charts he’d practiced over and over with Mrs. Morgan. He’d mastered dialects and accents like it was nobody’s business, which helped him win the part of Jack in The Importance of Being Earnest. Otherwise, if not for Mrs. Morgan, he was sure Jillian would catch on fairly quickly that he wasn’t who he claimed to be.

  At the mention of Rebekah’s name, Jillian’s face turned sour. She inhaled deeply and released the air on a loud sigh. He knew the look. His mother was good at perfecting the look of exasperation.

  “She left.”

  “Left? As in for lunch?”

  “As in ‘Adios.’ Never showed up yesterday morning and when I finally managed to find the regional manager’s number, he said not to worry. That I’d have help soon enough. You’re the help, I take it?” She scrutinized Cole once again and he nodded. Had he missed a call from Raymond? A text that Rebekah had bailed? Seemingly satisfied with the way he looked, she extended her hand to him.

  “I’m Jillian Winters. I don’t know how I got into this mess. Well, actually, I do. But you probably don’t want to hear all of that. At least not right away. Anyway, Rebekah quit and left me with the store and I just started a week ago. So, it looks like you and I can find our way together, right?”

  Even frazzled, Jillian was enchanting. She shook her chestnut locks away from her face and used her arm to wipe the light sheen from her forehead, taking in another deep breath.

  “Sure,” he said smoothly. “We can do this together. Where do you want me?”

  He was thinking of a few places he’d like to be, as she stared at him thoughtfully. So she started here a week ago? Was she a glutton for punishment? Out of all the jobs around here, she wanted this one? Then Cole had a messed up thought that maybe Jillian was here to try to sabotage his company. Well, first things first. If he was going to be working here, and she was going to be working here, then he’d have plenty of time to get to know her.