Hiring Mr. Darcy

by Bowman, Valerie

  Mitchell was about five foot five inches tall, slim and fit, and dressed to the nines. He was in his mid-forties, but looked twenty-five, and he was the most adorable gay guy you’d ever see. He was witty, and smart, and so fun to hang out with. I had adored him from the moment I’d met him. I hoped Jeremy would like him too.

  Mitchell owned his own fabric store and tailoring business. He’d been born and raised in Milwaukee, but he insisted upon speaking with a slow, gentlemanly Southern accent that sounded as if he was perpetually sitting on a wraparound porch, fanning himself and drinking a mint julep. I thought the accent was cute. Harrison hated it.

  “Hi, Mitchell. This is Jeremy Remington. Jeremy, this is Mitchell Hanson. He’s a genius at inventing men’s clothing. Especially vintage stuff.”

  Mitchell curtsied. “How do you do?” he said in his faux Southern drawl, eyeing Jeremy up and down with unabashed interest.

  Jeremy bowed, which was so endearing I couldn’t stand it. “Mr. Hanson,” he said in a formal tone. “A pleasure.”

  I had to look away and pretend I was staring at something across the shop, my fist covering my lips.

  Mitchell raised his brows and looked at me. “Ooh, gorgeous and polite. I think we have a winner here, Miss Meggie. Not to mention he looks exactly like Darcy. Be still my heart.”

  Oh, great. Now Mitchell was in love with him too. Just like the waitress. I couldn’t take this man anywhere without him stealing hearts. I tugged on the lapels of my navy blue blazer, determined to be business-like today after blurting out far too much last night about Lacey Lewis and half-ass diets. “I’ve already told Mitchell everything we need for you, Jeremy. We just have to pick out fabrics that, er, complement your coloring.”

  Suddenly it felt very intimate to be discussing Jeremy’s coloring. I was trying to recover from the blush heating my cheeks when Mitchell leaned over and, in a stage-whisper, said, “You told me he was handsome, sister, but you didn’t say he was this handsome.”

  Before I could scowl at him, a small white dog came trotting out from behind the counter. The Maltese sidled up to Mitchell’s leg and he scooped her up in one arm, petting her back.

  “Who’s that?” Jeremy asked, pointing to the dog.

  “This is my bebe, Ms. Julia Sugarbaker.”

  “Oh, like from that TV show, Designing Women?” Jeremy asked.

  “Exactly like that,” Mitchell replied, his eyes widening with obvious respect.

  I, too, was impressed. There weren’t many straight men of my acquaintance who knew who Julia Sugarbaker was.

  “My mom loved that show,” Jeremy said, as if he could sense we were waiting for an explanation. “I see your Ms. Julia wears a scarf, too,” Jeremy pointed out.

  It was true. Just like her namesake often did in the show, Ms. Julia wore a tiny but fabulous scarf around her neck that Mitchell, of course, had sewn for her to fit perfectly. At the moment, however, I was less concerned with Ms. Julia’s scarf and more concerned with the fact that Mitchell had just embarrassed the everlasting crap out of me in front of Jeremy. I had told him that Jeremy was handsome. Handsome and taller than Harrison. Mitchell knew Harrison. He had made his clothing too, clothing that I wished I had not helped design, because now Mitchell had to make an entirely new wardrobe that would not only rival Harrison’s, but would beat it. And while he’d had months to create Harrison’s looks, he only had two weeks to create Jeremy’s.

  “I’ll be back in a moment, y’all,” Mitchell tossed over his shoulder. That was one of Mitchell’s quirks. He took breaks whenever he felt like it. “Ms. Julia needs her anti-anxiety meds.” He headed behind the counter and toward the back room with his dog in his arms. “Don’t worry,” he added in a singsong voice as he went, “now that I’ve seen him, I have some excellent ideas.”

  Mitchell disappeared and I was left to stand awkwardly next to Jeremy in the wake of the handsome remark.

  He wasted no time. “So, you think I’m handsome?”

  I stuck my nose in the air. “Don’t be conceited.”

  “Who’s conceited? Mitchell said you said it.”

  “It’s unsporting of you to point it out.”

  Still smiling, Jeremy folded his arms behind his back and strolled behind the counter, where he picked up a top hat and lowered it onto his head. He jauntily cocked it to the side with the flick of one finger. “Do I look like Beau Brummel?”

  Did he Google that too? But it made me laugh. “Not yet. You need a cravat. You shouldn’t be back there, you know.” I nodded toward the counter.

  “Who’s gonna tell on me?” he replied, a challenging sparkle in his eye.

  I shook my head and rolled my eyes.

  “You never skipped school, did you?” He leaned his elbows on the counter and contemplated me.

  I was a nerd. Of course I never skipped school. “How did you know?”

  “You’re not the only one who can judge a book by its cover.”

  I paused in my study of a bolt of emerald satin. “What?” I spun around to face him and narrowed my eyes on him. “Really?”

  “That’s right. I can read you like a book.” He pushed the top hat down farther on his head.

  “Oh, really?” I went back to studying the satin, but I was barely paying attention to it. Instead I was trying to sound nonchalant when I was actually slightly panicked. I wasn’t at all sure I wanted to hear what his interpretation of me was. But I couldn’t tell him not to say it. Not after I’d analyzed him last night. Turnabout was fair play, after all.

  “Yep, do you want to know what else I can tell?” Jeremy asked.

  “Okay,” I offered, wincing and mentally steeling myself for it.

  He took a deep breath before launching into it. “You probably have a bunch of anti-bacterial hand sanitizer in your purse, you always take the truth and never the dare, and you’ve never called in sick to spend the day rolling around in bed with a man.”

  Wow. It felt like the wind had been knocked from my body. He could tell all that from looking at me? It was the glasses. And the sensible shoes, no doubt. I pretended to be studying more fabric, but all I could think about was what sort of witty comeback I could possibly invent. I took a deep breath and shook my hair over my shoulders. “First of all, anti-bacterial hand sanitizer has probably saved my life more than once, and it’s hardly my fault if they sell them in convenient little sets.”

  “Holy shit.” His eyes widened. “You really do, don’t you?”

  “So what?” I put a hand on my hip, trying, and failing, at not sounding defensive.

  Jeremy straightened to his full height, the ridiculous top hat still sitting on his head. “You know what else I think?”

  I didn’t want to know, but I couldn’t very well not listen. “What?”

  “I think you put on this semi-mean act to get people to stay away from you.”

  What? What was he talking about? ‘Semi-mean act’? “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Is it?” He raised his brows.

  “I’m not mean, and I don’t want people to stay away from me.”

  “Okay.” He shrugged.

  “I’m serious. I want to get married. Have kids.”

  “Fine. What about the truth-or-dare?” he asked.

  I narrowed my eyes on him. I could tell he still didn’t believe me about the mean thing, but I’d clearly have to fess up to my love of truth vs. dare. “Did we ever play in high school? You and me?”

  “No.”

  I secretly suspected he must have known because anyone who played me knew I always took the truth. The truth was preferable to whatever dangerous, messy, or potentially embarrassing dare some silly teenager would come up with. The truth allowed you to remain happily in your seat and not muss anything. Yes. Truth. Always.

  “Then Luke told you?” I demanded.

  Jeremy held up a hand, palm-first. “I swear on my life he never has.”

  “Okay, fine. You’re right about that, too.” It disturbed me to thin
k I was that predictable.

  “Ha!” Jeremy clapped his hands together. Removing the top hat, he flipped it over in his hands and placed it back on the counter. “And playing hooky from work?” he asked in a deeper, huskier voice that made goosebumps rush up the back of my neck.

  “Miss me, darlings?”

  Oh, thank God. Saved by Mitchell and Ms. Julia. Because I’d have died from embarrassment if I’d have to admit Jeremy had been right about that last part, too.

  Chapter 10

  We spent three hours with Mitchell. Three long hours in which poor Jeremy Remington was measured from top to toe, poked, prodded, fitted, and futzed with, while all the while I held up a ridiculous variety of fabric swatches to see how well they would coordinate with his dark hair and swoon-worthy green eyes.

  With Harrison, we’d had to use lighter colors, pastels that complemented his fair complexion, blond hair and crystal blue eyes. But with Jeremy, we used bold jewel tones like sapphire, and ruby, and my personal favorite, emerald, which made his eyes glow. To his credit, Jeremy didn’t complain even so much as one time, and he charmed both Mitchell with his jokes and his general dashingness, and Ms. Julia with his scratches behind her ears. I was convinced by the time it was over that Mitchell wanted Jeremy to scratch him behind his ears, too.

  The entire experience had been quite a change, I noted, from Harrison’s stoicism during all of his fittings. Harrison hadn’t said a word unless it was to indicate his dislike of a particular fabric or to veto a certain look. Jeremy, on the other hand, talked and laughed and told jokes until Mitchell fanned himself and said, “I do declare!”

  Jeremy was a very good sport, and I appreciated it enormously. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought he was actually having a good time.

  “So, what is it you do, Mr. Darcy?” Mitchell finally asked him as he was measuring his inseam for the third time. I secretly suspected he was doing it for fun, and I kinda envied him.

  “At the moment, I’m working construction,” Jeremy replied.

  I winced. I could just picture Mitchell telling Harrison and Lacey, when they came in for Harrison’s final fittings, that I’d replaced him with a construction worker. I loved Mitchell, but Gossip was his middle name.

  “But he’s starting his own business,” I hastened to add, feeling crappy for even caring. What was it to Harrison if I’d replaced him with a construction worker anyway? It just stung, I told myself, because he’d replaced me with a gorgeous, famous actress. But I’d have plenty of time, specifically during our lunch the next day, to explain everything to Harrison. Maybe.

  “Your own business?” Mitchell said to Jeremy, his eyelashes batting a-plenty.

  “Yeah,” Jeremy answered, flashing me an inscrutable look.

  “What sort of business?” Mitchell asked.

  “Woodworking,” Jeremy said. “Custom woodworking.”

  “Oh, that sounds hot,” Mitchell said, giving me a jellie glare. “I do so like a man who’s good with his hands.”

  Jeremy looked as if he was about to choke, and I nearly swallowed the cap of my pen that I’d temporarily placed in my mouth while I jotted down the names and inventory numbers of the fabrics we’d chosen.

  Finally, the clothing ordeal was over, and we made our way wearily toward the door. Mitchell followed us, holding Ms. Julia under his arm.

  “Now y’all don’t worry,” Mitchell said. “I’m calling in all of my favors. My designer friends are pitching in. We’ll sew like the wind. Hmm. Sew like the wind? I like that. I think that’ll be the name of my autobiography.”

  “You’re writing an autobiography?” Jeremy asked.

  I shook my head. Mitchell came up with a new title for his nonexistent autobiography at least once a week. It was addictive. I’d started to do it too.

  “Not yet, sweetie,” Mitchell told him. “I’ve still got a lot more livin’ ta do.”

  I cleared my throat. “Yes, well. Thank you, Mitchell. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

  “It’ll be reflected in my bill, don’t worry,” he replied saucily, flipping the ‘open’ sign over and trailing us outside.

  “As I expect,” I said.

  Jeremy raised his brows.

  “You’re a nice friend,” Mitchell said to Jeremy. “To help Meg here in her time of need.”

  Jeremy merely smiled and nodded.

  “You are...friends, aren’t you?” Mitchell prodded, plucking at Ms. Julia’s scarf, and not meeting my eyes.

  Why that nosy little faux-Southern man! He was fishing for information. Information he would no doubt pass on to Harrison and Lacey. Damn it. Why did the best tailor in the state have to be such a busybody?

  Jeremy tugged the cuff of his dark-blue merino wool sweater down to his wrist. “Can you keep a secret, Mitchell?” he asked in a conspiratorial voice.

  Mitchell nodded so vigorously that Ms. Julia’s little scarf flew up. “Of course.” He used his free hand to cross his heart. The liar. He’d never met a secret he didn’t rush to spill.

  I folded my arms over my chest, waiting to hear what sort of a ‘secret’ Jeremy would tell him. Jeremy’s quick wink at me told me he was just messing with Mitchell, but he leaned down to Mitchell’s ear and whispered loud enough for me to hear, “The truth is I’ve been love with Meg for years, but she just wants to be friends.”

  “What?” Mitchell looked positively horrified. I’m sure I did too. Jeremy had gone too far. No one was going to believe Foxy here was pining for short, squat, nerd-alert me.

  “It’s true,” Jeremy said, with a wink to Mitchell this time.

  Mitchell glanced back and forth between us a few times, clearly deciding whether to believe the unbelievable.

  “It’s true, isn’t it, Meg?” Jeremy said. “Didn’t I ask you to dinner last night, and you kept turning me down?”

  “She didn’t!” Mitchell gasped and clutched his chest. His mouth opened in an O.

  “Yes, she did. I had to beg her. She relented after I told her it would only be for half an hour.”

  Mitchell shook his head. Ms. Julia looked a little affronted, as well. “Young women these days.” As if that was a complete sentence and explained anything. Plus, Mitchell was probably no more than fifteen years older than me. It’s not like he’d lived through the actual Civil War.

  “Isn’t it true, Meg?” Jeremy prodded.

  For my part, I stood there with my mouth partially open, blinking at the man. I didn’t know whether I wanted to kiss him or strangle him. He was certainly doing a good job of convincing Mitchell that he’d been secretly pining for me for years, and Mitchell was sure to tell Harrison, but on the other hand, I felt as if he was laying it on way too thick by making me lie along with him. Though I suppose when I really thought about it, it wasn’t technically a lie. He had had to convince me to go to eat with him last night. “It’s true,” I said curtly, wanting to run out the door and hide in the Jetta. “Let’s go,” I ground out.

  Mitchell and Ms. Julia slowly waved us off with a handkerchief as if we were going to war, and I hightailed it out to my car. Jeremy’s truck was parked close by but he followed me to my car.

  “He’s going to tell them you know,” I said.

  “Tell who?”

  “Harrison and Lacey.”

  “I know. I want him to.”

  “Thanks. I guess.”

  “You’re welcome. I guess.”

  I unlocked the car door with my fob and Jeremy promptly opened the door for me.

  I paused. “You don’t have to walk me to my car and open the door for me. Haven’t you seen my bumper sticker?”

  “The herstory one? Yeah, I like it,” he said. “And I wanted to walk you to your car. Besides, I thought you were an old-fashioned sort of girl. Like 1815 old-fashioned.”

  Despite my lingering anxiety, that made me laugh. “I study it. I don’t want to live it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Disease, no plumbin
g, racism, lack of women’s rights, and no HVAC. I could go on.”

  He leaned an elbow on the top of my opened car door. “If it makes you feel any better, I’d do the same for my sister.”

  “Do what?” I frowned.

  “Open the door.”

  Oh, great, he’d compared me to his sister. Any momentary insanity that had made me think he might actually be digging me vanished.

  “How much are the clothes going to cost?” he asked next without waiting for me to reply.

  “That’s for me to worry about, not you.”

  He opened his mouth to say something, but the door to the shop jangled open again and Mitchell stuck out his head. “I forget to tell you. Come back next Tuesday for your first fitting, and the Tuesday after that to pick up everything.”

  “Thank you, Mitchell,” I called back.

  “Don’t worry.” Mitchell waved his handkerchief in the air again. “I’ll be sure not to schedule you at the same time Professor Macomb and his actress friend are here. Oh my. That would be awkward, wouldn’t it?”

  Chapter 11

  Wednesday

  Harrison was sitting at our favorite table in our favorite restaurant at precisely eleven thirty in the morning. He was wearing his favorite ‘uniform’: a pair of khakis, a buttoned-up, stiffly starched shirt, and a jacket with corduroy elbow patches. His hair was swept away from his forehead with the smallest bit of gel, and he looked fresh-faced and rested. Meanwhile, I’d gotten a total of about four hours of sleep in the last several nights.

  It was a bit early for lunch, but we preferred to eat early. That way we bypassed the big crowds. We loved the little soup and bread shop on the corner of campus because it had quick, efficient service and yummy food. It was the type of place where you ordered at the counter, however, and Harrison had obviously already ordered because his water bottle was sitting on the table in front of him, and that meant he’d already paid.

  Keeping my face carefully blank, I waved to him to indicate that I’d seen him and then made my way up to the counter to order my own lunch. Soup and salad. V. healthy. Who cared if the soup was loaded baked potato? Half-ass dieter here.