by Deborah Camp
Bedding Mr. Birdsong
A frolicking and sexy romance
By Deborah Camp
© 2020 by Deborah Camp
Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Other Books by Deborah Camp
A little birdy told me . . .
Beautiful women fly in and out of Matthew Birdsong’s apartment, but no one has a permanent roost there. Matt caged his heart after a bitter divorce. Zaney Miller, his neighbor, believes she can set Matt’s heart free to love again. But can she do it without falling in love with him and breaking her own heart in the process?
Acknowledgments
Cover design by Janet Drye
Editor: Joyce Anglin
Copyeditor: Pat Wade
Literary Agent: Barbara Lowenstein and Associates
Dear Reader;
I had so much fun writing this book for you! I do hope you enjoy it. Please visit my website at www.deborah-camp.com Subscribe to my newsletter while you’re there and look for me on Goodreads and All Author. I’d love to hear from you.
If you enjoy this novel, please leave a review of it on Amazon, Goodreads, All Author, Facebook, Twitter, and anywhere else you’d like as a courtesy to other interested readers. Thanks!
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of the author.
Bedding Mr. Birdsong
Chapter 1
M. Birdsong’s Revolving Door
Juggling her oversized purse that weighed a ton, a pair of heels to change into once she hit the office, and a tote full of fabric swatches and vendor catalogues, Zaney Miller emerged from her street-level apartment. With the toe of her tennis shoe, she blocked the scruffy mutt that was trying to exit with her.
“No, you don’t, Frito Pie. I’m off to work and you’re staying home today instead of going to doggy daycare. You know the drill.” She closed the door on Frito’s pug-nosed, snaggle-toothed face and locked it, then dropped her keys into the cavernous purse. Pausing a moment in the hallway, she breathed a sigh of relief when she heard no more growling, barking, and general fussing from her cantankerous canine roommate. He had more attitude than a Manhattan socialite.
The door catty-cornered from hers opened and a long-limbed, tousle-haired nymph slipped out. Batting her big, doe eyes, she held a clutch and a long silk scarf in one hand with a pair of Louboutin peep-toe pumps under her arm. She smiled shyly at a handsome man filling the doorway and shifted from one stockinged foot to the other. The man glanced at her as he buttoned his crisp, blue shirt.
“Thanks for calling a taxi for me,” the girl said, tipping her face up as if she expected a kiss from him. Instead, he looked pointedly at his expensive, gold wristwatch.
“I’m going to be late.”
“Oh. Right. Well, see you later,” she said, wiggling the fingers of her free hand.
He nodded and flashed a smile that was there and gone in a split second as he backed away. He used his shoulder to shut the door. In. Her. Face.
Zaney glanced at her own closed door. Yes, she’d done the same thing to Frito Pie, but Frito was a dog. Not a human who had slept over – intimately. Talk about your dick move. But that was classic M. Birdsong. She’d lived across the hall from him for about a year and had seen umpteen females flit out of his apartment. There were never any tender goodbyes. No “thanks for the sweet lay, babe.” No “I’ll call you (but don’t hold your breath).” Just a bang, slam, I’m-going-to-be-late-for-work-because-of-you-ma’am.
Funny, but she’d never actually met Birdsong. She knew his name from the mailbox. They’d occasionally eyed each other. It was odd, yes. But so was life most of the time in old New York. Zaney shook her head and did an eyeroll for good measure.
The nymph stared at the golden 1-A on the apartment door for a few seconds before she pivoted and noticed that she had an audience. Her brown eyes grew even larger in her wan face and she ducked her head as she glided toward the street door. Zaney had seen her before. She was a model, but not one she’d worked with. M. Birdsong went through a lot of models. They appeared to be his preference.
“Good morning,” Zaney said, refusing to pretend she didn’t see the girl slinking past her.
“Oh.” The nymph blinked at her as if she were surprised. Youngish. Twenty? Twenty-two? “Hi.” She tucked her chin against the base of her throat so that her long, straight brown hair curtained her face as she slipped on her pumps before scurrying away.
Shrugging, Zaney followed her out, but turned in the opposite direction toward East 38th and the Garment District. She had to admit that Mr. Birdsong intrigued her. Handsome as sin, he rocked finely tailored suits and perfectly fitted tuxedos. The man knew how to dress, and he had expensive tastes. Buff and bodacious, his blond hair had lighter blond streaks racing through it. She’d never been close enough to him to get a good look at his eyes, but she thought they were blue. Tall and tanned, he moved with a definite air of sophistication and athletic grace.
Birdsong in 1-A was fine. Except he was a man-whore. It was rare for a woman to exit his triplex more than a couple of times either early in the morning or very late at night. Yeah. Sometimes they didn’t even spend the whole night. Guess those girls didn’t score high enough for a morning bang. Oh, and sometimes he saw two women in one evening. One like around six and another one at ten. He really should install a revolving door and maybe a condom dispenser in his foyer, she thought.
She wasn’t a nosey neighbor, but her dog was. Frito Pie barked nearly every time he heard the door across the hall open. Zaney simply glanced through the peephole to see who was out there. Not that she was all that curious about who Birdsong was banging. It was just . . . just something to do. Sometimes she even knew the women, but she didn’t pop out of her apartment to shoot the breeze with them. That wouldn’t be cool since most of them were trying to make a quiet exit.
By the time she’d made it to Foster Mendoza’s Showroom, she’d decided that she needed to find a man to bed so that she’d stop spending so much of her time checking out her neighbor’s wanton sex life. She walked past the glass doors of the retail store on 35th Street and opened a lacquered red door next to it. A small foyer led to a staircase and she climbed to the second floor where Foster’s showroom and staff offices were located. As his lead dresser, she had her own small, tidy office a few steps from Foster’s huge, cluttered one.
“Zaney!” Foster called out to her. “Thank God, you’re here. Finally!”
She glanced at her Wonder Woman watch. Eight-twenty-eight. Finally? Dropping her tonnage purse to the floor and her other things on her desk top, she changed from her tennis shoes to her black suede heels before striding into Foster’s office where he, his assistant Dana, supervising seamstress Hailey and her assistant Gary, and head customer rep Jennifer were gathered around the double light table.
&nb
sp; “What’s up?”
Foster turned her direction and light from the ceiling cans swept over his carefully coiffed sponge curls. Beads of perspiration dotted his forehead. “Take a look. Jennifer brought in some sketches of Thom Garrison’s winter coat dresses. He’s copying me!”
Zaney wedged herself between him and Gary. “He’s showing these at Fashion Week?”
“He wouldn’t dare,” Foster said, dramatically. “Everyone will call him a thief.”
“He’s showing them,” Jennifer confirmed.
The four sketches on the light table all bore Garrison’s TF flourish in the right corners. Two were of coat dresses that had wide belts and narrow pinstriped lapels.
“Hmmm,” Zaney offered.
“Hmmm?” Foster repeated, fanning himself with a red, silk handkerchief bearing a green and yellow parrot motif. It went well with his buttery slacks and green, boat-necked shirt. Foster liked to stand out. “Hmmm, my pretty black ass! He’s a robber baron!”
“Hey, hey,” Hailey tutted, shoving her zebra-striped glasses higher on the long bridge of her nose. “I don’t want to hear that kind of talk this early in the day. Garrison’s design is similar, I’ll give you that, but these belts are much wider than ours. And ours were all in rich copper and hammered silver. These are tacky, shiny gold.” She made an icky face.
“They will interest some retailers,” Jennifer noted.
“Which ones? The Dollar Stores?” Dana interjected with a nasty smirk that got a hoot from Foster.
“He’s trying to change it up enough to be authentic,” Gary said in the droll way he said nearly everything. “What do you think, Zaney? For real.”
“I think that imitation is the highest form of flattery.” Zaney patted Foster’s shoulder. “Babe, this is so last year, right? Thom is Thommy Come Lately – again.”
Foster blinked slowly and then his plush lips stretched into dazzling smile. “Right! Oh, Zaney, dahling. What would I do without you?” He turned and gathered her in one of his infamous hugs, squeezing the actual breath from her lungs. She beat his upper arms with her fists, making him let go of her before she passed out.
Brushing down her dark gray blouse that had ridden up out of the waistband of her black trousers – basically, her work uniform – she inched away from her boss. “Okay! Now that the catastrophe has been averted, I have a private showing to prepare.” She sent Foster an arched look. “Bella Savoy is arriving at ten, remember?”
“Oh, yes!” Foster clasped his hands in a fit of star-love. “She’s one of my favorite new actresses. I saw her last week in the one where she’s a queen . . . or a princess, I guess.”
“The Duchess of Pennoir,” Gary supplied. “And she’s a duchess who falls in love with a horse trainer.”
“That’s right.” Foster nodded. “I loved those riding habits she wore. And that dressing gown! The silver one with red flocked swans on it!”
“I drooled over that one,” Dana said.
Zaney retreated along with the others, except for Dana who stayed at Foster’s side to swoon over the rest of the film’s costumes. Back in her office, Zaney opened her purse, rummaged about for a tube of lipstick, and stood in front of the oval mirror behind her desk to apply the peachy shade that went well with her red hair. Tawny/gold eyeshadow accentuated her green eyes. Having been described as “cute” by quite a few men, she accepted that label, although she knew how to make herself pretty when necessary. Working in the theater and fashion industry gave a girl some skills, after all. She flipped the ends of her hair back off her shoulders and then plucked fitfully at her bangs for a few seconds before giving up on them.
“I heard that Bella is a little diva with a huge ego,” Gary said as he stepped into Zaney’s office and leaned back against the doorframe. Dressed in jeans, a black t-shirt, and black biker boots, he looked more like a rock band member than a tailor.
“Sort of like you?” Zaney teased, dropping the lipstick back into her purse.
“Exactly,” he agreed with a snort. “You should have seen one of the guys who hit on me last night at the Red Light. He looked like he just graduated from high school. I swear! He even had pimples.”
“Did you send him home to his mother?”
“I let him buy me a drink before I showed him all the numbers I’d already been given and that he was way, way down on my ‘hit’ list.” He grinned, showing off his dimples. When Gary went bar hopping, he had guys swarming him like they were joints and he was the only lighter in the room. “Did you go out anywhere this weekend?”
“No. I wanted to finish reading a book. It’s on the bestseller list and it’s so—.”
“You need to go out, Zaney. You’re going to wake up tomorrow and be forty and wish you’d screwed more guys and read fewer books about girls screwing guys.”
She made a face at him. “I’m meeting Lonnie for drinks tonight at E Station, smart ass.”
He chuckled and the sunlight streaming in from the floor to ceiling windows winked off the small gold hoops in his ears. “Hey, hey, let’s watch that language this early in the day!”
Zaney shooed him with her hands. “Go sew something.”
It was a typical late Friday night at E Station. Most of the patrons were in their twenties and thirties along with a few older guys on the prowl. The older ones always seemed to be attracted to Lonnie. They’d eye her lush curves appreciatively and wink at her from the bar.
“Why do I attract the pervs and old guys?” Lonnie O’Grady moaned, smiling at the waitress who set a mojito in front of her and a lemon drop martini on Zaney’s cocktail napkin.
“Hey, don’t knock all of them. Some of these older guys are loaded,” the waitress said with a grin. “Can I get anything else for you two?”
“This will do for now,” Lonnie said, sending the server off to quench other thirsts. She sampled the drink before she said, “I don’t care how much money they have, I want someone closer to my age.”
“Me, too.” Zaney hummed her appreciation of the flavor intense drink. “I love these.” She adjusted her backside more comfortably on the tall stool. “So, how was your week? Anybody call in sick?” Resting her chin in her palm, she prepared to hear about her best friend’s busy and fun life as the swing dresser for Oklahoma! It was an important job that Zaney had never been asked to do. Lonnie had to know all the costume changes for every character so that she could step in if any dresser was unable to work.
“Not this week. Amy was back after her dental surgery, so it was calm for me. I assisted everyone.” She shrugged. “Back to normal for now. We’re still packing them in. Tonight it was sold out. Same thing for tomorrow and it’s more than two-thirds full for Sunday’s matinee.”
“It’ll be a sell-out by curtain time.”
Lonnie nodded her agreement as she took another long pull of her drink. “Do you ever miss it?”
“The theater? Oh, sure, I do.” Fleeting memories of backstage chaos chased through Zaney’s mind. “But I love working for Foster. And I especially love the hours. I’ve been off work since five-thirty and you finished only half an hour ago.” She tapped her watch, indicating that it was after eleven.
Lonnie rocked her head from side to side and her long, curling, brown hair fanned over her shoulders. “Right, and you don’t work again until Monday morning. I’ll be hard at it all weekend. I think I’d really miss the whole theater scene, though. It’s in my blood. Should be in yours! You were practically born in a trunk.”
“Not quite.” Zaney laughed. “But close. I guess that Mom passed the dresser bug on to me, but not the theater bug. I enjoyed working backstage with all the actors, but fashion shows have their own brand of excitement. I dressed models for a private showing for Bella Savoy today.”
“Oooo. How was that? Is she bitchy or nice?”
“I wasn’t around her, of course. I was behind the scenes, but the models said she was in between. Kind of nice and kind of snotty. She ended up selecting a few pieces. I thi
nk she spent about forty thousand.”
Lonnie faked a cough. “Christ on a crutch! Those movie people make way too much dough. How are they so much better than theater actors? They aren’t. Not even as good most of the time.”
“Foster is having a tag sale next month. You should come the night before and get a couple of things.”
“Yeah. Great idea. You think there will be any in my size?”
“Not many. The stores don’t order as many plus sizes, so we don’t have much surplus of them. But there will be a few. That’s why you need to come the day before.”
“I love him for remembering us size fourteen and sixteen gals.”
“Foster makes clothes for every size.” Zaney smiled, proud to represent him. “He started designing and making his own clothes when he was nine because he refused to shop in the ‘Stout Boy’ section.”
Lonnie laughed and then straightened, spotting someone across the crowded bar. “Hey, I think I know that woman over there. Wait . . . yeah! It’s her.” She slid off the high stool and waved a hand over her head. “Carin? Hi!”
An attractive blond in pink jeans and a burgundy wrap-around blouse maneuvered through the crush of bodies to them. She wobbled a little on her nine-inch strappy heels and reached to grip the edge of the table as if it were a life raft and she was on the verge of drowning.
“Lonnie O’Grady, where have you been keeping yourself, girl?” She flung an arm around Lonnie’s neck and gave her a quick side-hug.
“It’s been ages since I’ve seen you, Carin.” Lonnie motioned for her to sit on the vacant stool at their table. “Join us. This is my friend Zaney Miller. Carin and I went to Columbia together. Last time I saw you, you were teaching English at a private school.”
“God, that was a lifetime ago.” Carin hitched up on the stool and waved over a waitress. “Can I have a glass of Chablis? Thanks, hon.” She turned back to them, glancing at Zaney. “Nice to meet you . . . was it Zaney?”