Maybe that should have been my warning, that it was all far too complicated to be anything but a mess. But the warning went unheeded, and I held my breath to see whether he'd agree with me.
Chapter 4
Grady
This was, without a doubt, the worst, most unprofessional interview in the history of the world. I'd hardly asked her anything of substance. Within two minutes of my bumbling attempt to recover myself, she'd effectively started interviewing me.
Steamrolled. I'd been steamrolled, and I couldn't even be mad about it.
She was so beautiful that it became increasingly hard to meet her gaze without feeling like I was gawking at her. On the phone earlier, I remember wondering what she looked like and how old she was because the tone of her voice was so soft and low, she could've been anywhere from thirty to sixty, and it wouldn't have surprised me.
But this woman—with her sharp questions, and her talk of spreadsheets, and her degrees that far outshone anything I'd managed to accomplish—was right around my age, and that was something horrible and wonderful.
I'd fully and completely doubted the existence of the legendary tales in my family about how quickly the Buchanans fell in love when they met The One. Yes, a huge part of that came from the fact that my own parents' marriage hadn't lasted, but even when my twin sister moved to town and fell ass over teakettle for Tucker and proclaimed him the unequivocal love of her life, I thought all the stories were total and complete bullshit.
But I couldn't deny a single part of it anymore.
Not with her sitting across from me, prim and proper in her bright yellow dress, while I managed to catalog the different smiles I'd seen in the past twenty minutes. Each smile, each shift and change and degree of realness I saw uncovered in them as we talked was like a dart that landed with unerring accuracy in the center of my chest.
The polite one when she walked in.
The excited one when she talked about her spreadsheets.
The amused one when I dropped my pen and couldn't form a single intelligent word because her presence had me so fucking tied up in knots.
Thunk.
Thunk.
Thunk.
Each one pinned my heart down just a little bit more with their sharp edges.
And as she stared at me expectantly, waiting for an answer, I knew it would be monumentally stupid to hire this woman. Because how was I supposed to be around her every day, see those smiles, and try to uncover the hundreds of others she kept locked up behind her southern manners without staring at her like a whipped puppy dog.
Yet knowing all that, having processed through it the entire time she easily manhandled this interview, I said the dumbest thing I could have possibly said at that moment. "The job's yours if you want it."
Maybe I should have taken it back. Maybe I should have told her that I needed to talk to Tucker first. But every single fiber of my being relaxed knowing that I'd be able to spend time with her, get to know her, and see her.
And the smile she gave me? I almost had to clutch at my chest to make sure I was still breathing. It was like watching a sunrise unfold over the mountains. There was slow disbelief to it, a warmth, and a sheer, bright, blinding happiness that she couldn't hide.
That smile didn't waver in the slightest when she spoke. "Have we both lost our minds if I say yes?"
"Probably," I admitted.
Her smile disappeared slightly in the wake of my honesty, but in those eyes, I could tell she was still excited. "Maybe we should talk things like salary and benefits."
Right. Because that's the kind of stuff normal business owners did when conducting a professional interview and not hiring people on the basis that they may or may not have just experienced a probably-made-up-phenomenon of love at first sight.
I could hardly stifle my horrified groan, which I quickly covered up by clearing my throat. "Yes, uhh, yes. Good idea."
I yanked open the drawer on the desk where I'd jotted down notes from my phone call with Tucker about this very thing. He and I had worked out some preliminary numbers based on how much the business had in savings, because we were both aware that having someone on hand full-time to manage the logistics would be the most important first step. In order for him to come on full-time someday, we'd need steady bookings. Not just steady, but more than I could handle on my own. And in order to do that, we’d need someone capable to run everything else. Both he and I were willing to forgo a salary upfront in order to make that happen.
After glancing through my notes, I snagged a piece of paper from the desk, scrawled out a number, and handed it to her. "This is what I can offer you right now."
She stared at it.
"As the business grows," I continued, like her silence demanded an explanation from me, "there's room for that to grow too, if you're worried about that."
Glancing up at me, she smiled again. "I wasn't."
"Good."
"That'll be just fine for me."
The way her accent curled around the words was adorable. That'll be became one word. Just was dragged out longer than I would've said it. And I wanted to sit like a freaking creep and listen to her talk all day. I could already imagine Tucker's face when he walked into the office to find me doing nothing except listening to her answer the phone. Talk about the weather. Recite the alphabet.
This was awful. No wonder my sister had turned into such a basket case over Tucker. I felt like little heart-shaped aliens had taken over my body, cranking the wheels of my thoughts into these strange directions that I hadn't even known existed before she walked into this office.
"Good," I said. That one simple word was all I could manage without looking like a fool. Or more of a fool, at least.
I shifted on the box, and that distribution of weight proved too much for the sturdy cardboard. The tape popped, the corner caved, and my ass sank into the middle, lifting my feet off the ground.
Lia stood off the chair. "Oh heavens, do you need help?"
My face must have been bright red for how hot it felt. Really, in twenty-six years, I'd never fumbled my way through an interaction with a woman like I was fumbling through this one. If she looked at me with anything other than abject pity, I'd be fortunate.
"No, I'm fine." And I was. Once I pushed up off the side of the box, it fell forward, and I tipped onto the floor. I laughed under my breath at the look on her face. If my sister were here with her camera, and she snapped a shot of that one facial expression, it would be titled, "bless his heart."
She'd schooled her face when I finally managed to stand, and again, with the way the light was streaming into the front windows of the space, she practically glowed. There wasn't a single flaw on her that I could see. Like someone, somewhere plucked individual traits from a catalog and crafted an impossibly perfect human being. Or at least my definition of one.
And now, I thought with a dawning sense of horror and excitement, I was her boss.
Lia glanced over my shoulder at the mess, and I chuckled at the look of anticipation I saw in her face.
"Am I that obvious?" she asked.
I held up my hand, pointer finger and thumb only about an inch apart. "Only a little."
"I can't start today," she told me, cheeks pinking slightly from my observation. "And I'll need to transition out of my other job over the next couple of weeks, but ... I'd love to come back tomorrow afternoon and start working through these boxes."
I scratched the side of my face. I really should've shaved. I probably looked like a hobo. "Sure. That works. Do you think we'll need actual inventory software?"
That sounded expensive, but of course, I had no gauge for most of this.
Thankfully, she shook her head. "No, a spreadsheet should suffice since I'll be the only one tracking it for now. But what would be great is if you could have a list of vendors for me on all this, login info for wherever you ordered, and I'll need access to all the places you're running ads so we can make sure we're hitting all the right places. And
do you have a connection with Made in Tennessee?"
"I ..." My head tilted to the side. "What?"
She smiled. "The visitor’s bureau publication. It's called Made in Tennessee. We should contact their office and see about placement in their booklets and on the website."
My heavy exhale made her eyes twinkle.
"I'm not overwhelming you yet, am I?" she asked.
This ... this was a question I could answer with the utmost honesty. "Only in the very best way, I assure you."
"Good." She lifted her chin. "I don't fail, Grady. I promise."
"I feel like I should salute you right now."
She laughed. "Let's check that impulse for now, all right?"
"Yes, ma'am."
She appraised me, and I found myself standing straighter, holding her gaze in a way I probably shouldn't.
"I'll be back tomorrow at three."
"I can't wait." Another truth. Another admission, and she had no idea.
I found myself holding my breath until she was clear of the door, and it had swung shut. She walked in front of the window, looking like the queen of Green Valley for the way she held herself.
"Oh, shit," I muttered. "What the hell did I just do?"
Chapter 5
Magnolia
It was a terrible habit, one that betrayed nerves and horrible decision-making skills, but I was wringing my hands like they were a dirty dishtowel as I walked slowly through downtown.
"Oh Lord, what have I done?" I mumbled.
Mumbling.
When Magnolia MacIntyre wrung her hands and mumbled in public, it was a sad day indeed.
A young couple from church passed me, and I brightened my smile. And with all the force I could muster, I forced my fingers to unclench. "How y'all doing today?"
With his arm wrapped firmly around his wife's shoulders, he nodded. "Miss MacIntyre."
"Magnolia," the wife said, "the dress is pretty as a picture."
"Thank you, Darlene." I waved.
As our paths intersected and then diverged, I felt my body relax. That state of tension—smile pretty, be pleasing, don't give them a single shred of ammunition not to like you—was a state I was very accustomed to. Working for my father, I didn't have much of a choice.
That was about how it felt to live in this town. People liked me despite who Daddy was. People loved my mother in the same way.
But in the safety and comfort of the home I'd been raised in, there was love. So much love. And I was about to walk into it and tell Daddy that I quit. Or ... give him my notice, if he didn't fly straight off the handle and land himself into complete irrationality.
The Chamber offices were dark. Whoever had been left behind after Candy's unexpected demise probably got the heck out of Dodge when I'd left to change before my meeting with Grady.
My smile now, thinking about that disaster of an interview, was easy and unforced. Working with him wouldn't be like working with Daddy. Underneath that fumbling charm, I got the sense that Grady was a man at ease with himself. And the idea of that was something I liked.
Unlocking the front door to the office, I found myself glancing behind me to make sure Grady wasn't out for a stroll himself. A guilty pang knocked through with the force of an out of tune church bell being hit with a sledgehammer. He wouldn't be happy with me. He might even fire me.
No. My chin lifted in determination. I was not a hand-wringing, mumbling girl who worried about getting fired because I withheld my last name in an interview. He hired me on my merits. And I'd keep that job, that low-paying job, because I was damn good at what I did.
As I walked back to my office, I kept the lights off. It was still bright enough outside that I didn't need any, and it made my life easier if I could manage to do this without any interruption.
My laptop fired up quickly as I crossed my legs under my desk. While it pulled up a new document file, I looked across my office to the framed picture of my family. Taken at my high school graduation, my diploma clutched in my hands and flanked by my parents, I was beaming.
My valedictorian speech had made the mayor cry, and my family made the most obnoxious display of whooping and yelling as I crossed that stage to move the tassel to the other side of that silly hat. They got away with it because my momma's side—the Boones—and my daddy's side—the MacIntyres—both had more money than God. No one would dare to chastise either of those families, giving my daddy a sense of power that he drank a bit too freely from, unfortunately. But no matter if he did or didn't, the smiling faces of my parents in that picture were full of pride, full of love.
My momma, in one of the rare instances I'd ever seen her dressed up in something other than jeans and a T-shirt, looked so glamorous it almost hurt. Like an actress walking a red carpet somewhere, effortless and stunning. My dad, clean-shaven at that time, was smiling so wide it seemed like his cheeks might crack open.
I sighed. This wouldn't be fun.
But my fingers flew across the keyboard, eyes focused on the screen now, because waxing nostalgic about a picture wouldn't help me.
It didn't take me long to finish, and when the printer slid the finished product into my waiting hands, I felt lighter than I had in months. Maybe even years, if I was honest.
The drive out to my parents' house probably should have filled me with dread, because as sure as Dolly Parton would be a saint in heaven someday, my daddy would lose his ever-loving mind at what I was about to tell him. But there was no band of pressure tightening inexorably around my chest. No sense of dread crawling with sticky legs up the back of my neck. Those were feelings I was accustomed to and had been for years.
In a strange way, Tucker ending our seven-year relationship was the first time I'd truly experienced that feeling of unexpected freedom from expectations. Not in a million years had I seen that coming. Because we'd planned everything out (all right, I'd planned everything out) from the age of seventeen, how our life would unfold together, when he saw a different path for his life, I'd been the one left blindsided.
The girl who prepared for everything was left stunned by a fork in the road she hadn't seen coming.
When the road curved toward my parents' house on Bandit Lake, the trees towering over me, I realized when I'd hit that fork in the road—single and surprised by it—I no longer had to conform to someone else's definition of what was right or wrong for my life, for fear of making an irreparable mistake that would somehow reflect poorly on me. That that mistake might make me look bad in the eyes of whoever decided to judge.
Even though no cars were behind me, I flipped on my blinker before I made the turn onto my parents' driveway. At the base of the gently curved driveway, the log cabin home I'd been raised in rose up like it was trying to compete with the trees around it. The peak of the roof was impressive. Maybe not in comparison to the Smokies, but it was a home that made you stop and stare nonetheless. From that angle, you couldn't see the best part, though, which was the side of the house that faced the lake and made almost entirely of windows.
Momma and Daddy paid someone to come in to clean those windows every other week because they wanted a clean, clear view of all that space they owned. People born into money, I was convinced, all had strange little quirks and foibles.
A wall of perfectly clean windows was theirs.
The house was quiet when I let myself in the front door, and I took a second to stare out all those windows. My daddy liked to tell the story that when he finally convinced my momma to marry him (after they'd been together for around fifteen years, and at the realization that they'd both enter their fortieth year on the planet as parents for the first time), she said she would as long as they lived somewhere where she felt like she was outside all the time.
I smiled because I saw her out on the end of the dock by the lake, casting her line into the smooth water. Other than the Bait and Tackle, it was the place we always knew we could find her.
Glancing down at my bright yellow dress, and then back out to he
r, in her standard outfit of faded jeans and a simple T-shirt, I marveled that she and I came from the same gene pool. She'd given me the color of my skin, my bone structure, and a healthy dose of her determination. Everything else was from my daddy and those etiquette classes I'd sat through.
"Magnolia," my daddy said, startling me as he appeared from down the hallway that led to their bedroom. "Didn't know you were coming by, sweetheart."
I let out a shaky breath and set the paper down on the granite, blank side facing up so that he couldn't see it.
He kissed the top of my head and opened the fridge. "Tea?"
"Please." I took a seat at one of the stools and watched as he poured two glasses of sweet tea.
"Your momma and I didn't have anything fancy planned for dinner, but if you're gonna stay, I'll whip something up."
My daddy was handsome, I thought, as I watched him peruse the contents of the fridge. His hair was dark with shades of silver growing in along his temples, his jaw strong and determined. When I was younger, I used to think that he looked like a movie star from the forties and fifties with a barrel chest, strong arms, and shoulders broad enough to carry the weight of the world.
And he had too. For both me and Momma.
"Don't go to any trouble for me." I took a sip of the tea and exhaled. Sometimes I thought sweet tea contained restorative powers.
He shook his head. "Nothing's trouble when it comes to my girls. How about breakfast for dinner? I can do pancakes and some bacon."
I closed my eyes and fiddled with the edge of the paper. "I need to talk to you about something, Daddy."
"Well, we can talk while we eat." He never pulled his gaze from the fridge. "Where you'd go this afternoon? I got out of my meeting with the mayor about the park cleanup day and your office was empty." Daddy stuck a finger in the air. "Remind me to go over the budget for that tomorrow. I told him we'd sponsor the supplies again this year, even though he promised he'd start getting donations. I told him he waited too long to get that rolling, but he never listens."
Steal My Magnolia (Love at First Sight Book 3) Page 4