His Little Black Book
Page 1
Look what people are saying about Heather MacAllister
“Witty, romantic, sexy and fun…and Heather’s books aren’t bad either.”
—New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd
“Curling up with a Heather MacAllister romance is one of my favorite indulgences.”
—#1 New York Times bestselling author Debbie Macomber
“Funny, fabulous, fantastic! Heather MacAllister is at the top of my must-read list.”
—RITA® Award winner and USA TODAY bestselling author Barbara Dawson Smith
“Smart, witty and fun…no one does it better than Heather MacAllister.”
—Award-winning author Amanda Stevens
“A one-sitting read for me. I got so caught up in this story that I really didn’t want it to end.”
—The Best Reviews on Male Call
“The plot was inspired, the dialogue was witty and the secondary characters were extraordinary.”
—Writers Unlimited on How to Be the Perfect Girlfriend
Dear Reader,
In September 2008, Hurricane Ike hit the Houston-Galveston area and I missed the whole thing. I was at a writing retreat in the Pacific Northwest and all I could do was watch the news reports as the storm headed for my family and friends. Everybody is fine and we had minimal damage, but I didn’t know for several days because there was no electricity, no phone, no cell service and no Internet. Oh, and no flights into the airport. I stood in line at SeaTac with thousands of other displaced passengers and discovered that it would be five days before I could get on a flight.
Christina Dodd and her husband, Scott, graciously took me into their home. So while my family was sweltering and cleaning up hurricane debris, I was suffering in perfect fall weather, sampling lovely wines, shopping and trying to feel guilty. His Little Black Book takes place during a tropical storm that will give you just a hint of what happens during a hurricane. Or so they tell me.
Best wishes,
Heather MacAllister
Heather MacAllister
HIS LITTLE BLACK BOOK
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Heather MacAllister lives near the Texas gulf coast where, in spite of the ten-month growing season and plenty of humidity, she can’t grow plants. She’s a former music teacher who married her high school sweetheart on the Fourth of July, so is it any surprise that their two sons turned out to be a couple of firecrackers? Heather has written more than forty romantic comedies, which have been translated into twenty-six languages and published in dozens of countries. She’s won a Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Award, RT Book Reviews awards for best Harlequin Romance and best Harlequin Temptation, and is a three-time RITA® Award finalist. When she’s not writing stories about where life has its quirks, Heather collects vintage costume jewelry, loves fireworks displays, computers that behave and sons who answer their mother’s e-mails. You can visit her at www.HeatherMacAllister.com.
Books by Heather MacAllister
HARLEQUIN BLAZE
473—UNDRESSED
To Christina Dodd and her husband, Scott.
Thanks for sheltering this hurricane refugee.
Contents
Prologue
Text and the Single Girl
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Text Appeal
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Safe Text
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Epilogue
Prologue
“JONATHAN?”
Emerging from his office, Jonathan Black did an about face and schooled his features to hide his impatience. He was on his way to discuss advertising strategy with a new client and it was Friday afternoon. Friday. Afternoon. The sooner the meeting was over, the sooner the weekend would begin.
“What’s up, Cammy?”
Cammy Phillips, his very unassuming, but very devoted, assistant smiled eagerly. “You know how you said to let you know anytime the beach house is vacant?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s about to be vacant. Adrian Dean is leaving early because of the storm warnings.”
“No kidding? What a wuss. Who else knows?”
“Just you.”
“Yes!” Jonathan pumped his fist into the air.
“And,” Cammy continued a little breathlessly, “I went ahead and reserved it for you.”
“You are a goddess among women!” He blew her a kiss.
She actually blushed.
Grinning, Jonathan wheeled around and headed to the conference room. This was great. Peck and Davilla Media Management owned a sweet beach house in Surfside, Texas, a little over an hour’s drive from the Houston office. Weekends when the house wasn’t being used for company business were rare, highly prized and often used as currency to get favors from Production. With more advance warning, that’s what Jonathan would do, but it was already three-thirty, so he’d just have to make the sacrifice and use the beach house himself. He deserved it after being scheduled for an initial client meeting on a Friday afternoon and he knew who had done the scheduling: Mia Weiss in the traffic department.
Mia, Mia, Mia. He shook his head.
He liked her and there was serious potential there, and the new short haircut actually looked sexy on her. Yeah. Short hair. Sure surprised him and he liked surprise. But. Yes, but. Mia had made it clear that she wanted more than good times. Jonathan didn’t want long term. He had enough trouble with short term. To be honest, she’d only asked for exclusivity. Eminently reasonable.
But when it came to women, Jonathan wasn’t reasonable. Didn’t want to be. Didn’t have to be.
So the late meeting was Mia’s way of messing with the start of his weekend. Nicely played.
Asking her to the beach house would be a waste. Time to move on. He’d have Cammy send her the usual lovely parting gift: a spa basket with an afternoon pampering certificate for a facial and a “mani-pedi.” A classy ending meant friendly exes. And since he had a lot of exes, life was much easier if they were friendly.
So, who was gonna be the lucky girl?
As he walked, Jonathan whipped out his iPhone and scrolled through his electronic little black book. He needed someone casual…spontaneous…hot. He needed Jennifer Allen, the bartender at Junipers.
Entering the conference room, he scanned the occupants—creative teams hoping for a crack at a new account, a guy from Production, a few interns and Ross, the senior art director and Jonathan’s preferred go-to guy. The client hadn’t arrived yet.
Neither had Sophie What’s-Her-Name, the ambitious junior copywriter who’d shown Ross up on Monday. She was talented, and she was cute, and she had focus. And a lot of nerve. Ross was going to have to watch her. Jonathan certainly was. He was mildly disappointed that she wasn’t here now, but he wasn’t surprised. Ross couldn’t have his junior staff hijacking client meetings, no matter how much the client liked their ideas.
But in the meantime, the beach house awaited. Jonathan thumbed a text message as a couple of interns set up the PowerPoint and Ross answered his cell. “Jonathan, reception says Terry Simmons is on the way up.”
Nodding to Ross, Jonathan spoke while he continued with the text he wanted to get out before the meeting began. “Could you go meet him at the elevator? Thanks.”
He quickly finished the message. Up for a hurricane party? Scored compan
y beach house for weekend! Might run late. Will meet you there. Pick up steaks and breakfast? Key code #3214.
He was in the process of highlighting “Allen, Jennifer” when out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ross and Simmons approaching and glanced up. First he noticed the funny look on Ross’s face and then he saw the stunning brunette who preceded him into the conference room. Behind her, Ross mouthed, “Terry Simmons.”
That was Terry Simmons? Terry Simmons was a woman? No, not just a woman. A Woman.
A womanly woman with impressive womanly parts that strained against the buttons of her blouse. Her hair was pulled back and she rocked the sexy square glasses she wore.
It was the naughty librarian of his fantasies. Of any man’s fantasies.
She tugged on her suit jacket and Jonathan immediately yanked his gaze northward and kept it firmly fixed on her face as he stood to greet her.
“Ms. Simmons, I’m Jonathan Black, Creative Director.” He smiled directly into her (alluring brown) eyes and grasped her (sensuously smooth) hand. He let an extra beat go by. Very important, that extra moment.
Rush the initial greeting and the client felt less valued and less inclined to approve campaigns. It was pretty much the same when approaching women, too.
“I’m here to learn all about you and what you want so Peck and Davilla can make it happen.” He spoke with a practiced, warm sincerity accompanied by a practiced, warm smile. Maybe he kicked the smile up a notch.
As he released her hand, Terry Simmons blinked behind her smart-girl glasses.
He pulled out a chair at the conference table. “Would you like some coffee? A soft drink?”
“Just water, thanks.” She smiled.
Was there a little added warmth in the smile? Why, yes, he believed there was.
Jonathan had a good feeling about this. As an intern poured water and everyone got settled, he returned to his seat and picked up his iPhone. If Jennifer couldn’t make it, perhaps the luscious Terry Simmons might enjoy a weekend at the beach.
“Jonathan?”
At the sound of Terry’s husky, seductive voice, he glanced up.
“I brought our current Flex-Time brochures to give everyone an idea about the company.” She pushed a bundle across the table. “I’m open to any ideas.” Her generous lips curved upward.
Open to any ideas. Message received. It’s good to be me. Quickly tapping Send, Jonathan pocketed his cell and reached for the brochures.
Had he not been distracted, he might have noticed that in his electronic little black book, “Allen, Jennifer” was perilously close to “ALL”—close enough that it would have behooved him to double check which line he’d highlighted before sending the text.
But he didn’t.
Text and the Single Girl
1
SOPHIE CALLAHAN SQUEALED and clamped her hand over her mouth. Her cell had just buzzed with an incoming text: Up for a hurricane party? Scored company beach house for weekend! Might run late. Will meet you there. Pick up steaks and breakfast? Key code #3214.
It was from Jonathan Black, Peck and Davilla’s handsome, charismatic, talented, dynamic, sexy and irresistible Creative Director. Sigh and double sigh.
Sophie read the message three times, just to make sure she hadn’t hallucinated it. Then she glanced around the room of copywriters, production artists, junior designers and image developers. In other words, newbies, all hoping to climb out of the pit. And it looked as though, she, Sophie Callahan, had just hauled herself over the edge.
No one else held a phone. Sophie waited, listening for buzzes and chirps. Had anyone else from the pit been invited to the party?
No? Then she’d really and truly caught the eye of Jonathan Black. And in a good way. Clutching her phone, she closed her eyes and exhaled, feeling relief more than anything. Relief that she’d accomplished a goal for which she’d sacrificed her entire social life.
For a year, she’d targeted Jonathan Black as the Creative Director she wanted to work with. For a year, she’d studied his past ad campaigns, analyzed his style, figured out which Peck and Davilla creatives he favored and studied their styles, and then put herself around them whenever she could. For a year, she’d volunteered for scut work and had done favors—many favors. She’d learned as much as she could and she’d given away ideas.
And the senior creatives had taken those ideas and used them as their own, especially Ross, one of the art directors.
That was okay. That was how the game was played. But Sophie knew when they used her ideas and they knew when they used her ideas. And after she disingenuously and publicly gushed her delight that they’d found her idea worthy, others knew it, too.
But it was her audacity during last Monday’s meeting that must have finally pinged Jonathan’s radar.
Ross’s team had been pitching the second time to a retirement developer who’d hated their first ideas. All of them. Jonathan was sitting in as they’d scrambled not to lose the account. Knowing this, Sophie had intercepted an intern from Production and offered to deliver last-minute mock-ups to the meeting.
And then she’d stayed, ignoring pointed glances and a long look from Jonathan.
Sophie had studied this campaign as she’d studied the others and she didn’t like it. It wasn’t all that much different from the first one. Ross and his team weren’t getting it, and Sophie could tell the clients didn’t think so, either.
The P&D team was treating the retirement community as though it housed relics from an ancient civilization. The people in the illustrations didn’t look like her grandparents. Her grandparents traveled, they volunteered—they went to the gym, for Pete’s sake. They didn’t spend their days sitting on a bench surrounded by azaleas and grinning goofily at each other like the couple in the picture Ross held.
And that’s when Sophie had laughed. The room had grown tense and silent and the small sound drew everyone’s attention. Not what she’d planned, but she brazened it out.
She gestured to the picture. “They’re so not my grandparents. My grandparents are all about use it or lose it.”
“And these two look like they’ve lost it,” one of the client reps said, which was exactly what Sophie had been going to say.
Aware of Jonathan’s sharp, unsmiling gaze upon her, she was glad she hadn’t.
“This is—” one of the Worthington (Because You’re Worth It) reps waved at the display and slumped in his seat “—depressing.”
“The presentation reflects the tone you told us you were going for,” Jonathan reminded them. “We stayed on message.”
“We said ‘upscale serenity,’ not ‘sit around and wait for the white light.’”
Jonathan interrupted the nervous chuckles. “So we don’t want to emphasize calm and peaceful.” He gestured for Ross to remove the storyboard. “Now we know. Don’t feel you have to stick with your original idea. Let us kick this around and come at it from another direction.”
The Worthington people exchanged looks and the rep spoke. “Jonathan, I don’t think we’re on the same wavelength.”
Wave. Sophie’s cue. “What about Ross’s cruise idea?” Which was actually Sophie’s idea. Which she’d just thought of.
“Cruise?” one of the clients asked.
Ross sent her a murderous glance and shook his head. “It was just a thought. It didn’t fit the Worthington image.”
But Jonathan had picked up on the client’s interest. “They want to go in a different direction. Maybe it fits now. Outline the idea for us.”
Heart pounding, Sophie was afraid she’d gone too far. “My grandparents are always saying they could live on a cruise ship, so Ross was thinking about cruising through retirement and making the ads all bright and peppy like a cruise line’s instead of lifeless and boring.” Oops. She hadn’t meant to say “lifeless and boring.” Never criticize the client’s idea. To his face. And never never never say anything negative about a pitch.
The Worthington people perked up. Ross, pro th
at he was, was already sketching out a few ideas. “When I saw the plans for your complex, I remember thinking that living there would be like being on a permanent vacation.” And he was off.
Sophie stayed quiet, aware that Jonathan was studying her. She met his eyes once and smiled before turning her attention to Ross’s extemporaneous presentation. Well, not all her attention. Jonathan wasn’t the type of man a woman could ignore.
After the clients had left, just when Ross had been about to lay into her, Jonathan approached. “Great save, Ross.” They exchanged a look. The other man gave a tight nod and retreated, but Sophie knew she’d hear about it later.
“What’s your name?” Jonathan asked her.
“Sophie Callahan.”
He pulled out his phone. “You’ve got balls, Sophie Callahan.”
“I—”
“Don’t ever do that again.”
She clamped her mouth shut.
His gaze flicked over her. “I need your contact info.”
Her voice sounding eager in spite of her best efforts, Sophie supplied it.
Jonathan entered her number and pocketed his phone. “You’re lucky the cruise angle worked.”
And did she say “thanks” and leave it at that? No. “It wasn’t luck. I studied the account and I researched the demographics.”
“Your grandparents,” he said dryly.
“And their friends.” She met his gaze. No use backing down now, even though her heart drummed so hard she could hear her pulse.
Something shifted in his eyes. He liked beautiful women, Sophie knew. Everyone knew. And he liked them with a certain sensual seasoning. Sophie was not beautifully seasoned. She was cute. And energetic. Not perky—energetic. There was a difference.