Just Marry Me Already (BWWM Romance Book 1)

by Ayo Campbell

  Hallie didn’t have the best luck with that. She was friendly, and fun, but had an extremely low level of tolerance for bullshit.

  Most men seemed to be full of bullshit. At least, most men she met, and the ones her friends set her up with, were almost off the scale as far as bullshit was concerned.

  “You must be a very happy man, Alfred,” said Hallie, a bit wistfully.

  “That I am, Miss Holt.”

  “Please, call me Hallie. It looks like we’re going to be stuck here a while, so we might as well be on first name basis.”

  “You have a business meeting of some sort to get to?”

  Hallie smiled.

  “I’m afraid so. I work for a catering company. Newly promoted to manager, though I still have to work the events, too. I don’t mind that, it’s fun.”

  “Must be a fancy event of some sort if you have a meeting in Upper East for it.”

  “It is, actually. I can be fancy when I have to be. I need to lie down with a cold cloth over my eyes for a while to get over it later, but I can be fancy.”

  Alfred chuckled. Hallie thought she could hear a faint hint of that beautiful Irish lilt in his voice once he loosened up.

  “When’s your meeting, Hallie?”

  She checked the time and winced.

  “In exactly twenty minutes. I’m meeting my boss to go over everything first, and then meeting the client. It’s not the end of the world if I’m late now, but I hate to be late. And my boss hates it. Not the best impression to give after a new promotion, don’t you think?”

  “Well, let’s see if we can get you there on time or thereabouts. I know a few tricks.”

  “That would be just fine if you did,” agreed Hallie.

  “Are you Irish?” Hallie had to ask.

  “Never set foot on that island, but on this island, I sometimes still feel like that one’s home. My grandfather came over here, and we settled here. Made good lives for ourselves. But I grew up listening to my grandparents talk about home, so I feel like it’s home, sometimes.”

  “I hope you can go there, with your family, and spend some time finding a new one. Or old one, depending on how you look at it.”

  That made Alfred smile, and work whatever magic he managed, because in twenty-two minutes, she was at Café Mocha.

  “Wow, that was incredible, Alfred. My love to your Mary Alice, your Patrick, the grandkids and your Brianna,” called Hallie, adding a good tip to the fare.

  He tried to say no, but Hallie knew what buttons to push.

  “Buy something for your new grandchild’s christening. From me.”

  That did it.

  “You give me a call if you’re ever in Harlem,” said Alfred, and drove off after she’d unloaded everything.

  Two trays – check.

  A giant folder – check.

  Another slimmer folder with photos of personnel, as requested – check.

  She got it all together and walked in.

  Valerie Roberts, her boss, was waiting. Of course she was. Valerie was always on time. Always and unfailingly.

  Sometimes, just sometimes, Hallie wished Valerie would be a bit less than perfect. Tall, blonde, slim and perfect Valerie always made Hallie feel chunky and clumsy. Hallie had curves – a full bust, a small waist and wide hips – and though she was slim, Valerie made her feel fat. She’d never been able to order anything more than a salad when having lunch with Valerie.

  “Hey, sorry I’m late, but I’ve got everything here.”

  “Samples?”

  “All done, and perfect, if I do say so myself. Bridget outdid herself. She really did. That salmon mousse, it’s so good I think I want to marry it.”

  Valerie smiled. When Valerie smiled, Hallie forgot all about her resentment that she was perfect. She was the perfect boss.

  “And the venue the client wants?”

  “Available and blocked for the twenty-third. Alternate venue also available and blocked. After party venue suggestions are in there, too.”

  “Well, that’s thorough.”

  But Valerie still looked nervous.

  “We’ve got it all, Val. Why’re you so nervous about this one?”

  “Aldous Banks is extremely demanding, Hallie. Most people who work with him say that he needs everything to be perfect. But he doesn’t quibble about paying for perfection. If we do one event perfectly for him, he’ll hire us for more.”

  “So we’ll do it perfectly, Val. Stop worrying so much. He’ll think we can’t handle it if you look so worried.”

  That just made Valerie look even more nervous.

  “We don’t have to worry about wine, right? He made his millions in wine.”

  “No, we don’t have to deal with wine or cocktails or spirits of any sort.”

  “Well, if there’s anything needed there – are we to tend the bar? Because I think the Specialist is free on the day. I could ask him, get a tentative block on that. But if he doesn’t want a bartender, we’ll have to pay him the deposit. You know how he is. If he weren’t just so indisputably brilliant at his job, nobody would hire him. But he is the best. And are mocktails on us? I brought our menu, but I couldn’t very well bring mocktail samples.”

  “Oh, that’s good thinking. I’m not sure, actually. I should ask. Let me add it to my list.”

  Ah, Valerie and her lists, thought Hallie.

  Hallie didn’t understand this obsession with lists. She never needed one. She was excellent at keeping everything she needed in her head.

  “It took a lot of wrangling to get a foot in the door, Hallie. I want us to make the most of it.”

  “Val, everything will work out fine. Trust me. Do you want me on desserts myself? I could handle that, if you like.”

  Valerie considered.

  “I wouldn’t mind, actually, but you’re good at keeping staff ready, organizing, making sure everything goes smoothly. I want you out at the event, not in the kitchen.”

  Hallie shrugged.

  “With the right menu, I could do both. If it’s frozen desserts, I would only have to supervise plating. Everything else will be done ahead of time. I can juggle.”

  That was another thing Hallie did extremely well. She could juggle a dozen things and keep them all in the air.

  “We’ll see. For now, I just want to land this and get that part done.”

  “I don’t think I like our wine billionaire,” said Hallie, suddenly.

  “Why not?”

  Valerie was surprised.

  “Well, I’ve never seen him with the same girl twice. In tabloids, I mean. And I did a basic search, you know, to try to figure out what the client wants. Standard, so we can tailor our pitch. He seems like a bit of a dick,” declared Hallie.

  “Hallie!”

  Valerie was shocked.

  “I suppose you don’t get to be a self-made billionaire at twenty-nine without being a bit of a dick. You probably have to trample over a few people to do that. But still, he seems to have no respect at all for the women he dates. There was this one report about how he forgot the name of his date at some red carpet event. Can you imagine how embarrassing that must’ve been for the poor girl?”

  Valerie’s eyes were sparkling, as they did when she was deeply interested despite her best efforts not to be. Still, she tried.

  “We shouldn’t be gossiping about our client.”

  Hallie grinned.

  “Not our client yet, and we gossip about all our clients. It’s practically part of our perks,” she pointed out.

  “Well, maybe, but you know how tabloids are. And all those gossip sites. They all want clickbait. Good things never make it for clickbait.”

  Hallie shrugged.

  “And he’s always seen with all these models. It seems pretty obvious that he goes for the superficial. If he wanted anything more, he would at least be seen with the same model twice.”

  “Well, he’s young and single. And extremely handsome.”

  Hallie pretended indifferenc
e. She didn’t want to admit that yes, she had found him extremely handsome, too. He seemed to be tall and broad shouldered, always impeccably tailored, and he had a smile that reduced even seasoned veterans of the tabloid circuit into giggles. Even society matrons seemed to like him, from what she had read.

  Apparently, that combination of sunshine blonde hair and eyes so blue they were like the sky made him irresistible to women. There was the famous chin dimple, too, she thought, rolling her eyes. Who on earth made a Twitter account for a chin dimple?

  Some besotted idiot, she figured. There was an actual Twitter account dedicated to his chin dimple, and sometimes, expressing the dimple’s philosophical musings about the universe.

  It was all beyond ridiculous, really. Nobody with an ounce of sense would be taken in by all that. He might be charming – and by all accounts, he used that charm to good effect – but did nobody look beneath the surface anymore?

  What about kindness, compassion, using your power for good and all that, she wondered, because he had both wealth and power. If she’d had that kind of money and power, she would spend it all on something far more important than private jets and buying islands.

  “Val, the man has an island.”

  “What?”

  “An actual island. A Polynesian island. He really owns an island. I checked.”

  Valerie’s eyes popped a bit at that.

  “An island seems… a bit much,” she conceded.

  “A bit? Try a lot. Who on earth needs an actual island?”

  Valerie shrugged.

  “I don’t think billionaires have our priorities. But details about our client, fingers crossed, is good. Anything more?”

  “He likes nectarines. He really likes nectarines, and all kinds of sauces and marinades with nectarines. That’s something I got. He also likes coconut-based desserts, a lot. I’ve added both in our sample menus. I’ve added a few low-cal, low-fat options of everything. Judging by the women he hangs out with, those are also necessary. And his favorite drink is Jameson’s. Irish whiskey. Which is funny, I had the most awesome Irish cabbie named Alfred on the way over here.”

  She trailed off as Valerie’s phone rang. She could only hear one side of the conversation, but she could get the gist.

  “Lori, you need to handle… That is absolutely out of the question. It is not an emergency, it’s just a problem. I… I’ll call you back, two minutes.”

  Valerie raised harried eyes to Hallie.

  “Lori is wigging out.”

  “And how. She didn’t get the peaches. Our produce guy didn’t have peaches, so it’s the end of the world.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, can’t she send somebody to get peaches?”

  “Nobody's in. Everybody’s out at that birthday party, remember?”

  “Of course. And she can’t go, because she’s Lori. I’ll go and get her the damn peaches.”

  Valerie nodded.

  “I would’ve preferred to have you here for the meeting, but… Well, I have the research, and I have everything here. You will have to go and sort out Lori and her peaches.”

  “On it,” said Hallie, and walked out.

  She had to admit, she didn’t feel as much regret at not being at the meeting as she might have. She was curious to meet Aldous Banks, the playboy billionaire, but she wanted her first client meeting as manager, though a very junior one, to be a client she would like. A client she could enjoy working with.

  There were some clients she loved running point with. They were the ones who were excited about the event, open to ideas, who cared about how their guests would feel. Not the ones who threw parties because throwing parties was what you did. Especially not ones who threw parties that doubled as corporate and business mixers.

  She really didn’t like such events. She liked catering fun events, where everybody let their hair loose and could just be themselves.

  Still, she was curious. She had never catered for a billionaire before.

  Well, it wasn’t like billionaires had horns, she reasoned. Billionaires were regular people. With at least a billion dollars, which she couldn’t even imagine, honestly. How much space would a billion dollars take in, say, hundred-dollar bills? She had no clue.

  She hated herself for that nagging little wish that he’d have the party on his yacht, or on his island, or in his house – mansion – castle – whatever he lived in. If he had his party on an island, he wouldn’t be hiring them, she reasoned as she went down the steps to be smart and catch the subway back.

  Or he might, of course. Billionaires did crazy shit like flying the help all over the place, didn’t they?

  That’s what she would be, of course – the help. She was fine with that, really. She might have dreamed of being a princess with her own castle when she was a child, but she had left those childish fantasies behind. She was working her way up the ladder, slowly.

  Her dreams were simple, in any case. She didn’t want castles and private jets, except during short, foolish moments. She wanted a cottage, with a backyard where she could have a swing, and a little herb garden. She wasn’t even too particular about a garden in the front yard. She would be fine with window boxes if that was too much.

  But she wanted that, near the water somewhere. She wanted a home, with a husband who loved her, with children they would love. She would have fulfilling work that she enjoyed and she was good at. Maybe she would have her own company – just a small one, where she could do local catering.

  Simple dreams could go out of reach if you spent your time daydreaming, she reminded herself, making herself wake up sharply. She had work to do, and work she would do.

  She knew she had done all the groundwork to make sealing the deal easy for Valerie. She also knew that her work would be acknowledged, unlike at a bigger organization. She was valued there.

  She wondered if Aldous Banks valued his employees. He probably understood that it was profitable to do so. He seemed to know everything about profits, at least.

  Curious, she took her tablet out and ran another search on him. This time, she focused on his business, instead of his personal tastes and preferences. After all, he would probably have business associates at his event. Was it a business or personal event? He hadn’t given them any real details in the brief.

  Another test, she assumed. He probably wanted to see how prepared they would be for all possible scenarios. Well, when he went through the file she’d put together, he’d see that they were as prepared as prepared could be. Boy Scouts could take lessons from them.

  His online presence – at least that of his flagship company, Fine Times, focusing on wines for every wallet because everybody deserves a fine time, and wasn’t that a good tag line – was impressive. That probably also meant that it was carefully plotted and planned. Still, she could see that the company had several subsidiaries. There was an elite line that focused on exclusive and vintage wines. There was a more affordable range. There was even a more experimental range meant for people who were open to taking risks and exploring their palates.

  A good spin, she could readily admit. She wouldn’t mind taking a look at some of their suppliers for their events, either. It looked like they had an excellent reputation for service and for quality.

  And, she noticed, with some surprise, employee turnover seemed to be fairly low. That indicated that he did value his employees. Most of his leadership across the board had been with the company since the beginning.

  She recognized a few extremely famous names as part of sommelier tours. Not just wine tours with an employee of the company – his outfit organized tours with people who knew what they were talking about.

  All in all, she was extremely impressed with the setup. That didn’t mean, she reminded herself, that the man himself was anything better than complete scum. He was probably a pretty boy who had all the money. He probably invested in a start-up that was the actual brains and brawn behind the entire thing, and he was just the face for all of it.

 
Somehow, she doubted that as she left the swaying subway and made her way above ground to deal with the peachy scenario waiting for her.

  She stopped almost in Little Italy to find an excellent market with extraordinarily lovely fruits, picked up their entire supply of peaches. That should keep Lori’s panties untwisted long enough for her to get more peaches, bury her in peaches if need be, she figured.

  Lori was actually in tears by the time she got there. They changed into tears of happiness when she saw that Hallie came bearing peaches. If the girl wasn’t a genius with all kinds of pastries, she wouldn’t be worth the trouble, thought Hallie as she patted and soothed.

  She chased the uncharitable thought away immediately. She was thinking like an unscrupulous billionaire.

  He was probably the kind who just had to crook a finger to have girls flocking to him. Well, he would soon discover that not all girls were willing to be at his beck and call. She was amused when she realized that her hackles were already rising. He hadn’t hit on her, nor was he likely to. She’d be invisible to him – part of the help. People like him didn’t see people like her.

  She had just about finally found a moment for herself when her phone rang. It was Valerie. For a moment, she felt a huge weight on her chest, as if everything was about to change. She shook it off immediately.

  “Hallie?”

  Valerie sounded a bit harassed.

  “Val, what’s wrong?”

  “Oh, nothing. We’ve almost got the job. Man, he grilled me, Hallie. He knows what he wants, and he’s determined to have it. The good part is that he absolutely has no problem with paying what we want. He’ll throw in a hefty bonus, too, if we do it to his satisfaction.

  “But?”

  “Well, he had a few unpleasant things to say. I stood my ground in the end, but… Well, it wasn’t very nice.”

  She had known he was an asshole.

  “Come back to work and tell me all about it.”

  “Yeah, I’m on my way.”

  “I do need to talk to you about it. Boy, your first assignment as manager isn’t an easy one!”

  Good, though Hallie as she hung up. She liked a challenge. And she’d take his arrogant billionaire down a peg or two if she must, too. She quite looked forward to that.