The Heavenly Bites Novella Collection:
Pastels and Jingle Bells
Love Lessons
Playing Cupid
by
Christine S. Feldman
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Pastels and Jingle Bells first published via Kindle Direct and Nook Press © 2013 by Christine S. Feldman
Love Lessons first published via Kindle Direct and Nook Press © 2013 by Christine S. Feldman
Playing Cupid first published via Kindle Direct and Nook Press © 2014 by Christine S. Feldman
Cover Design by - Elaina Lee
Cover Image - © belchonock/Depositphotos
All rights reserved.
To my husband, Earl,
who has always been my inspiration when it comes to romance
Table of Contents
Pastels and Jingle Bells
Love Lessons
Playing Cupid
Author’s Note
About the Author
Pastels and Jingle Bells
Chapter One
It was probably inviting the worst kind of karma to be contemplating murder during the holiday season of all times, but that didn’t faze Trish Ackerly in the slightest as she stared through her bakery’s storefront window in shock.
It was him. Ian Rafferty, bane of her junior high school existence. She’d know that face anywhere, despite the changes in it. Sure, he was a couple of feet taller now and certainly broader shouldered, but as he glanced away from the winter scene she had painted on the window only yesterday and at a passing car that whizzed by much too fast on the busy city street, the profile he presented to her confirmed it. Yes, it was him. That same nose, the odd little scar above his eye, the familiar way he quirked his lips…
Her eyes narrowed. Ian Rafferty. That miserable, mean-spirited little—
Then he turned his face back to the window, and Trish gasped and dropped to the floor before he could spot her staring at him.
“What on earth are you doing?” came Nadia’s voice from behind the counter.
Trish huddled behind a tall metal trash can and glanced up through her dark bangs at her startled friend and business partner only to remember belatedly that they had company in the shop, namely wizened little Mrs. Beasley, whose startled eyes blinked at her from behind enormous tortoise-shell spectacles.
Well, there was little help for it now. “That guy,” Trish hissed, jerking one thumb in the direction of the window. “I know him!”
Both Nadia and Mrs. Beasley peered intently through the glass. “Mmm,” said Nadia appreciatively a moment later. “Lucky you, girlfriend.”
“No, not lucky me! That guy made my life a living hell in junior high. He’s a jerk, he’s a bully—”
“He’s coming in here, dear,” Mrs. Beasley interrupted her, with obvious interest in her voice.
With a squeak of alarm, Trish shuffled hastily behind the counter on her hands and knees and hunched into as small and inconspicuous a ball as she could.
Nadia blinked. “Trish, are you out of your—”
“Sh!”
“Oh, you did not just shush me—”
“SHH!” Trish insisted again, knowing full well that she’d pay for it later, and then she pulled her head down into her shoulders as much as her anatomy would allow.
The bell on the door jangled cheerfully then, and a gust of cold air heralded Ian Rafferty’s arrival.
“Hi, there,” Nadia greeted him brightly, surreptitiously giving Trish’s foot a little dig with one of her own. “Welcome to Heavenly Bites. What can I get for you?”
“Cup of coffee would be great for starters,” came a voice that was deep but soft, and far less reptilian than Trish expected. She cocked her head slightly to better catch his words and heard the unmistakable sound of him blowing on his hands and rubbing them together to warm them. “Cream, no sugar.”
“Sure thing, honey.”
“Your window art,” his voice continued, and Trish straightened ever so slightly at the mention of her work. “It’s fantastic. Can I ask who painted it?”
“Absolutely,” Nadia returned, turning her attention to getting the coffee he requested. “My business partner, Trish.”
“Is she around, by any chance?”
Nadia glanced down at where Trish sat scrunched up and did what Trish thought was a very poor job of suppressing a smirk. “She’s, um, indisposed at the moment. Why do you ask?”
“I’ve got a couple of windows that could use a little holiday cheer. Think she might be interested in the job?”
Nadia gave Trish another brief sideways glance.
Trish shook her head frantically.
“Tell you what. Leave me your number, and we’ll find out.” Nadia stepped out of reach before Trish could smack her leg.
“Great, thanks. Here’s my card.”
“I’ll see that she gets it, Mr.—” Nadia glanced at the card. “—Rafferty. Here’s your coffee, and you, sir, have a very nice day.”
The bell on the door jingled again, and Trish cautiously poked her head up long enough to verify that Ian was indeed gone. She then ignored the fascinated look Mrs. Beasley was giving her and fixed an icy stare on Nadia. “I’m going to kill you. How could you do that?”
Nadia tossed her dark braids over her shoulder. “Hmph. Shush me in my own shop…”
“I don’t want to talk to that guy! I don’t want to have anything to do with him.”
“He seemed nice enough to me,” her friend returned, shrugging unapologetically. “And easy on the eyes, too.”
“And single,” put in Mrs. Beasley eagerly, one wrinkled hand fluttering over her heart. “No wedding ring.”
“Of course there’s no ring! No woman wants to marry the devil!” Trish sank back down onto the floor and leaned back heavily against the shelves behind her.
“He used to be the devil,” Nadia corrected her, examining the business card he had handed to her. “Now he’s ‘Ian Rafferty, Landscape Architect’. And he’s a paying customer, Trish. Face it, you could use the money.”
“Forget it. I’m not so hard up that I’d go crawling to Ian Rafferty for a job.” Trish scowled and folded her arms across her chest. “I have my dignity, you know.”
“Yeah? Why don’t you get up off the floor and tell me all about your dignity.”
“Oh, shut up,” Trish muttered, getting to her feet and snatching the card from Nadia’s hand. Wadding it up, she tossed it in the direction of the trashcan and stalked into the bakery’s kitchen.
* * *
Her aim must have been off, because the crunched up card was lying on the floor by the trashcan when she locked up that evening. It caught her eye as she was reaching for her coat, and her gaze darkened. A hundred different memories swirled up inside her head…
Ian shoving her twelve-year-old self down for no reason at all as he walked by her at recess; Ian yanking on her braid, laughing at her snaggletooth; Ian teasing her in the hallway and calling her names—Patty-cake, wasn’t that what he used to call her? A baby name that made her cheeks burn with embarrassment every time she heard it. She’d learned to hate the name Patricia and switched to going by Trish once she moved out on her own.
She’d gotten her teeth fixed, too. Put on a couple of pounds in most of the right places, cut her hair and darkened it a few shades. Learned to take care of herself. All in all, Trish had come a long way. She hardly bore any resemblance at a
ll to the goofy kid Ian had tormented years ago, she thought as she stooped to pick up the business card and prepared to drop it in the trash. How aggravating, then, that her brief glimpse of him today should leave her so hot under the collar, as if it had all happened yesterday instead of nearly twenty years ago. And then old instincts had kicked in and sent her scurrying for cover! Wonderful. She’d be thrilled if today’s unexpected encounter was the last she ever saw of him.
But then again…
Her hand froze in place over the trashcan.
…maybe she was being presented with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity here.
Trish slowly straightened and stared at the card between her fingers. Back in junior high, Ian had disappeared before she’d summoned up enough courage to tell him exactly what he could do with himself. He’d moved away overnight, leaving her relieved but also a quivering mass of insecurities.
What if…
Trish smoothed the wrinkles out of the card enough to read the name and phone number on it. A little thrill ran through her as a scene played out in her mind.
What if she actually confronted the jerk and told him off, just like she used to fantasize about doing as a kid? And even—if she was honest about it—a few times as an adult, too. And now she wasn’t some poor little goofy preadolescent, despite the way she had behaved this afternoon at the sight of him. She could show him just exactly the confident, attractive, and poised woman she had become. Ha!
When a little voice in the back of her head tried to suggest that confident, poised women didn’t need to go around proving that they were confident and poised, she chose to ignore it. She wasn’t insecure. Absolutely not. She was merely seeking appropriate closure to a painful period in her life. And if that closure happened to involve a certain triumphant comeuppance, well, what was so wrong with that? Opportunities like this didn’t come along every day. It was a gift. To turn her back on it would be downright crazy. Ungrateful, even.
Pulling out her cell phone, she dialed the phone number on the card before she could lose her nerve.
Ian answered on the third ring, and his voice momentarily startled her with its deepness. “Ian Rafferty.”
Trish took a deep breath and forced a breeziness into her voice. “Mr. Rafferty? My name is…Trish. I believe you’re looking for me.”
Chapter Two
“It’s a silly idea, girlfriend.”
“It’s not silly,” Trish corrected Nadia from across their favorite booth in La Bella Rosa. “It’s inspired.” She pointed her fork at her friend. “I think you’re just all sour grapes about it because you’ve never had a chance to confront some jerk from your past like this.”
“I don’t need to. I always confront them in the present. You should try it sometime.”
Trish ignored her and took a bite of her linguini.
Nadia sighed and shook her head. “Sounds like a waste of a perfectly good hunk of man flesh to me. Come on, Trish. You guys were kids. Kids do stupid things. Just let it go.”
“Not stupid. Cruel. This guy tormented me all the time back then. It’s like he singled me out or something. I was the butt of all his jokes—” She ticked the examples of evidence off her fingers one at a time. “He pulled my hair, tripped me in the halls, called me names—”
“Who called my darling girl names?” an indignant voice demanded hotly, and both Trish and Nadia glanced up to see “Pop” De Luca, proud owner of La Bella Rosa and patron grandfather to half the neighborhood, standing beside their booth. He wiped his meaty hands on the apron tied around his substantial middle and glowered, which would have been more effective if his wispy white hair didn’t frame a face like a cherub’s.
“Hey, Pop,” both women greeted him at once.
“Don’t ‘hey Pop’ me. If somebody’s not treating one of my two favorite girls right, I want to know about it. Give me his name, I’ll talk to the pazzo and set him straight.”
“His name is Ian Rafferty, but I’m going to set him straight myself, Pop. Thanks anyway.” Trish patted the old man’s hand.
He seemed unconvinced because his scowl remained in place. “This bum isn’t somebody you’re dating, is it, cara? If he is, he’s got to go.” Pop jerked a thumb in the direction of the door.
“He did go,” Nadia put in wryly. “Eighteen years ago.”
The old man’s scowl faltered as his brow furrowed in confusion.
“But now he’s back,” Trish said firmly. “And I intend to give him the verbal thrashing I should have back then.”
“And when are you putting this master plan of yours into action?” her friend asked.
“Saturday.” Trish took another bite. Pop’s pasta was the best in the city, which was probably why she and Nadia ate here so often—which was itself probably the reason why Pop had practically adopted them both. Maybe it was the pasta talking, but she was feeling bolder by the minute. “I’m supposed to drop by his house to talk about his job offer, but I’ve got a very different speech in mind.”
Pop’s eyes lit up. “His house, huh? So you know where this bozo lives?”
“Forget it, Pop. I’m not telling you where it is.”
“But—”
“Nope. Don’t worry.” Trish smiled a confident smile. “I’ve got it covered.”
And she pointedly ignored Nadia’s eyeroll, choosing to look out the window at the lightly falling snow instead.
* * *
Muttering under her breath, Trish tugged the hem of her short little black skirt down as far as it would go and shivered. The tights she wore offered little warmth or protection from the brisk December wind, but she told herself that hypothermia was a small price to pay for the satisfaction she was about to achieve.
Eat your heart out, Ian Rafferty, she thought, and then stumbled when the heel of her pump caught in a crack on the sidewalk. Yanking it free, she nearly slipped on a patch of ice and did a wild sort of sideways shuffle with her arms windmilling until she recovered her balance.
Feeling her cheeks bloom with heat, she threw an anxious glance toward the house that sat at the address Ian had given her. She saw no sign of him, so hopefully he had missed her impromptu little Ice Capades rendition. Abandoning any attempt at a sashay, she settled for tiny mincing steps and proceeded cautiously toward the entrance of his home.
It was smaller than she expected. Somehow the bold lettering on the card made her picture someone who wore double breasted suits and power ties and was rolling in money, but the house up ahead was a rather small single-story brick home that looked like it had been built at least fifty years ago.
But the yard, small as it was, put all the other yards on the street to shame. Considering Ian’s line of work, Trish supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. Because it was his, she wanted to dislike it, but the way each part of the yard flowed seamlessly into another while still retaining its own special charm—on the verge of winter, no less—she had to begrudgingly admire it.
Unless, of course, she turned her attention away from the enchanting yard and onto something else, like the speech she had rehearsed several times during the night as she lay awake, too wired with adrenaline to sleep.
Well, well. Ian Rafferty. I’ll bet you don’t remember me, do you? Allow me to refresh your memory.
In her mind’s eye, the words were followed by a swift kick to his shins, or maybe someplace a little higher. Not that she really planned to resort to violence, but a girl could dream. She reached for the railing beside his front steps and started up them, her mind still on her triumphant entrance.
Little Pattycake’s all grown up now, and—
“Who are you?”
The sullen, small voice coming from somewhere below her made Trish gasp and jump. She wobbled precariously in the high heels that did wonders for her legs and derriere but precious little for her balance, and then her grip on the railing saved her at the last minute. “What the h—”
A little girl’s wary brown eyes stared up at her from where she sat most
ly hidden in the shrubs by the side of the house.
“—eck,” Trish amended just in time. She willed her heart rate to slow back down to normal. “Yeesh. Who am I? I’m the person who’s cheated death twice today in these heels.”
“What?”
“Nothing. I’m here to see Mr. Rafferty. He lives here, right?”
The girl just scowled at her and pulled the knitted hat she wore further down over her ears.
“Chatty, aren’t you?” Trish commented, thinking that despite her limited experience with children, she was fairly sure it wasn’t common to find one skulking around in shrubbery.
The child withdrew further into the bushes without another word, rustling branches and twigs as she went, and in a moment she was completely out of sight.
Trish blinked. “O-kay.” Shaking her head, she turned her attention to the door in front of her and smoothed down a stray wrinkle or two in her skirt before raising her hand to knock.
Well, well. Ian Rafferty. I’ll bet you don’t remember—
The door opened before she could knock and suddenly Ian stood there, no more than three feet away from her. All of Trish’s rehearsed words vanished from her mind.
“Hi,” Ian greeted her. “I caught you through the window coming up the steps.”
Remembering her slip on the pavement, Trish cringed inwardly.
“You must be Trish. Right on time.” He held out his hand with a smile. “I’m Ian. Thanks for coming all the way over here. I hope it wasn’t too much trouble?”
Reacting out of habit, Trish automatically stuck out her own hand for him to shake before she could think better of it. Her mind continued to draw a blank. Despite the familiarity in his features, Ian Rafferty up close had leaner lines in his face than he’d had as a boy. The scar above his eye was still visible but fainter, and yes, the nose was the same, but he had grown into it and lost any gangly quality he might have once had. The shortness of his current haircut suited him much more than the long, brown mop that had once hidden most of his face like a surly curtain, and the overall effect was—she grudgingly admitted to herself—not bad.
The Heavenly Bites Novella Collection Page 1