Starfire (Erotic Romance) (Peaches Monroe)

by Strong, Mimi

  A brunette woman, about fifty, swept the front sidewalk clear of dirt and debris.

  “Hi, boss! I’m Laura,” she said. “I would have waited for you, but I still had my key, so I hope you don’t mind. I called Adrian and got the alarm code. He said to say hello if you showed up.” She swept a little more, stirring the dust mostly into the air. “Adrian said to go get you a mocha if you didn’t already have one in your hand, so I’ll just go do that.”

  “Interesting.”

  She handed me the broom, then disappeared up the street.

  I walked into the store, surprised to find three—no, four—customers browsing the books. They seemed to be shopping independently, which meant either our new location was going to be much better for business, or I was about to get flash-mobbed.

  I darted back out the door and looked around for people acting suspiciously. Was there a flash mob waiting in the wings? The mailman waved, but that was it. Everything seemed normal enough.

  I went back in and stood in the middle of the new store for a minute, feeling awkward. Everything looked perfect and organized, the way it had been on Friday.

  Except for a few balloons tied to the tops of bookshelves, nobody would ever guess the store had only been open since Saturday.

  Good job, Adrian.

  The customers were browsing fine on their own, so I made my way to my spot behind the counter and dumped out the pens from the tin, to give them a good sorting.

  Ten minutes later, Laura returned with two takeout cups, including a mocha for me. And a gingersnap cookie.

  “Laura, I love you already,” I said.

  Yes, things were going well.

  Adrian thought he’d pull one over on me by hiring some woman without my permission, but I wasn’t going to freak out.

  Laura and I talked some more throughout the day, and I learned she’d been an employee of Black Sheep Books until about a year ago, when she couldn’t stand the owners anymore. She did, however, love the books and the customers, and had brought her resume in on Saturday to give to Adrian. He hired her on the spot. On Sunday, she came in and trained to learn the point-of-sale software, and now she was mine. All mine.

  Having a full-time weekday employee made me giddy… until the end of the day, when I closed up the cash register.

  The sales for the day were up twenty-two percent from a typical Monday that time of year. That was good, but not amazing. We seemed to be busier at the new location, but not enough to justify two weekday employees. Sure, the sample size was small, but the writing was on the wall.

  I didn’t say anything about my worries to our new employee, who looked so happy, and had been friendly and helpful with customers all day.

  Either Laura or I would have to go.

  I was getting married to a wealthy actor, whereas Laura was a single mom with two teenage boys.

  She needed the job more than I did. She wanted the job, whereas I simply had the job and kept showing up.

  Thinking about my future, I felt like I was up in a plane again, and everything below me seemed small in the distance.

  We locked up for the day, and I told Laura I’d see her Tuesday.

  Then I started the long walk home. I could have taken the bus and saved myself a couple of miles, but I had a lot of thinking to do, and I always think better when I’m walking.

  I was a third of the way home when my senses tingled that I was being followed by a car. I whipped around to see a German Shepherd, wearing a cone around his neck, hanging out of a car window. He had the dog equivalent of a giant grin on his face.

  “Penny for your thoughts,” Adrian called out from the driver’s seat.

  I kept walking, because I still had a lot of thinking to do.

  “You hate me that much?” he called out. “I hoped you’d be happy that I hired Laura to help out for a few weeks, so you could do all the wedding stuff.”

  “You told her it was only a few weeks? By the way she was talking, she must think the job’s hers permanently.”

  “I wouldn’t do that to you.” He waved for the car behind him to go around, and continued to roll along slowly next to the sidewalk while I kept walking. “Is this it? You hate me now? Because if you hated me, things could get less complicated.”

  “Maybe I should hate you. You’re a billion times better than me at running the bookstore. It took you less than a month to improve the business more than I did over the years I’ve been there.”

  “I’ve got a brain for spreadsheets and a body for sin. Hop in. I’ll take you home, or anywhere you want to go.”

  I looked back at Cujo, hanging out of the back seat’s window, his tongue lolling out happily.

  “Hey, hero dog,” I cooed at him. “I’m sorry you have to wear that plastic thing, buddy. Think of it more as a Cone of Pride.”

  “If you want to thank Cujo, get in and we can take him to the park with the pond, where he can terrorize the ducks.”

  I stopped walking, and the car stopped. Adrian leaned over and nudged open the passenger door.

  The truth is, I didn’t want to talk to Adrian.

  I wanted to get a big eraser and scrub away everything that had happened in the last few weeks between us, so we could go back to just being friends. My adolescent crush on him was cute, in retrospect. Messing up each other’s lives and feelings wasn’t cute. Having innocent people (and dogs) get hurt in the process that wasn’t so cute, either. I wished I could take everything back.

  CHAPTER 34

  Instead of saying those things I felt and being honest, I climbed into the car and said, “Laura’s a great hire. You did the right thing.” I fidgeted with the seat belt. The damn thing was made for the skinny Storm family and cut into my belly and my feelings. “Fucking seatbelt,” I muttered. “Fucking world. Fucking small chairs and small clothes and fucking inadequate seat belts.”

  I tossed it aside, the buckle banging the leather interior and leaving a scar before the belt retracted.

  Rubbing the scratch with my fingertip, I apologized to Adrian, the car, and Adrian’s mother.

  Cujo began to howl miserably in the back seat.

  I turned to Adrian. “What’s wrong with your dog?”

  “He howls when people are in distress. He’s very sensitive to emotions.”

  “Awesome,” I said flatly. “Now I’m causing emotional distress to your dog, on top of nearly getting him killed.”

  “Are you having a bad day?”

  “I don’t know. I’m all mixed up.”

  “Mondays.”

  I took a breath and looked around. We were heading away from the town center, in a direction I didn’t usually travel.

  “Yeah, fuck Mondays,” I said. “You didn’t text me back today. How did the soft opening go? I had a look at the sales numbers, and they were good. We can afford to have two people working on the weekends, at least. Were you run off your feet?”

  “Keeping busy was good. I didn’t have to think about you, off doing things with Dalton Deangelo.”

  The memory of sex in the canoe and then getting dumped into the lake brought a smile to my lips. Yes, I had done things.

  “How is Golden?” I asked.

  “Never you mind.”

  “Did you sleep with her? Because it’s okay if you did.”

  “And I suppose that answers my unspoken question about what you got up to over the weekend.”

  “You know, Dalton and I are getting married on Saturday.”

  “Am I invited?”

  “Would you come?”

  “If you wanted me to.”

  “Adrian, stop being so perfect. You’re too good. You deserve better, and I’ve done nothing but dick you around and hurt you.”

  Cujo began to howl again.

  “And I hurt Cujo,” I added. “When I think about what happened in the woods…”

  “Stop being so hard on yourself.”

  “Why? What makes me so great? I’m a college dropout with a dead-end job, or maybe no
job. If you haven’t noticed, I go around shooting my big mouth off at people without a second thought to their feelings. I already act like one of those people with a reality TV show, so can you imagine what a monster fame will make me?”

  “You’re scared.”

  “Duh. Two points for Adrian.”

  Cujo barked twice.

  “Three points,” I said.

  Cujo barked three times.

  “Fuck me, Adrian, your dog can count!”

  Adrian started to laugh, still facing ahead at the road as he drove into the parking lot for the park with the duck pond. He laughed harder once we parked, squeezing the top of his nose between his eyes with his fingertips.

  Was he messing with my head?

  “Cujo,” I said. “Count to three points.”

  WOOF WOOF WOOF!

  Adrian wiped his eyes. “I forgot about that trick. He can only count to three. He’s not a genius, but he is a very smart dog.”

  “Cujo, two points.”

  WOOF WOOF.

  Tail wagging, he tried to come up into the front seat, but the cone around his neck got caught on the headrest and he got stuck, which only made us laugh harder.

  We opened our doors and I let him out of the back seat.

  He sat patiently, his gaze darting back and forth between me and Adrian for permission, the white spots above his eyes looking like reverse-eyebrows.

  “Go get the ducks,” Adrian said, nodding toward the pond.

  Cujo bounded off, a beast made of nothing but fur and pure joy.

  If only human lives could be as simple as dog lives.

  Adrian reached for my hand. “Let’s walk. We’ll do one circuit around the pond, then get some dinner.”

  I pulled back my hand and slipped it in my pocket.

  He nodded, his knowing expression breaking my heart.

  Just a gesture, and two hearts shear.

  He knew this was the end for us.

  After a moment, he said, “Let’s at least have our walk around the pond. We’re already here.”

  “Sure.” I started walking, my hands still in my pockets. We brushed elbows as he joined at my side.

  Twenty minutes later, we were at the one-third marker when Adrian spoke.

  “I’ll work at the store through the Christmas season, then I’ll probably be on my way in the new year. I’ll head off to a new city and get a fresh start. Have you ever been to Chicago?”

  “Is that the Windy City? No, I’ve never been there. I’ve hardly been anywhere.”

  “I’m sure you’ll go to lots of places.”

  “All the places I read about in books. Not Narnia, though, obviously. Or Hogwarts.”

  Adrian kicked a pebble off the path. “I feel like I’ve been to the moon. In my head, I know I haven’t, but my heart tells me otherwise. When I see those photos from space, I always think, I’ve been there.”

  “Because you’ve been alone, and you’ve been lonely.”

  “I know you don’t believe me, but I’m quite sure I’ve actually been there. I’ve walked on the moon.”

  “You’ll find someone,” I said.

  “She won’t be like you.”

  “I hope not. That would be a disaster. You’d fight over every little thing.”

  “Couples argue because they’re afraid of losing control. When I fall in love again, I’m going to surrender.”

  The corner of my lip twitched. Surrender? So many great jokes came to mind, involving whips and chains and leather accessories.

  I didn’t say a word, though, and soon the only sounds were our feet on the path and the ducks quacking at Cujo, who’d tired of the chase and lay on the shore, content with watching.

  CHAPTER 35

  Tuesday.

  Four more sleeps until my wedding.

  I tried to get to work at the bookstore early, but Laura got there even earlier.*

  *Actually, I was late again.

  We finished stocking shelves throughout the morning, and I covered the store while she went for lunch.

  I looked around for more things to keep us busy, but everything was done. All we had to do was help customers.

  When Laura returned from lunch, I disappeared into the new office we had at the bigger location. I closed the door, and called Gordon Oliver Junior.

  And then I resigned.

  He was disappointed to hear I was leaving, but offered to write me a letter of recommendation.

  “I feel bad,” I said. “I’ve been so distracted lately, I probably haven’t been a good employee at all.”

  “Peaches, on your worst day, you’re more fun to be around than most people on their best day.”

  I laughed. “Fun?”

  “At the end of the day, we all want to be with someone who’s fun. The customers love you because you care, and you’re honest. The store has an excellent reputation in town, and it’s because of you.”

  “Gordon, don’t make me cry.”

  “You don’t have to stay for the full two weeks of your notice,” he said. “That’s more of a professional courtesy for when nobody’s been hired yet. We do have Laura and Adrian, plus Amy wants to come back and work a few shifts after school and weekends.”

  “I guess everything will carry on just fine without me,” I said, my voice thin and betraying my hurt feelings—silly as they were.

  “You always have a job to return to,” he said. “Either at the bookstore, or here at the wine shop.”

  “The wine shop,” I said brightly. “That sounds fun. I bet all you do is sit around and taste wine all day.”

  “Har har,” he said.

  “Gordon, are you available Saturday to come to my wedding? You can bring your girlfriend. There’s just one catch. I can’t tell you where it is, so you have to meet with everyone at the bus stop, where you’ll get transported to the location.”

  “Of course I’ll go! I already got the invite, anyway. You know I wouldn’t miss your wedding for all the Bordeaux in Bordeaux.”

  “So… Laura seems to have a handle on everything here.”

  He hiccuped. “What time have you got there? One o’clock? I’ll mark your timesheet. You’re done selling books, Peaches. Right now. Walk out that door and live your life.”

  “Are you drinking?”

  “It’s Taste Test Tuesday here. Now get going. I forbid you from working another minute.”

  I thanked him, said goodbye, and put my purse on my shoulder. On the way out, I stopped to let Laura know her position had been made permanent, and I was happy for her.

  She squealed and hugged me.

  I was almost at the front door when I remembered something. I ran back to the counter, shook the pens out of the cup-holder tin Kyle had decorated, and tucked it into my purse. “Someone I love made this for me,” I said.

  Laura grinned. “I understand completely. Good luck with your wedding. Let me know if I can help.”

  “You could start a rumor that the location is Duck Pond Park.”

  “I could totally do that,” she said. “People have been pumping me for information ever since Sunday. Typical small town nosiness.”

  I winked at Laura and walked out the door, my thoughts alternating between the positive and the negative:

  Yay, I’m free! No more talking about book clubs while I’m hopping around on one foot desperate to pee!

  Oh, crap. I’m unemployed. I’ll have to sell my designer dress on EBay for rent money.

  I can go home and have a nap!

  What if Dalton doesn’t love me and he crushes my heart on our wedding night? What if he’s fucking that Justine chick on the side? What if his whole story about the chubby neighbor was a lie, and this is just a phase, and soon he’ll be back to skinny actresses?

  Yay, I get to wear a pretty dress on Saturday!

  I settled on the happy thought about my dress.

  Then I caught the bus home, made and ate a batch of Rice Krispie squares, and napped the rest of the day.

  Un
employed life is amazing!

  CHAPTER 36

  Wednesday.

  Three more sleeps until my wedding.

  Wednesday was the date Mitchell was scheduled to arrive in town to help me get ready for the wedding—not that I needed much help, since Vern was busy coordinating most of the preparations, with help* from my mother.

  * By help, I mean my mother provided equal parts help and hindrance, netting out to neutral. Whatever. At least they got the flowers sorted out between the two of them, and no orchids were beheaded.

  I’d been text-messaging with Mitchell for days, but he was deliberately vague about how he was arriving in town. Vern was still in Washington State, with the plane, so I imagined Mitchell was driving up from California.

  And he was driving up, as it turned out.

  In a sexy red car.

  The car pulled up in front of the house around two o’clock Wednesday afternoon, and Shayla and I ran out to greet Mitchell.

  “You upgraded,” I said, referring to his blue two-door Miada.

  With an impish smile on his adorable face, Mitchell tossed the car keys to me. “You’re the one who upgraded,” he said.

  The keys landed in the grass before me.

  A minute later, I picked up the keys, along with my jaw, off the grassy front lawn.

  I mumbled, “Shayla, Mitchell, introductions, go.”

  As they said hello, I shuffled like a zombie toward the pretty red car in my tunnel vision.

  The car was gorgeous—sporty and expensive-looking, but with four doors, so it wasn’t all that impractical, though the gas mileage would probably make my father cringe.

  I’d never owned a car before, much less gotten one as a gift. I climbed in the driver’s side and found an oversized bow wrapped around the headrest of the passenger side, along with a card.

  My hands shook as I opened the envelope.

  The card read:

  I couldn’t decide between blue or red, since you look so beautiful in both colors, so I let Mitchell pick which one to drive up. - Dalton

  P.S. It’s really yours. And so is the matching one that’s parked in front of our house in LA.

  I held my hands over my mouth and screamed with happiness. Two cars? Was I still napping and dreaming?