Cinderella Busted (The Cinderella Romances #1)

by Petie McCarty

  “You know, if you just talk to him for a few minutes, he might stop sending all those.” She waved at the dozens of floral displays in the nursery office. “I sent an arrangement home with every employee last night, and a dozen more arrived this morning.”

  Lily just glared. “No.”

  Tammy sighed. “All the notes say exactly the same thing. I just need to talk to you for a few minutes. Love, Rhett.”

  “Love, my ass.”

  “Ouch! Well, then take all these vases to your cottage. There’s no room to move around in here, and this is a place of business.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Can’t? Why not?”

  Lily fought back a smile. “My house is full of roses.”

  Tammy gaped at her and then started laughing. “How full?”

  “Worse than this.” She waved her hand at the vases covering every open space on the floor and counters.

  “When? How?”

  “They arrive every evening after the nursery closes.”

  “What do those notes say?”

  Lily looked sheepish. “‘I’m willing to beg.’”

  Tammy laughed harder. “No Love, Rhett?”

  Lily shook her head, and her smiled faded.

  “Aw, come on, Lil. Don’t go sour on me again.”

  The arms crossed in defensive posture again. “Why are you standing up for him?”

  Tammy came around the desk and sat beside her. “I’m not, honey. I’m on your side. And I admit I wanted to shoot him last weekend when you came back from the barbecue and told me what he did.”

  “So, why are you forgiving him? He hurt me. He accused me of horrible things—of plotting to go after his money. He didn’t know me at all to accuse me like that, and I don’t want a man who would accuse me like that.”

  “But would you want someone who loved you so much that seeing you on a date with someone else made him act a little crazy? Made him do and say outrageous things?

  “That’s not what—”

  “I think it is, and that’s the only reason I think you should hear him out.”

  Lily turned away. “No, I don’t trust him.”

  “Ah, you’re probably right.”

  Lily jerked her head back around to stare. “I am?”

  Tammy nodded. “Yep. If you got back together, and he saw you at another charity gala with a different man, he would probably do and say more ridiculous things. Especially if he thought or even suspected you cared about the other guy.”

  Lily frowned. “So you think this is all because Rhett was jealous?” She shook her head. “I don’t think so. You forget he also called me deceitful and a liar and threw me out of his house.”

  “You did deceive him, and you swallowed your pride and went to the barbecue for a chance to talk to him and explain. You did it because you thought he was worth it. Now he’s swallowed his pride and wants a chance to explain. He thinks you’re worth it.”

  Lily considered that for several moments, then shook her head. “I still don’t want to talk to him. He’ll just say more things to hurt me.”

  Tammy stood and retrieved the phone. “Sorry, Rhett. I can’t find her right now.” Her eyes flashed at Lily. “Uh, sure thing. I’ll tell her.”

  “What’d he say?”

  “What do you care? You didn’t want to talk to him, remember?”

  “Stop kidding around, Tammy. What did he say?”

  “He said to go outside and look up.”

  The two girls stared at each other for a second and then scrambled for the door. Out on the gravel driveway, they turned their gaze skyward. Puffs of skywriter smoke stood out against an azure blue sky as a small two-engine prop plane puffed out an exclamation point.

  PLEASE LILY!

  “Ohhh,” Tammy gushed, “that is so romantic.” She turned to Lily, but only saw her back as she strode for the cottage.

  “All right! You made this mess, now help me clean it up,” Tammy barked across the greenhouse.

  Rob’s head jerked up from the Tentia cuttings he transplanted. “My mess!”

  “At least, you didn’t ask, What mess?” she said, striding over to the potting bench. Her hands went to her hips.

  “How do you figure I made the mess?” he said sullenly.

  “You and Lily don’t speak to each other unless it’s about work. She won’t talk to Rhett at all. Garrett told me to leave him out of it, and we need to buy another nursery property to hold all the cut flowers Buchanan keeps sending over. This can’t go on!” She threw her hands in the air. “And now, he’s got skywriters sending messages.”

  Rob’s eyes widened. “For real?”

  She nodded. “Don’t bother getting up. There’s too much wind today, and she never gave the PLEASE LILY! in the sky a second glance.”

  He sighed and stared at the cutting in his hand. “She’s simmering like a volcano ready to erupt. She has a right to be mad because I shared her personal information about the trust fund, but I’d do it again. The guy made idiotic accusations, and I had to stop him. I couldn’t have him thinking or saying those things about Lily.”

  Tammy patted his shoulder. “Don’t beat yourself up. I’d have said that and more. You know I would. She’s just frustrated Rhett has the upper edge now.”

  “Upper edge?” He stared blankly. “I don’t get it.”

  “He knows she liked him. He knows she wanted to keep seeing him, and he knows she wanted to explain everything to him. And lastly, he now knows she’s got her own money and wasn’t after his.”

  He frowned. “It’s all true.”

  She shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. Lily’s got no secrets now. Rhett didn’t want her, when he thought she was poor, so she doesn’t want him to suddenly want her because she’s rich.”

  “You lost me again.”

  “She thinks he should have taken a chance and loved her without knowing whether she was poor or rich. He should have loved her for herself. Which is ironic since that is exactly what he wanted.”

  “Oh.”

  “Love should have made him want Lily, no matter what. At least, that’s what I think she is thinking.”

  Rob sighed heavily. “She has never been this upset before. I hate it.”

  “She’s mad at the situation, not at you. She thinks Buchanan is finally after her under false pretenses. He didn’t love her enough on her own.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “Nothing. Buchanan’s on his own. He’s going to have to fix this himself, and only he can do it now.”

  “But I thought you said I had to fix this mess.”

  She gave him her devilish grin. “You do. You and I have to come up with a way to force those two together so he has a chance to plead his case.”

  “How will we do that?”

  “I’m working on it. Are you in?”

  He nodded. “Sure, anything to get things back to normal around here. And speaking of normal, when’s the special code enforcement hearing?”

  “She got the notice of hearing today, which didn’t help her frame of mind any. It’s scheduled for next Tuesday morning at nine. We called the Jupiter Town Council office and were told that Lily and the attorneys filing the injunction against her grandfathered status for a “residence occupying a commercial property” would each get an opportunity to plead their case before the Code Compliance Special Magistrate at that time. Tallahassee is leaving the issue up to local government, on the question of Lily’s grandfathered status, since she is the only business owner affected.”

  “Has Lily changed her mind about getting an attorney?” Rob wanted to know.

  Tammy shook her head. “She said she’d be wasting her money and doesn’t need one with the Code Enforcement Department mana
ger coming to the meeting to stand up for her grandfathered status. Lily said he promised to be there.”

  Rob looked grim. “So it’s a pack of attorneys against Lily.”

  Tammy nodded. “Looks that way, but she’s not worried. And it’s not like she’ll be losing the nursery.”

  “It will feel like that to her if she’s forced to move. This is her childhood home, the only home she’s ever known.”

  Now, it was Tammy’s turn to frown. “You don’t think she’d sell out because she lost the cottage, do you?”

  “I honestly don’t know what she’ll do. I’ve never seen her this upset before.”

  “Well then, we’ll just have to work fast.”

  Lily quietly closed the greenhouse door behind her and stood for a moment to acclimate her eyes after the bright sunlight outside. Rob sat hunched over his potting table as he so often did now, sticking new cuttings he intended to offer through their interior lines. He didn’t look up as she approached, and she could hardly blame him.

  Their parting after the barbecue had been acrimonious at best with each saying things neither one had meant. He accused her of being stupid for falling for Rhett Buchanan, which now in hindsight seemed quite true, and of being selfish and narrow-minded for getting mad at Rob for standing up for her. She had called him a controlling buttinsky.

  Neither had spoken to the other since, and after four days of avoiding each other and walking on eggshells, she realized how badly she missed his company and the ability to share her thoughts with him.

  “Are you just going to stand behind me and stare, or step up to the table and say what you came to say,” he said softly without turning around.

  Startled, she stepped forward. “Sorry, I was just planning what I wanted to say.”

  He put down the cutting he trimmed with his scalpel and turned to face her, his expression solemn. “I’m just glad you’re going to say anything to me after four days of the silent treatment. I hope you’re going to say I’m like a brother to you, and you hate fighting with me.”

  She felt her bottom lip quiver with relief, and she hugged him. “Oh Rob, I’m sorry.”

  He squeezed her tight. “Me too, Lil.”

  She pulled back and smiled, her eyes welling with relieved tears. “That’s exactly what I was going to say. I hate fighting with you.”

  He grinned. “How would you know? We’ve never fought before.”

  She swiped at a lone escaping tear. “I guess you’re right. About everything. We are like brother and sister, and that did give you the right to step in with Buchanan.”

  He held up a hand. “I went too far and said way too much. I’m sorry. I just got so mad at his accusations.”

  She gave him a wry smile. “I know. Me, too. You only told Rhett what I had intended to tell him myself.”

  “Except for the part about your trust fund.” He hung his head. “Sorry.”

  “He would have found out anyway. It’s what he does and how he operates. I’m just surprised he didn’t already know. I probably would have told him myself if he’d ever given me the opportunity to explain.” She let out a disgusted sigh. “But when he accused me of trying to marry him so I could cheat on him with you or Aidan, I got so angry I didn’t think he deserved to know anything about me.”

  “And then I went and blabbed,” he said with chagrin.

  She pulled him into another hug. “Forget it. The important thing is we’re back to being us.”

  He gave her a crooked smile, then chuckled. “You and me cheating on the side. How did I come out ahead in that deal?”

  “How did Buchanan come up with an idiotic idea like that?” She exhaled on a derisive laugh. “He thought I was too stupid to come up with anything better.”

  “Nah,” Rob said and shook his head. “Jealousy put that idiotic idea in his head. Jealousy does that to guys, makes them think with anything but their head.” He sat back down at his bench. “So what are you going to do, Lil?”

  “About what?” She wouldn’t look at him. She knew what he was asking.

  “About Buchanan?”

  “What’s to do? It’s over. I had my chance to talk to him, and instead I found out how he felt. He wasn’t really jealous, and he’ll give up. Then there’s no reason for us to talk to each other ever again.”

  “Don’t be so sure.”

  “Why not?”

  “When was the last time you were up at the office to pick up your messages?”

  She thought for a moment. “I don’t know, several hours. I had a bad headache from working the Vermeer digger this morning, so I laid down at the cottage for a while after lunch.”

  “You might want to wander up to the office.”

  “Why?”

  Rob’s lips quirked as though he were fighting a grin. “Well, I’m told a landscape crew showed up right after lunch with a truckload of annuals. They replanted the beds in front of the office and told Tammy the work was on the house.”

  “That’s crazy! Who would do that?”

  Rob raised his brows. “Want to go look?”

  “Yes, I do,” she said indignantly. “No one plants our landscape beds but us.”

  They hopped in the golf cart outside the greenhouse and sped for the nursery office. The cart careened around the corner, and Lily gasped. Rob hit the brakes.

  The enormous annual bed in front of the nursery office had indeed been replanted. Against a dark-green background of dwarf jasmine were bright yellow marigolds arranged in two-foot-high letters spelling, Give me a chance.

  Too stunned to do anything else, Lily stared.

  Tammy spotted them and sauntered out onto the front porch. “Heck of thing when a crew shows up and plants your annuals bed for you,” she said. “Of course, I’m going to get a lot of questions from customers about what they spelled. What do you want me to tell them, boss?”

  Lily couldn’t take her eyes off the marigolds. Ever the grower, Rob climbed out of the cart to check the planting technique and see if the annuals needed water.

  Tammy grinned at her. “I called Garrett, and he’s stopping by. He couldn’t stop laughing and says he has to get a look at what Rhett did all by himself.”

  That did get Lily’s attention. “Garrett didn’t take care of this?”

  “Nope. He didn’t know anything about it. Rhett must have done it all on his own, just like everything else he did this week. Garrett was in the dark about all of it.”

  “What now, Lily?” Rob asked, getting to his feet.

  “I’m still not going to speak to him,” Lily said on the verge of tears. “He can’t just send over a bunch of flowers and expect me to run right back to him. He hurt me. I hate him.” She took off for the cottage at a dead run.

  The nursery workers had already gone home Thursday evening, so Lily was surprised to hear Tammy’s page on the outside nursery speakers and trotted to the closest house phone at the annuals greenhouse. “What’s up?” she asked when she dialed in to the office.

  “There’s an attorney on the phone, Lil,” Tammy said without preamble. “A Carstairs Whittenhurst the Third. Not the second mind you, but the third. Are you in the middle of something?”

  “Just taking a load of potting soil to the shadehouse. It’s after five and late for an attorney to be calling. Did the guy say what he wanted?”

  “Maybe he only intended to leave a voicemail,” Tammy said, “but I couldn’t get a peep out of him. Could be anything, but with your hearing before the Special Code Compliance Magistrate next week, I have a hunch that may be what he’s calling about. You never get calls from attorneys.”

  Lily was in the front office minutes later, and she took the call in Tammy’s office, thankful Tammy had stayed behind for moral support.

  Lily put Whittenhurst
on speaker. “This is Lily Foster.”

  “Ms. Foster, this is Carstairs Whittenhurst the Third.”

  Lily rolled her eyes at Tammy. “What can I do for you, Mr. Whittenhurst?”

  “On behalf of my client, I have filed an injunction. Your residence located at a commercial site violates Jupiter City Code, Chapter 4.208.”

  “So it’s you who’s causing me all this trouble. Who is your client, Mr. Whittenhurst? I’d like to speak to him or her and ask why they should care whether I live at my nursery or not.”

  “I represent my client, Ms. Foster, in any and all land negotiations, and as a good citizen and ethical barrister, I felt compelled to bring your code violation to the city’s attention.”

  “Approval to have my residence at this commercial site is grandfathered, since the code prohibiting my residence here wasn’t written until years after we moved in, and—”

  “And the state of Florida does not support a grandfathered status following a change in ownership or a renovation exceeding fifty percent of the total value of the property venue renovated,” he retorted. “Your initial building expansion after the original purchase was enough to lose your so-called grandfathered status, as you call it, and requires you to conform to existing code.”

  Lily cast a stricken look at Tammy as she felt her panic rising. Tammy gave her a helpless shrug.

  “Would you like me to cite the appropriate section of the code?” Whittenhurst asked.

  The condescension in his tone infuriated Lily. “No, I would not. What I would like is to know why you are doing this, and I want the name of your client.”

  “You will deal with me and only me in this matter, so don’t bother asking about my client again. The why is simple. We would like to purchase your property, all one hundred acres of it, and we are willing to purchase it outright or offer a comparably valued property inland, should you wish to relocate your nursery.”

  “My nursery isn’t for sale, Mr. Whittenhurst!” she exclaimed.

  Undaunted, he continued as though she hadn’t said a word. “And you must consider whether you can run your nursery as effectively without being in residence. The parcel we’re prepared to offer you has no such code restriction as the land parcel lies outside the city limits, and you would be well within your legal rights to maintain your home on-site.”