by Jane Graves
Moon Over Miami
Book 3 of the Moon Series
Jane Graves
Contents
ABOUT THE BOOK
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
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ABOUT MOON OVER MIAMI
Book Three in the Moon Series
* * *
A laugh-out-loud romantic comedy about a straight-laced man who accepts the help of a fun-loving, free-spirited bartender to meet the woman of his dreams, only to fall in love with the matchmaker herself.
Mark McAlister needs a woman. But not just any woman. She has to be cultured and reserved with impeccable manners, the kind of woman he can bring to his stuffy accounting firm's dinner dance to convince his boss he's partner material.
* * *
Bartender Liz Prescott knows a nice guy like Mark doesn't stand a chance with the snooty, condescending woman he's set his sights on, so she offers to help. All he needs is a bit of a makeover and a dose of self confidence, and Liz is convinced he can have any woman he wants.
* * *
Mark is sure Liz's advice couldn't possibly help, but sure enough, his dream woman takes the bait. It isn't long, though, before Liz goes from helping Mark find the woman of his dreams to being the woman of his dreams. But if his boss sees him with a crazy, short-skirted, fun-loving woman like her, Mark knows he can kiss his partnership goodbye. Can he give up the future he desperately wants for the love he's always dreamed of?
* * *
Copyright © 2017 by Jane Graves
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This book is a work of fiction. The events, places, names and characters in this book are derived from the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to events, locales or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
First published in 2001 as The Matchmaker’s Mistake. The book has been updated and rewritten with a substantial amount of new content.
Prologue
Liz Prescott came to the conclusion nothing caused more chaos than a bride dumping her fiancé at the altar and falling into another man’s arms. Unless, of course, that other man was her fiance’s brother, who’d flown fifteen hundred miles to stop the wedding and steal the bride.
Now, that was pandemonium.
Liz didn’t care that she was out the cost of a bridesmaid’s dress and a trip to Jamaica for a wedding that never happened. True love had finally prevailed, and wasn’t that the most important thing?
Now, hours after the wedding that wasn’t, she sat with Kelsey Morrison, Sarah's other bridesmaid, at the edge of the Caribbean Sea, sipping a tropical drink and watching a full moon rise over the ocean. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, savoring her last night in paradise before returning to her regularly scheduled life in Miami.
“Sarah's so lucky,” Liz said. “Nick is crazy about her. I’d kill to have a man fly thousands of miles to stop my wedding and get me back."
"Please," Kelsey said. "Sarah barely knows him. Wait till she finds out he watches TV in his underwear and clips his toenails in bed. There goes the romance."
Liz frowned. ”Well, that's heartwarming."
"It’s realistic.”
"It was love at first sight when she met Nick year ago,” Liz said. “Don’t you think that means something?”
“So why didn’t she stay with him instead of getting engaged to his brother?”
“It took her a while to come to her senses. I’m just glad she did.”
Kelsey continued to frown disapprovingly, as if true love was a concept only the most starry-eyed idiots would believe in. Maybe it was because she was a cop, which meant she probably broke up a lot of domestic disputes. That would give just about anyone a bad attitude about love and marriage, wouldn’t it?
Sarah had actually tried to send a little luck Kelsey’s way by throwing her bridal bouquet directly at her so she had no choice but to catch it. Then that horrible woman had come out of nowhere and snagged it before Kelsey could, giving her an elbow to the eye at the same time.
Kelsey pulled the nearly-melted ice pack away from her face, where a multicolored bruise was forming beneath her eye.
“Yep,” Liz said. “There it is. You definitely have a black eye.”
“Of course I do,” Kelsey muttered. “That woman was lethal.”
“You're a cop, and she was lethal?”
“You have to watch out for the crazy ones. Sometimes they have superhuman strength.” Kelsey shook her head. "I can't believe Sarah threw the damned thing in the first place. Don't you have to say 'I do' before it counts?”
Liz grinned. "She thinks you should get married, so she figured it was worth a shot. If only you'd caught it—"
“That’s nothing but superstition. Why does every woman on earth believe that stuff?"
"Because most women want to get married.”
"I don't. Half of all marriages end in divorce."
"And half don't."
"Is it really worth all that trouble for a fifty-fifty shot?"
"That's kinda cynical, isn’t it?” Liz said.
Kelsey just shrugged and drained her glass.
Okay, so it appeared that not only did Kelsey not believe in love at first sight, she didn’t believe in love at all. Liz couldn’t fathom that. She hadn’t had the best luck in the world herself when it came to men, but she was never without hope. She had no doubt that someday she’d have the same kind of happiness Sarah had found with Nick. She only hoped it happened before she was too old to enjoy it.
“Will you ladies be needin' anything else?”
Liz turned to see a waitress walking through the sand toward them. She wore a tropical print shirt and a black skirt, the uniform of the resort staff. She wasn't the petite waitress who'd taken their original order. This woman was tall and statuesque with heavy black dreadlocks spilling down her back. According to the tag she wore, her name was “Kiki.”
“Nothing more for me,” Kelsey said.
Liz said she’d had enough, too, but instead of walking away, Kiki said, “You ladies looked lovely at the wedding today."
"You mean the wedding that never happened?” Kelsey said.
Kiki gave them a knowing smile. "There'll be one soon enough. It's just a shame you ladies are alone in this romantic place without your own men to share it with.”
“I don't have a man,” Liz said. “I haven't had much luck in the relationship department lately.”
“I can do without a relationship altogether,” Kelsey said. “Men are just too much trouble.”
“Oh, no!” Kiki said. “You should never give up on love! Wonderful men are out there just waitin’ for you.”
Kelsey gave her a suspicious look. “Yeah? So where are we supposed to meet these wonderful men?”
Kiki laughed softly, those long dreadlocks swaying in the Car
ibbean breeze. “Oh, there's no meetin' anybody, sweetness. You know 'em already.”
Kelsey made a scoffing noise. “Well, that does it. If it has to be a man I already know, I’m going to be alone forever.”
“Men we already know?” Liz said. “How would you know that?”
Kiki gave her a sly smile. “I know a lot of things, milady.”
"I'm a bartender,” Liz went on, “so I know a lot of men. But most of them aren't my type." She considered that for a moment. "Actually, none of them are my type."
She wasn’t joking about that. Most of the men who came into Simon’s Bar and Grill were Wall Street types who had high-stress jobs, drove Beemers and Jags, and were looking for woman who spent more every month on makeup and clothes than Liz did on her apartment rent.
“The only single men I know are cops,” Kelsey said, “and I'm not going there.”
“Are you sure they’re going to be men we already know?” Liz said.
Kiki gave her that sly smile again. “Whatever Fate decides.”
Fate? Liz sighed. If Fate thought she was going to hook her up with one of the stressed-out, Scotch-drinking, suit-wearing men who never missed happy hour at Simon’s, she needed to think again.
“Keep your eyes open, ladies,” Kiki said, looking up at the sky. “You see the full moon tonight? By the time the next one rises, you'll be in the arms of those wonderful men who’ll love you with all their hearts.”
A little tingle of excitement ran down Liz’s spine. Just as quickly, though, she brushed it off, telling herself it was nothing more than her natural optimism oozing out. Nobody in their right mind would believe what this woman was saying.
“That’s right,” Kiki said. “The next full moon belongs to both of you. This one,” she said, nodding toward the sky, “is Sarah’s.”
Liz felt another tingle, one she just couldn’t quell. After all, Kiki was right. Tonight of all nights, there was a full moon, the very night when Sarah was finally in the arms of the man who really loved her. So that meant that next month—
No! That was crazy. All that natural optimism of hers that was oozing out? She needed to stuff it back in. She was definitely a positive person, but even she wasn’t buying this.
“Walk good, sweeties,” Kiki said as she swished away, her dreadlocks swaying in the night breeze. “Walk good, now.”
Walk good. Jamaican slang for Take care. Be happy. Have a nice life.
“Okay, she was kinda weird,” Liz said.
Kelsey made a scoffing noise. “No kidding.”
“But what if she's right? What if our soul mates are right under our noses?”
“Not a chance.”
Liz finished the last of her drink, then checked the time. It was still early. Maybe one more after all? She turned toward the beach bar, intending to call out to Kiki.
She wasn’t there.
Confused, Liz looked left and right to see if she was serving other customers on the beach, but she was nowhere to be seen.
Hmm. Very weird.
Finally Liz decided the two drinks she’d had must have been stronger than she realized, so more time had passed than she thought before she looked toward the beach bar. And if her mind was already that messed up, the last thing she needed was one more drink.
“I have an idea,” she said. “The night of the next full moon, we’ll text each other. Just one word. If Kiki was right and you found the love of your life, text YES. If she was wrong, text NO.”
Kelsey played along and exchanged phone numbers, even as Liz knew she thought it was pointless. And it probably was. Liz thought about Sarah and Nick and felt a bittersweet tug of envy. When was it going to be her turn?
According to Kiki, by the next full moon.
For a moment Liz gave in to the dreamy, optimistic feeling that overcame her as she imagined what it would feel like to turn around and find the man of her dreams standing right behind her. In her heart she knew the likelihood of meeting that perfect man in the next thirty days when it hadn’t happened in the past ten years was almost nonexistent.
But still a girl could hope, couldn’t she?
* * *
1
“Hey, McAlister. Did you hear the news?"
Mark McAlister looked up from the balance sheets scattered across his desk. When he saw Jared Sloan swagger into his office, he wished he'd locked the door and booby-trapped it for good measure. Monday mornings were bad enough without being subjected to Sloan before he'd even had his second cup of coffee.
Sloan stopped in front of Mark's desk, folding his arms in the casual yet commanding pose of a man who thought he ruled the world. Mark had no time for gossip, but if he didn't ask, Sloan would never leave.
"What news is that?"
"Carson Industries. They're signing with us this morning."
It took every ounce of self-control Mark had to keep his shock from showing. Last Friday he'd given Jack Carson a presentation to show how Carson Industries was needlessly throwing away hundreds of thousands of dollars every year in taxes. He'd approached the issue with logic and reason, but for reasons he couldn't fathom, Carson had frowned his way through most of the presentation, then left the office with a noncommittal "I'll get back to you." Mark had been around long enough to know what that meant: Don't call me. I'll call you.
Had he read Carson wrong? Had he finally won a client through a clear, concise presentation of the facts? He felt a rush of satisfaction, his heart beating double-time.
"That's good," he told Sloan, trying not to let his relief show. "Of course, I assumed Carson would say yes after he had a chance to think about the numbers. We can save him a bundle with those tax credits I proposed, and that environmental loophole--"
"The numbers? Are you kidding?" Sloan burst into laughter. "Any accounting firm in Miami can throw numbers on a page. I took a different approach."
Mark froze, dread washing over him. Not again. This couldn't be happening again. He could barely spit out the words. "You got him to sign?
"Yeah. With a little help from Tiffany, of course. Turns out she and Carson's wife were both Tri-Delts at the University of Florida, so Tiffany invited her and Carson to join us in Aspen for the weekend. It took my lovely wife less than an hour to find out that Carson's wife makes all the decisions in that family." Sloan gave Mark a superior smile. "It was all downhill from there."
Sloan's secret weapon. The Tiffany Connection.
Tiffany was the daughter of one of Miami's most prominent neurosurgeons. She had a Master's degree in anthropology. She belonged to the Junior League, and she was on the board of the Miami Symphony. She was acquainted with movers and shakers all over the state of Florida, and she'd used that influence more than once to snag her husband a client.
Sloan gave Mark a big, phony grin. "I think this calls for a celebration, don't you? There'll be a bottle of bubbly floating around my office later on. Be sure to drop by."
At that moment it was all Mark could do not to vault over his desk, take Sloan by the throat and squeeze all that mocking condescension right out of him. It was bad enough that he horned in on every client Mark had ever tried to sign. What was worse was that he gloated about it--incessantly--then made Mark look like a bad sport for taking it personally.
"I've got work to do, Sloan. If you want to spend your day guzzling champagne, that's up to you."
"Aw, come on, McAlister! It's not important who's actually getting Carson to sign on the dotted line. This is a team effort, right?"
Team effort? What a joke. The day Sloan became a team player was the day hell became a winter wonderland.
"Don't worry," Sloan added. "I'm sure your contribution will be considered as highly as mine when the new partnership is announced. After all, somebody's got to crunch those numbers, right?" He gave Mark an irritating little chuckle, then strolled out of his office.
Anger and resentment tore through Mark like wildfire. He wanted that partnership so badly he could taste it, but it was going to
be a damned hard thing to accomplish if Sloan continued to one-up him every step of the way. How was he ever going to outshine a phony ex-frat boy with a savvy, ambitious wife, who'd written the book on corporate ladder-climbing?
He strode out of his office to his assistant's desk. Tina Boyd had her hands on her computer keyboard, her fingers flying like mad. Her short, spiky blonde hair and long pink fingernails made her a striking standout among her peers, but Mark wouldn't have traded her for anyone. She was a hundred pounds of pure administrative dynamite, which left her plenty of time for her volunteer job as officer-in-charge of the rumor mill at Nichols, Marbury & White.
"Tina, can I ask you a question?"
"Sure, boss," she said, her fingers never ceasing their frantic tapping. "Shoot."
He lowered his voice. "The partnership. What's the grapevine telling you?"
Tina's fingers froze on the keyboard. She paused a moment, then lifted them off. She turned around in her chair to face Mark, her mouth falling into a sympathetic frown. "It doesn't look good for you."
That was exactly what Mark had expected to hear, but still the words felt like a anvil settling on his chest.
"Almost everyone knows you're the best candidate," Tina added. "But that nasty Jared Sloan and his prissy wife won't get out of the way long enough for the big boys to see that."
Another fact Mark was painfully aware of.
"Actually," Tina went on, "from what I've been able to see, it's easy to become a partner at this company. All you have to do is turn yourself into a pushy, arrogant jerk and get yourself a woman who knows how to play the corporate social game, and you'll move right to the top of the list."