“Never. You’re a good person, Merry Crismis. Except for that potent glare you gave me when I arrived. But underneath that you’ve got a heart of pure—”
“Gold?”
“I was thinking more in terms of vanilla buttercream.”
Meredith bit her lip to keep from grinning, then couldn’t help it and grinned anyway. With a sigh, she gave up completely on annoyance and admitted to herself that being turned on was the only logical option. “Make it chocolate ganache, and I agree.”
He nodded. “Chocolate ganache, it is.”
“You know, that answering glare you gave me was pretty potent, too,” she protested.
“Only because you glared first.” He held his hand out to her. “Truce?”
The smile wreathing his face was so genuine there was no way she could refuse, or resist, so she grasped his hand. “You bet.”
He squeezed her fingers gently. “I apologize for criticizing your candy-heart obsession.”
She squeezed his fingers in return. “I apologize for concentrating so much on one sale that I became unbearable.”
He shook his head firmly. “Never unbearable, just slightly single-minded.”
He settled his butt on the edge of the desk and opened his arms to her. “Come here. Somehow you don’t look deliriously happy about it. I thought you’d be dancing on the ceiling to know those computer screw-ups weren’t your fault.”
She went willingly, letting him envelop her in a warm embrace. “I would be, if it weren’t for that cake.”
He groaned. “That damn ‘Adore-Me’ cake.”
“The same,” she admitted, hoping he wouldn’t get ticked off again and break their embrace.
He didn’t, but his attention suddenly seemed diverted to something in back of her.
“Hey, you have a package.”
Meredith spared a glance behind her at the mystery box. “Uh-huh.”
“You haven’t opened it.”
“Uh-huh.”
He leaned toward her until they were almost nose to nose. “Will you stop saying, ‘Uh-huh,’ and open the damn thing?”
Meredith stared at him. Okay, this was strange, him being obsessed by someone else’s mail. “Why are you so interested in my package?”
He leaned back again and cleared his throat. “Because…uh…because closed packages intrigue me,” he finally said.
“Seriously? Since when?”
The stricken look on his face told Meredith that he was struggling to find a logical answer. It also told her something was wrong. And then instinct kicked in, and she knew her surprise delivery was the answer to what that something was, so she twisted around in his arms and pulled the carton closer.
She’d only had time to give the box’s return address a cursory glance before being interrupted by Vlad’s unexpected arrival with Randy. Now her eyes zeroed in on it as her mind rearranged the pieces of the puzzle until they all fell into place, and she suddenly realized what had happened.
She tightened her hold on Vlad, hugging him against her to let him know how grateful she was. “Oh my gosh, you did this, didn’t you? You bought ‘Adore-Me’ hearts.”
He nodded. “Enough of them to decorate a wedding cake and a bunch of cupcakes.”
Enough hearts to decorate a six-tier cake and a bunch of cupcakes?
Meredith shook her head. Something about that didn’t compute. Two-million hearts would be enough to decorate a mere six-tier cake and a simple bunch of cupcakes only if the cake was big enough to fill an amphitheater and there were enough cupcakes to feed a small nation.
Pulling out of his arms, she grabbed the scissors and slashed the tape that secured the flaps. Then she yanked the carton open and dug in, unearthing boxes of hearts. A few more scissor snips and one of the boxes gaped wide.
She reached in, felt the smooth candy surface against her skin, and joyfully pulled out a couple of hearts, one yellow, one blue. “Adore Me” was imprinted on them, and she grinned with wonder and relief.
The hearts had the right phrase, and there were undoubtedly enough for Julia’s wedding extravaganza, but there was no way this box held almost two million of them.
“How did you get these? Dana saw an article that said if anyone wanted a retired phrase, he’d have to order a full production run. In other words, one-point-seven-million hearts. But there aren’t that many here.”
He grinned, looking totally pleased with himself. “Always go to the source, babe.”
Meredith’s eyes widened when she finally understood. “You mean—?”
“I mean the company itself. Now they have a policy that lets you order as little as a one-pound bag. You can even have personalized phrases, like this one.”
He pulled a ring box from his pocket and offered it to her. “Go on, open it. There are about four-hundred-and-forty-nine identical hearts where this one came from, but at least it’s not almost two-million.”
Meredith took it from him and flipped the cover back. A pink candy heart lay inside inscribed with the words: “Merry C., UR the 1!”
“Oh, my God,” she said, brushing a hand across her eyes because she knew that at any moment she was probably going to start bawling like a baby. “I virtually kicked you out, and you still did this for me?”
“I told you, when someone is important to me, I always go the extra mile or two or two million to help them get what they want…even if they toss me out without dinner.”
“I’m sorry. I thought you didn’t care.”
“Think again. I’m absolutely mad about you…and your desserts, especially the chocolate cupcakes.”
He wrapped his arms around her and rocked her back and forth.
“You know, I was going to check the manufacturer’s website, but then the Divine Desserts site got hijacked, and we received all those last-minute Valentine’s Day orders, and things became so frantic that—” Meredith broke off and groaned. “The terrible things—they were all Tippi’s fault.”
“Right you are. It was always Tippi’s fault. Busy lady, wasn’t she?”
“Busy, desperate, and underhanded. But she’s not going to win. I’m going to give Julia Ogilvy a wedding cake that will be the culinary highlight of her reception. And all because of you.”
“So thank me properly, already.”
“Constantly,” she promised and drew his face down to hers so she could nip gently at his lips to begin fulfilling her promise.
“Wonderful. And from now on we’ll put candy hearts on everything,” he said as his mouth took over the kiss, raising all sorts of wonderful tingling sensations in her skin.
“Even on each other?” she asked, happily remembering their first foray into sex-with-candy.
“Especially on each other. After all, we’ve got four-hundred-and-forty-nine of the things to use,” he murmured and deepened the kiss so thoroughly that she lost all desire to speak.
But at the back of her mind she knew that even if her company didn’t succeed, she’d still won the greatest prize of all—someone who cared enough about her to forgive her failings and support her even when she acted like an obsessed fool.
And, ooh, could the guy kiss!
Epilogue
It had been a perfect day for an elegant wedding and a posh reception.
That thought kept going through Meredith’s mind as the reception reached its end and Julia Ogilvy, now Julia McCullum, drove off with her groom while a bevy of moneyed guests tossed rice at their limousine and cheered them on as they started their new life together.
Standing on the sidelines, Meredith watched the spectacle, unable to stop smiling. She’d spent most of the time providing extra cupcakes to those who wanted them, and there had been more than a few attendees who fit that category.
But as soon as she got through packing up her supplies, she was heading home to Vlad. She found a quiet alcove in a corner of the banquet room and speed-dialed his number to tell him how things had gone.
“Vlad,” she said when he picked up. “It went off without a hitch. I got tons of compliments on the cake and cupcakes, and several of Nan Ogilvy’s friends want to make appointments to discuss various celebrations they’re planning.”
“Wonderful.” Then his voice became deeper, more sensual, vibrating in her ear as though his mouth was pressed right against the phone. “Now ditch those deep-pocket folks and come home to me. I thought of a new game we can play with candy. It involves you, me, whipped cream, melted chocolate, candy hearts, and a lot of exposed skin.”
Meredith shivered as the sound of his whispered words slithered along her spine, kindling a tingly sensation that suffused her skin. “Sounds delicious,” she murmured. “I’ll be there soon.”
And two hours later, when she got home and fell, laughing, into bed with him, she discovered just how delicious it was.
A word about the author…
A writer and researcher who has dealt with subjects as diverse as international organizations, multiple sclerosis, the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, and the Soviet Union (when there still was a Soviet Union), Darcy Lundeen enjoys taking long walks, visiting the Ancient Egyptian, Ancient Etruscan, and dinosaur exhibits in museums, doing Sudoku (but only the easy ones), and concocting stories about everyday people who laugh a lot, cry a little, and ultimately find the happily-ever-after they deserve.
darcylundeen.blogspot.com
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