“Not a problem.”
“I’m the owner, Sophia. How can I help you?”
“Annie,” I said, taking her outstretched hand and shaking it. “I’m actually here from the medical school. We’re hosting a retirement party for one of our distinguished faculty up at the Spirit Ranch today. We ordered a few cases of wine from here, but it was never delivered.”
I passed over the order form to Sophia, who looked even more surprised when she scanned it over.
“I have this order,” she said, “but it’s for next weekend.”
“No, it’s for today. We’re all back in rotations next weekend.”
“I don’t even have to look it up. I know that I have it for next weekend.”
Sophia immediately went to the computer. I followed her, standing before the desk. She quickly printed out a similar form and passed it to me.
I glanced down at it. It was nearly identical to the draft form I’d handed her, except that the date was filled in on the completed form and it was in fact for next weekend. What the hell?
“Oh God,” I groaned as I looked at the signature.
Who the hell put Bryan Clifford in charge of this?
Bryan was our resident fuckup. He’d only gotten through the last three years of medical school because his mother was on the board and kept bailing him out. I prayed for anyone who had him as a doctor after we finished all of this. Lord, save me from mediocre white men.
I had no idea how it had gone from my name on Cézanne’s list to Bryan ordering the wine and putting the wrong date on it.
“You’re right. It is for next weekend.”
“I’m really sorry,” Sophia said.
“Do you have the wine in stock?”
“Sure, I have it, but my drivers are already gone for the day. I don’t even have a van here tonight to deliver it myself.”
My heart sank. “Can’t you call someone?” I asked, teetering toward desperate. “It’s, like, a three-thousand-dollar order. You’ll lose that if we don’t figure this out.”
She shot me a pained expression. “I don’t know who I could get to come in time. I can text a few drivers, but I’m sorry. It seems like a stretch, and I have a meeting after I close.”
“I’d appreciate it. It would be really helpful. I don’t know what else we’re going to do.”
Sophia patted my hand across the desk. “Let me shoot off those texts. Hopefully we can fix this.”
“Thanks,” I said with a sigh and then pulled out my phone to text Cézanne about the disaster. I had a feeling Bryan was about to get eaten alive by her after she found out.
I waited for news from Sophia when the bell over the door jingled.
I glanced up from my phone, praying to whoever would listen that one of the drivers had come back for some reason or another. Some serendipitous reason that would save my shitty day. We could pack up the van and drive out to the ranch, and I’d look like a hero.
Instead, I turned around and found the last person in Lubbock I wanted to see. The one person who had fractured my trust and left me a little more cynical than I’d been before. A line had been drawn in the sand. No matter that we’d had a one-night stand with the best sex of my life, I wouldn’t open myself back up to be shattered by Jordan Wright again.
2
Annie
“Annie,” Jordan said warily. He still held the door open, letting freezing air into the lovely heat of the boutique, as if he needed an escape route. Just in case. “What are you doing here?”
I crossed my arms over my chest, immediately hitting the defensive wherever Jordan was concerned. “Believe it or not, but some people frequent the same places as you.”
“That wasn’t what I meant.” He clenched his jaw. “I just…”
“I know what you meant,” I snapped, turning back toward Sophia.
Her dark eyes were wide and bright when she saw Jordan standing there. He closed the door at her approach. Escape no longer needed.
“Hi, Sophia,” he said with an enthusiasm that I hadn’t heard from him in years. His normal response to seeing and talking to me was tightly controlled warfare.
“Jordan,” Sophia gushed. She brushed past me and swept into his arms. “So good to see you again.”
I bit my tongue to keep from gagging. Instead, I clenched my hands into fists in the pockets of my peacoat.
Ah, so when Sophia had mentioned that she had a meeting, she’d meant, date. Sophia, the owner of The Wine Boutique, was dating Jordan Wright. My not-quite ex. If you could even call our one passionate night together and subsequent months of anger and deterioration a relationship. Most days, I didn’t. Today I did.
Three years ago, Jordan and I had fallen head-over-heels in a matter of hours. It still felt indescribable even to me. That one moment he could just be the hot guy at the bar and the next, I couldn’t get enough of him. Then he’d left for Vancouver, forever in my mind as that perfect one-night stand. Until he’d moved to Lubbock and ruined everything.
“Sorry about this. There was some miscommunication with a client,” Sophia said. “I’m going to try to work this out, and then we can have our meeting.”
“Sure. No problem. What’s going on?” he asked.
Our eyes met across the space, and heat blossomed in my body. I stifled it, ignoring the way he still ignited something hot and needy in my core. It was purely sexual. I couldn’t help that he was probably the hottest guy I’d ever met in my life, and who wouldn’t want to fuck a guy this attractive?
He was six foot four of pure muscle with wind-tousled dark hair that sometimes swept into his chocolate eyes, which always looked straight through me. He peeled off his overcoat to reveal the black suit underneath that molded to his muscular physique. I could picture the six-pack and V-lines beneath. Somehow, my imagination had only intensified his body in my mind.
With that body and a quick mind that missed nothing, all signs should have pointed to us banging constantly.
Instead, here we were. A chill colder than the January wind against my bare legs settled between us.
“Some idiot at the medical school wrote down the wrong date for our party,” I told him. “Sophia doesn’t have any drivers tonight and there’s no way to get three thousand dollars worth of wine to the event now.”
“We’ll find a way to make this right,” Sophia assured me. “I can stay a little later if Jordan doesn’t mind waiting.”
“I don’t mind,” he said. “You can’t get ahold of any drivers?”
She cringed. “No. Everyone’s already left for the weekend.”
“Maybe we could get a few cases in my car,” I suggested with a shrug. “I’d probably have to make a couple trips, but at least it’d get done.”
“We could do that,” Sophia said uncertainly.
Jordan interrupted. “I…have a truck.”
All of my blood dropped into my toes. I felt woozy. Oh, this was not a good turn of events.
Sophia brightened. “That would be so helpful,but…what about our meeting?”
Definitely, definitely a date. But…maybe Jordan didn’t know?