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He thinks I’m some sweet, flaky girl he can intimidate. But he couldn’t be more wrong. I’m an Andrews through and through, and if I can handle Meredith and do whatever it takes to get that arrangement where it needed to be, on time, I can sure as hell deal with a manager who’s majorly fucked up.
“I made sure last week that I’d have all the flowers I need for the Johnson-Kennedy wedding. My first morning here, and I find that your equipment failure has caused me to lose a large portion of them. Now, I don’t care if you have to call the owner, or the other resorts, or every flower shop on this island, or even get them air-flighted on a charter plane from the next island over. You are going to have those flowers replaced by the end of the day because I am not going to fuck around for the next few days trying to scrape bouquets together on the fly.”
The truth is, I will likely do that too. But getting flowers to the island was a long and difficult process with customs, so what’s already here is going to have to work. I just need them from their scattered locations to one central cooler so I can see what I’m working with.
“Miss, I’m sure this is stressful, but please calm down,” the manager says, trying to regain control, but his condescension is heavy as he mansplains, “I assure you that we’ll make this right. But by tonight is impossible. You must be reasonable.” He tacks on an awkward laugh, as though my request for flowers might as well be a temper tantrum over wanting a mythical unicorn with a rainbow mane that eats sugar and shits cotton candy.
My voice goes cold as ice, my tone threatening death. Not his, but his business’s, which might be even worse. “I think you’ll find that I am extremely reasonable, decidedly more so than Meredith Wildeman. Currently, she has not been informed of your failure, of Casa del Mario’s failure, to provide a satisfactory venue as outlined in your legally binding contract. Mr. Kennedy and Miss Johnson are also currently blissfully unaware that their pending nuptials might include none of their carefully selected flowers because of your issue. I would hate for them to lose faith in your resort, especially seeing as how high-profile this wedding is.” I look to the cooler with a sad frown.
The manager knows he’s backed into a corner. I am his kindest option to deal with. And to be clear, I’m not nice nor naïve. I will do whatever is necessary to make this right for my client. Even if it’s taking a wheelbarrow down to that greenhouse and chopping every last bloom at the root.
Sorry, Edward! I know better now, but desperate times . . . desperate measures, you know?
He sighs. “I will get as many flowers as I possibly can.” I raise my brows, silently demanding more. “They’ll be here by this afternoon.”
“Thank you.” I nod agreement to his terms. “And the cooler repaired or I’ll be taking over one of your restaurant’s refrigerators.”
“You can’t!” he balks.
If I could shoot daggers from my eyeballs, he’d be a dead man right where he’s standing.
“Very well. It will be repaired within the day.”
Janey waits until we make it to the elevator before she busts up laughing. “Oh, my God! I thought he was gonna piss himself when you went all Godzilla Rampage on his ass. Precise slice and dice!” she exclaims, slashing through the air with a flurry of sharp karate chops. “That was awesome, Miss Andrews!” She mimics the manager who thought he could walk all over me but got smashed in our game of chicken.
It was. But it shouldn’t have happened to begin with. And now, I’m way too busy to go kayaking with Lorenzo.
Last night, I was mad at him for saying yes to that without asking me, but once he explained, I’d gotten on board. Now, I’m disappointed to miss it, though I could definitely do without another dose of Emily.
“I’ll have to cancel on Lorenzo. We had plans this afternoon, but I have to focus on this. It’s too important.”
Janey shakes her head, determined. “Hell no, you’re not canceling. Yeah, this sucks and has the potential to be a serious clusterfuck, but you can’t do anything about it in the next few hours. The manager’s working and I’ll be working, so go and enjoy. I insist. You deserve this.”
“No way,” I argue. “Don’t be ridiculous. This is priority.”
Janey throws her arm around my shoulder and whispers in my ear.
“The highest priority you should have is knocking the rust off your pussy. It’s been a long time since you’ve gotten any or even had any fun. Go, Abs. I can handle this, and I’ll call you if I can’t. Girl Scout promise.” She holds up her hand, obviously never having been a Girl Scout. If anything, she looks like she’s about to testify in her own defense, which her next words make me worry about. “Plus, I think I’m going to visit that greenhouse again to see if I can swipe a few more blooms. If you’re with me, we might both get arrested. But if you’re out on the water with witnesses when it happens, you’ll have plausible deniability.”
