If only I had the power to kick people off the board… I would have booted Tristan so fast. But my dad had other thoughts. You can’t make business decisions based on personal feelings, son, he had said. And even though I knew he was right, it was still frustrating as hell.
Bells jingled somewhere near the door and I groaned. How many store owners put bells on their doors? Didn’t they know there were goddamn apps now that could text you when a customer walked in?
I didn’t bother looking up. If there was anything that I was sure of, it was that I wasn’t interested in making friends in a town where I didn’t plan on staying more than a few weeks.
The bells got louder somehow and didn’t stop when I felt the cold gust of wind disappear with the closed door.
“Morning Avery,” I heard the British guy say. And still, those damn bells jingled. “What can I get you?”
I glanced up to find my employee standing at the counter, drumming her red and green striped fingernails against the glass countertop. “Hmmm. Peppermint mocha, Lex. Thanks!”
She turned to face me, and that’s when I saw her sweater—a hideous bright red frock that had bells sewn onto a green knit Christmas tree. Her light brown hair was pulled into two braids and tucked together in a crazy pigtail sort of updo with a point at the center of her head.
I think I preferred her in the pajamas.
In fact, I knew I did. The way her muscled legs peeked out from the hem of the sleep shirt—it made me want to reach out and hook my finger beneath the silk material and drag it up her legs to see just how bare she was beneath it.
I pinched my eyes shut and forced the dirty thoughts out of my head. Sex with Avery would be like having sex with a character from Whoville. Her sweater and hair proved as much—literally. Not to mention my dad’s store looked like a Christmas Elf puked all over it. She even named her damn dog thematically.
Still, I had to hand it to her… her store’s sales numbers were the best of any location for five years running. Even if I believed we could do better in a larger city, whatever she was doing here, she was doing it right.
She must have sensed my thoughts somehow because she grinned and, lifting the paper latte cup in her hand, strolled over to take the seat across from me—jingling all the way. “Good morning.” The way she sang the greeting made me wonder if birds and mice helped her get dressed.
“You’re awfully… chipper.”
“Well, I was up before the sun. So, I figured I might as well embrace that. There was no reason to start the day off wearing grumpy pants.”
“You started the day off wearing no pants if I recall.” Shit. The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.
The corners of her mouth tightened, her smile growing brittle. “Well, like I said before, I won’t apologize for wearing pajamas in my home outside of business hours. So, think twice before barging in again at all hours of the night.”
Oh, I will. I didn’t think I’d be able to get that image of the silky, button-down shirt—and how it gaped just the tiniest bit over her cleavage—out of my head for a while.
“Nice sweater,” I said, trying to keep the sarcasm in my voice from dripping like molasses.
“It’s ugly sweater day,” she said proudly. “All business owners wear their ugliest Christmas sweater today and the mayor visits all participants to choose the winner.”
“Sounds like he’s going to choose a loser.”
She spun in her chair and pointed at the bakery owner. “Which reminds me… Lex! Where’s your sweater?”
He put a finger up and reached below the counter, pulling out an apron with knitted sleeves sewn on. He slipped his arms through and tied it around his waist.
Yep, it was hideous. A giant Santa face with something three-dimensional creating the beard. “Tada,” he sang and did a little twirl for her. “Olivia picked it out at the store and glued marshmallows onto the beard. Then my mother-in-law knitted the sleeves onto the apron so that that it would technically qualify as a sweater.”
Avery clapped her hands. “Wow, you may actually have me beat! Then again, I didn’t have a two-year-old to help me glue marshmallows onto my sweater!”
Ah, he had a toddler. That almost made his participation make sense. “Creative,” I said, lifting my coffee cup to toast him from afar.
“What about you?” Avery asked, turning her attention back to me.
“What about me?”
“It’s an ugly sweater contest for all Maple Grove business owners. You’re a business owner. You need a sweater.”
“Technically, you’re not a business owner in Maple Grove.”
Again, that confident smile faltered. Why did I do that? I had nothing against this Avery girl. I didn’t know her all that well—just what I’d heard about her from my dad and the fact that her store’s success was single handedly convincing him not to branch out into cities.
“See?” he would say. “If Avery can make our stores profitable in a town with a population below five thousand people, we don’t need the high rents of a city!”
“That’s true. But since I’m usually the face of the company here in Maple Grove, I act accordingly. I treat it like it’s my store, even if it isn’t. But, for the record, I own shares of your dad’s company… so technically I am an owner. I just own a tiny piece of it.”
“Touché.”
“But, don’t you worry,” she continued. “I have the perfect sweater for you.”
Fifteen minutes later, we were back in the store and I was standing in front of a tinsel framed mirror staring at the hooded green Grinch sweater she had shoved into my hands and told me to put on.
“Well?” she called from the other side of the changing room.
I debated lying… telling her it was too small to wear. But I was a little worried that she had a stockpile of these sweaters in various sizes. And then I’d be stuck wearing a hideous sweater that was way too large for me.
I sighed, shoved the curtain open and found her waiting on the other side, grinning. “Aw, it’s perfect.”
I snorted. “We have very different definitions of perfection, then.”
“Oh, come on. It’s the kick-off day to Christmas Fest! The ugly sweater contest is an age-old tradition here in Maple Grove!”
When she reached out and brushed her hand across my forearm, I wasn’t ready for the spark of electricity as her palm connected with my sleeve. The molecules between us buzzed to life, and she must have felt it, too, because she immediately jerked her hand away, cradling it to her breast.
“So,” she said, clearing her throat and tucking her hair behind her ear. “What was so important here in the store that it couldn’t wait until normal operating hours?”
In truth… nothing that I needed her for. But I couldn’t exactly say that to her face. Not after I barged in and woke her up at this god-awful early hour.
“Well,” I walked past her, glancing at the various aisles of the Christmas store. “I wanted to take inventory and have a look around before customers started coming in.”
“Okay…” she said carefully. “And that couldn’t have waited?”