One
Samantha
I grabbed my cat-ear headband, did a once-over in the mirror to make sure my tail was still attached—my cat tail, not my real ass—and left for the Halloween party. I had to arrive at the Vampire Ball early enough to handle my business. Being the event planner had its perks; one of the benefits was that I could attend the events. Both Lisa—the event coordinator—and I were required to be at all events that we had designed. Unfortunately for Lisa, she had to do more working than partying, but I was usually able to enjoy the party with minimal work involved.
I wasn’t working frat-party type festivities or somewhere that would offer beer pong and strippers—though I’d planned my fair share of those events too. These days, my parties were for the elite, the wealthy, the people who had too much money and time, the bored housewives and braggart husbands, and—the most annoying of all—the single alpha males, the forever bachelors. And the man who was throwing this party just so happened to be the biggest alpha asshole in New Orleans.
Victor Beaumont. Even his name sounded pretentious. I had never met Victor personally, but I worked with his snooty little assistant, Sara, all the time. According to Sara, nothing was ever good enough for Victor. At our previous events, he had wanted me to do this another way, and he had wanted me to do that a different way. And what had I wanted? I’d wanted to punch him in the face half the time I had been working on his events. Everything had to be in perfect order with him. Always.
He’d made her weasel her way on over to me, that damn clipboard bobbing against her chest, and advise me how to meet his ridiculously high standards. For instance, at the last event I’d planned for him, he had told her that he needed to have an eight-foot ice sculpture of a bottle of rum in two weeks, and it had to be perfection. When Sara had told me that Victor requested the ice sculpture ASAP, I’d wanted to say to him that he could take his bottle of rum and shove it, but instead, I’d poured myself a glass of that rum and carried on. I had to admit; he did make fantastic rum. But it wasn’t just his rum.
The Beaumonts owned Fleur-De-Lis, the largest rum distillery in New Orleans. They had been in the business for a very long time, so I was sure Victor knew what he was doing—with rum, not with event planning and design.
“Perfection,” Sara had stressed to me when she called to inform me of yet another one of his wild ideas.
I hadn’t known what her problem was with me until I saw her treating everyone else just as terrible. Now, I didn’t take it so personally. It was hard to work with an egomaniac such as Victor. I felt sorry for her. Kind of. Not really.
“Everything will be perfect. I have already done this eight times with you guys. When is Victor going to trust that I can handle his outlandish requests?” I’d replied.
“Probably never. That’s how Mr. Beaumont operates. That’s why he has been so successful in his endeavors, and I’m here to see that through. Fleur-De-Lis has the highest of standards. It’s expected of us.”
I’d imagined Sara barking at me on her cell phone, right outside of her favorite coffee shop. Her mint-green ball cap hung low to hide the puffiness in her face from one too many cheap sangrias the night before and the night before that and the night before that even. For Victor to be so damn particular, I had no idea what he saw in her. Maybe it was because she matched his personality—a total douche canoe.
“Wonderful. Will you please tell Victor that I’ll handle it? His party will be amazing, as always, and if he has concerns, he can speak with Lisa or me directly.” I had hung up the phone and tossed it in my purse.
I couldn’t let them get to me—not Sara or Victor Beaumont. He was so much of an asshat that he was too cool to even introduce himself to his event team, me included. Though I’d never met him personally, I’d seen pictures of him in the local who’s who magazines. Everyone knew the Beaumont family. And to be honest, as much as I hated to admit it, Victor and all of his brothers were the hottest men I’d seen since … well, since forever.
If Victor weren’t one of those stupid alpha males that I couldn’t stand, I would have marched right past Sara and given him my sexy Sam sammich a long time ago. To be clear, a Sam sammich was what you thought it was. I didn’t give that to just anyone—yet.
But alas, Victor was not on my radar. I was done with alpha assholes. After my very young and very dumb marriage to the Douche Who Must Not Be Named, I had learned how to quickly spot an egotistical rat bastard. They were ridiculously sexy, usually had good careers, liked to wear suits, and wanted to be in control of everything. Yep, Victor checked off everything on that list, especially with his well-defined jawline, signature smirk, and micromanagement of my domain.
All of his recent events had been a success because I made them that way. He’d given me ideas, sure, but I had done the magic. Me. Had I ever gotten credit from the man himself? No. All I had ever gotten from him—Sara—was a bottle of rum and a thank-you note. But to be fair, he paid me well. That was the only reason I stuck with his demanding account in the first place. And also, those bottles of rum were pretty damn amazing.
I parked my car in the back of his almost-castle-like mansion and headed toward the party room that he had recently built. I shielded my eyes to look up and admire the architecture that Mr. Fancy Pants had chosen. Massive Roman columns gave way to a three-story wall made entirely of glass. The room overlooked his expansive pool and out toward an even fancier guest house.
I slammed my door shut and scurried inside the back entrance. My heels echoed throughout the cold stone halls. I made my way around the room, checking to make sure my vendors were doing everything correctly. They, too, knew how Victor could be, and they also couldn’t afford to lose his account. Lisa, who always made sure things went smoothly, was a newly single mom. My sound guy, Pete, was struggling to make ends meet after his wife had been diagnosed with breast cancer. The caterer, Anna, was putting three kids through college. With each rare bonus check I had received, I usually slipped it to one of my vendors. They needed extra cash more than I did. I was single and only had to take care of myself.
These are all real people, I wanted to shout at Victor. They don’t get to piggyback off of their daddy’s money and buy eight-foot-tall ice sculptures or rent eighteen swans and a dozen ducks or plan a ten-course dinner cruise on a yacht.
The least he could do to show his appreciation was give us all a sincere, heartfelt, personal, in-person thank-you. But instead, we always received rum.
Still, the money was better than any of the other events we worked. It was the boss’s demeanor that was the trouble. We worked hard under his iron fist so that we could survive. But with his over-the-top attitude and list of crazy demands, we were all honestly terrified that we would be on the chopping block at any moment’s notice if we didn’t meet his expectations. Thankfully, none of my vendors had pissed Victor off—yet.
Even though I had already planned several of his events, I was still new to working with him. He had scrapped his last planner and her whole team after a fireworks extravaganza hadn’t gone as planned. But who would have guessed that someone drunk on Victor’s rum would sneak over to the fireworks and begin playfully setting them off? The planner should have hired security specifically for the fireworks, not just to guard Mr. Drill Sergeant Beaumont. Rookie mistake.