Page 10 of Perfect (mis)Match

My pulse quickened. I was on the hunt and getting closer. “I don’t know, you tell me. Are your blooms healthy?”

“What’s this about?” the man frowned at me.

“Do they haveblight?” I sighed. How were they not understanding what I meant? Blight was a gigantic issue for heliotrope blooms this season—they had to have heard about it.

I could feel Piper glaring holes in the side of my head.

“You mean that disease? No, blight didn’t make the jump to the islands. We have one of the few remaining healthy farms in the country.”

“And how many acres did you say you own?” I asked.

I realized too late that perhaps my tone was a touch brusque.

Piper jumped out of her chair and grabbed my arm. “Honey, Paul is calling for us, we should go see him.”

I glanced over at the main table and saw Paul engrossed in conversation with Trent. “What are you talking about? He’s not even looking?—”

She wrenched my arm in a surprisingly strong grip. “We’ll be right back, folks.”

I got up and allowed her to slide her arm against mine. She led us out of the private dining room and into the restaurant’s main dining space, in a nook close to the host stand. I craned my neckto see if Maya was in view and spotted her ebony bun across the room. Hopefully she wouldn’t glance our way.

“What the hell?” Piper hissed at me. “Why are you interrogating those nice people?”

“I wasn’t interrogating them. I was asking questions,” I insisted.

“Do you work for border patrol or something? For fuck’s sake, Vincent, you were so rude to them.”

I considered how the conversation had gone and realized my excitement could be misconstrued as rudeness.

“I’m in desperate need of heliotrope, and they’re the key.”

She screwed up her face like I was speaking another language. “Huh?”

I sighed. I didn’t have the time to explain it to her. “They have something I need, and I’m going to get it.”

She gave me a deeply unimpressed glare. “Yeah, that’s not going to cut it. I’ll need more of an explanation before I let you interrogate them again.”

“I’m the CEO of Summit Fragrances, and I need the flower growing on their farm in order to create my next fragrance.”

Piper laughed in my face. “You really think they want to give youanything? Jean looked like she was about to cry, and Joe looked like he was going to use his cane to crack you over the head. Good luck convincing them to give you the time of day.”

Damn it. She was right.

“Can you just keep quiet and let the rest of us have a nice evening?”

“But I need?—”

“Ah, ah,” she chastised, wagging her finger at me. “Tonight isn’t about you, remember? And you’ll never convince them to do anything for you if you keep acting like an entitled asshole.”

“Excuseme?”

She shrugged and scrunched up her nose, which I would’ve admitted was adorable if she wasn’t so exhausting.

“Just calling ’em like I see ’em,” Piper said.

I heard a commotion across the room along with a cringingly familiar laugh and realized Maya was on the move and headed our way. That was the last thing I needed right now. I slung my arm around Piper’s shoulder and started back toward the private room.

“Wha—?” she sputtered at my closeness.

---