Page 9 of Perfect (mis)Match

I looked up to everyone at the table staring at me. “I’m sorry, work.” I held up my phone. “What’s happening?”

“We’re going around the table talking about our favorite places to escape the world. You’re next.”

I frowned. “What was your answer?”

She rolled her eyes at me. “If you’d been listening, you would’ve heard me talk about the wedding I shot in Antigua. It was long before we were dating,sweetheart.” She quirked an eyebrow at me.

The guy next to me handed me a phone. “These are her photos from the trip,” he explained.

I started to pass the phone on but stopped and actually scrolled through them once I caught a glimpse. Her work wassurprising, not only because the photos weren’t the typical I’m-in-a-tropical-location fare, but because they weregood. She had an artist’s eye, and if she were anyone else, I would’ve told her as much.

Seeing as the woman turned her Toyota into a battering ram, I refrained.

“So what’s your location, Vincent?” the older woman asked me.

There was something in her face that reminded me of Nana Dee. Maybe it was the way the corners of her eyes crinkled up when she smiled, like she’d spent a lifetime wearing a grin.

“Jamesport,” I answered.

I’d traveled the world and stayed in every luxury location imaginable, but the one place where I felt happiest? Nana Dee’s bayfront home.

“Long Island?” the grey-haired woman laughed at me. “Well, that’sadorable. And it’s a very attainable getaway, since it’s right up the road!”

“It’s a very special place to me,” I snapped at her, offended she thought my answer was funny.

She might vaguely resemble Nana Dee, but she sure didn’t act like her. Nana Dee wouldneverlaugh at me.

The woman’s face fell. “Oh, I wasn’t suggesting it was a bad choice, we love that area.”

“I’m happy for you,” I shot back as I refocused on my phone.

Piper gasped.

“Wow, rude much?” she muttered under her breath to me. She turned to the couple. “Jean, where do you and Joe go to escape?”

I didn’t even flick my eyes up as the woman started to speak, because the latest email from R&D suggested that we give up on the distilled heliotrope oil and go with the synthetic version.

Fuck. I started banging out a carefully worded email that would convey myextreme displeasureat the news, since I couldn’t actually say there was no fucking way we were giving up.

“Joe and I are very blessed to have a home on Kauai. It’s a lovely little farm.”

The man laughed. “Jean, I’d hardly call twenty acres ‘little,’ especially on an island like Kauai, where land is so precious.”

I tried to relegate the conversation around me to no more than a dull hum as I finished my email. I was so upset my fingers couldn’t punch the letters quickly enough.

“Hawaii is on my bucket list,” Piper said. “I’d love to pick your brain about the best places to visit.”

“Well, if you ever make it, please plan a stop at Sugarview Farm. We have plenty of guest rooms. And if you can time your trip when the heliotrope blooms, I swear you’ll think you’ve died and gone to flower heaven,” the woman laughed. “It’s the reason we bought the place.”

I froze with my finger hovering above my phone. “I’m sorry,what?”

The woman frowned, confused by my sudden interest. “I said we bought the farm because of the flowers.” She glanced at her husband. “They’re my favorite.”

“Heliotrope,” I repeated, locked onto her.

Was it possible my luck was turning around?

The man leaned in. “That’s what she said. Is there a problem?”

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