Page 7 of The Dreidl Disaster

Judith laughed but Liv knew the expression.

“So,” Judith continued, clearly not giving up control or her agenda, “aside from Leah, does anybody have any exciting romantic developments to discuss?”

In the moment, Liv’s heart stopped, knowing that it was possible her sister was going to tell the group about her recent encounter and the very last thing Liv wanted to do was dissect not only the incident but also the reaction. Especially considering how extreme it felt; this was a normal hot guy and she shouldn’t be…

“I’m quitting the dating scene completely,” Naomi announced out of nowhere. “I have a very demanding job and an extra client that’s driving me out of my mind.”

Judith snickered, which was a relief, considering the woman was, in fact, Naomi’s extra client. “Fine, fine,” her cousin said once she composed herself. “Liv?”

And once again, the spotlight of family was on her.

“Liv’s busy trying to find us a place to celebrate Hanukkah,” Naomi interjected, once again inserting herself. Whatever was going on, she had no idea.

“Which is all well and good,” Judith said, “but there’s more to life than Hanukkah and office planning.”

Liv snorted. “Every time I think about dating someone, I’m reminded that a guy I had feelings for at one point in my life turned a mayoral race into a personal attack. No thank you.”

“Not everybody’s like him,” Judith answered. “You should…”

Liv raised an eyebrow. “Are we here for your wedding or for an optional interrogation?”

“Well,” Leah said with a laugh, “considering my love life is professionally intertwined with Judith’s wedding, I think maybe both.”

“Since our last wedding meeting,” Naomi said, “we’ve gotten progress on the ketubah, flower girl dresses, we’ve gotten bridesmaids dresses, I’ll deal with the caterer and ceremony design…”

And as her sister ran through the wedding checklist she’d prepared for Judith, Liv found her mind drifting.

Chapter Three

The traffic onroute nine between Rivertown and Briarwood on Monday morning wasn’t awful, which meant that by nine thirty, Artur was standing in front of the mayor’s door.

It felt…odd. Not like any other assignment he’d done before, not even the moment where he’d offhandedly offered a solution at the inaugural Rivertown latke fry-off a few years before. And that wasn’t even an actual assignment.

Nor was his advice taken seriously then. He hoped it would be now.

The door opened with a creaking noise, revealing…

Her.

Mayor Olivia Nachman.

None of the photos he saw during the hours of research he’d spent the weekend doing came close to demonstrating how captivating she was.

She was gorgeous.

Tall, bright eyes, thick gorgeous hair he wanted to run his fingers through…

But she was his contact, the woman in charge of the situation he’d been sent to fix. She was the one he had to make happy so that his actual bosses were happy.

Which meant he had to keep his interactions with her 100,000 percent professional. And completely forget about the fact he knew what it felt like to have her weight against him.

Because of course she was the woman whose scent had run up his nose and distracted him most of the rest of Sunday.

“Good morning,” he managed.

“Come in, sit down,” she said, beckoning him into the office behind her, moving folders and files off a chair in front of her desk.

“Thank you,” he said. “Thank you very much for making time for me this morning.”

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