Love, Chocolate, and Beer (Cactus Creek) (7 page)

It was a beautiful Christmas cactus, with loads of volcanic, chlorophyll-green leaf strands and waxy, bright flowers in full bloom.

Touching one of the pinkish-red petals, unique to this variety, she smiled, curious as to who’d have brought it in. For all she knew, it could’ve been here for days. And since none of her workers saw the untamed beauty in all the local desert cacti flowers she chose to decorate her brewpub with—often asking why she didn’t go with orchids or other ‘normal’ restaurant flowers instead—Dani knew this had to be a gift for her...but from whom?

Oh
, mystery solved—there was a card. She felt her lips curve up in a smile as she read it.

To: Dani (err, fill in the blank because I’m an idiot)

I’ve discovered that calling you to schedule our first date is just slightly more challenging without your phone number, or a way to look you up without your last name. (That one, I’m really sorry for). I apologize for my utter lack of game. My number’s on the back of this card. Hope to hear from you soon.

She laughed in delight at the ‘This is Luke, by the way’ signature.

So it hadn’t been a onetime thing for him. Blushing over that news and admiring the cactus with a touch of wonder, she marveled at Luke’s choice of this prickly plant over the more obvious rose bouquet most guys would have opted for.

The unbidden appraisal of how un-cliché he was made her lace her fingers together to restrain herself from calling him right then and there. As she’d discovered more times than she cared to admit, making a call when she was this tired was about as bad as drunk-dialing.

Cat-yawning again, she dropped down onto the sofa. Nope, definitely a nap first.

Burrowing against the cushions, relaxation swiftly draped over her. Soon, she was drifting in and out as she peeked at the cactus one last time.

So sweet
, she thought hazily before dragging her phone out of her pocket. The ‘no sleep dialing’ rule didn’t apply to texting, she reasoned with drowsy clarity. Oh, or
sexting
. Even better. Blinking slowly, she sexted Luke the first wayward thought floating in her head and hit send.

A devilish grin tugged at her lips. She’d close her eyes for just a sec until he...

Dani was asleep before she even completed her thought.

* * * * *

IT WAS
past noon when Quinn headed back to Desert Confections after finishing the corporate deliveries along with the drop-offs for their growing local distributor base around the county they’d managed to keep even throughout the move from Mesa to Cactus Creek.

All morning, she’d deliberately detoured through every main bar district in the neighboring areas as her vision for the Valentine’s Day marketing plan took firmer shape. Sadly, none of the establishments she saw fit the video vibe she had in mind for their ad launch.

Only one business would do, really.

Driving past Ocotillos, she decided then and there to go with her first instincts. The brewpub had the exact look and patronage she was going for. With that decision out of the way, she quickly got the ball rolling by first calling in a favor to a friend who worked freelance as a video graphics designer. Evan was the perfect guy to handle the footage she wanted to squeeze in today.

By the time she finished coming up with the interview questions she wanted to ask during the video, Evan was ready and waiting with his equipment set up on the busy walkway as she’d requested. Twenty- and thirty- something year-olds were steadily filing in and out of Ocotillos for lunch. Perfect.

Luckily, she’d worn one of her less severe skirt suits today—one that made her look less like a tired single-mom and more like one of those reporters who did field-side NFL interviews. Taking a breath, she spotted what looked like older grad students—cool, attractive guys in their mid- to late- twenties. The ideal interviewees. Encouraged, she flashed them a radiant smile and waved them over with the kind of charm she’d forgotten she possessed.

“Hey guys,” she grinned conspiratorially. “I just have a few questions about Valentine’s Day. My shop partner and I are thinking about doing a little V-Day overhaul. Wanna help us out?”

And the answers began rolling in.

Almost an hour later, after finishing her tenth slam-dunk interview, Quinn decided to wrap it up. All the young business professionals and college students she’d videotaped had been fantastic, both with their candid answers and their genuine enthusiasm when she explained the concept of Valentine’s Day and White Chocolate Day. The responses she’d gathered were priceless.

The pleased high she was on faded fast, however, when she glanced up and saw a woman in a black Ocotillos t-shirt stalking toward them in what could only be described as barely contained fury. With the angry scowl she was wearing, the cute pixie-looking woman somehow managed to look like an enraged mama bear jolted out of hibernation. The paradoxical contrast should’ve been funny.

It wasn’t.

“Why the hell are you videotaping out here without our consent?” demanded the woman.

Quinn went into damage control mode real quick. “We were just interviewing people for a short video ad for our new chocolate shop next door.” She pointed over at their cheerful storefront window the next building over while her eyes told Evan to start packing up the camera equipment like his life depended on it.

She kept her all-business mask on, hoping the cool smile and no-nonsense reply would mollify the woman with murder in her glare and send her on her away.

No such luck.

The woman’s eyes narrowed on the Desert Confections sign and then zoomed back on her. “So why are you harassing people coming into our brewpub instead of filming outside your own shop?” she asked finally, her voice now a little calmer.

But still basically terrifying.

“Well, we uh had very specific questions to ask...for a very specific interviewee group— young business folk and older college students mostly,” replied Quinn, surprised to hear the tiny stutter in her own voice. Her inner wicked witch was actually intimidated by the woman from Ocotillos. An impressive feat. If she hadn’t been so busy watching the woman’s fist to make sure it didn’t come barreling her way, she would’ve complimented her and asked if they could be twitter friends, their kind needing to stick together and all.

“Give it a rest. The cooks and I overheard your interview,” seethed the woman. Hostility filled her voice, holding nothing back. “Insulting the way some folks like to spend a night out in our brewpub doesn’t make your only-in-the-movies lame excuse for romance look any better than what our business has to offer couples. All it does is make you look like an ass. An ass trying to sell a load of fairytale bull.”

Quinn backed up another step.

“Oh, and those
very specific interviewees
?” continued the woman. “They’re called ‘our customers.’ You’re specifically targeting them to use what they say against us. Frankly, you’re lucky I’m not already kicking your ass. So why don’t you take advantage of this unnecessary restraint I’m exhibiting and get your Reporter Barbie ass out of here before I really get pissed.”

Quinn was stunned. She felt so terrible she could barely talk. “I – I didn’t mean for it to come off like that, I swear. We were just trying to show a contrast. We didn’t mean to insult you.”

The woman scrutinized her for a second and took a slow, steadying breath. “Okay, let’s suspend reality for a moment and say I believe you didn’t really mean any harm; you're kidding yourself if you think this was all so innocent. You used our customers, plain and simple. What’s worse, you used them to try and make the nightlife that
we
provide them look unromantic in comparison to the cheesy night at home eating chocolate and drinking champagne in red lacy lingerie. That’s your fairytale portrait of romance, right?” She rolled her eyes. “Whatever, feel free. Just don’t drag our customers or our business into it. If I catch you harassing our customers or making us look bad out here again, you’ll be sorry.”

With that, the woman spun on her heel and stomped back into Ocotillos.

Quinn quickly helped a mildly traumatized Evan put away his camera gear. She felt awful. Never had it been her intent to put down another business to promote Desert Confections. That wasn’t what she’d been trying to do at all. She detested commercials that used such petty marketing techniques. It was cheap and unseemly, and completely insulting to the standards she held to as manager of Luke’s shop.

Completely flummoxed, she had no idea how to proceed. Desert Confections had clearly just made their first enemy in town. An irate, pissed-with-a-sawed-off-shotgun one. Alerting Luke of that fact was priority number one.

She went back in the shop to sound the Defcon 3 alarm.

YIKES.
Raise the siren to Defcon 1.

Quinn jumped when the door of Desert Confections opened with a bell-jangling shove nearly a half hour later, courtesy of the same angry worker from Ocotillos.

Hell, even the big, buff granite counter guys steered a wide berth around her. As the woman charged through the store, right into the back, Quinn automatically began fumbling for her cellphone. Who she was planning on calling, she had no idea. The Coast Guard was the fastest, but the Marines could probably take this five-and-a-half-foot walking powder keg.

Maybe.

It was fair to say Quinn didn’t scare easy, or at all usually, but good lord, this woman was like a dainty little vial of dangerous chemical you just weren’t sure about messing with.

Quinn just barely resisted the urge to hit the deck when the woman came up and slammed a piece of paper next to the register. With a deathly silent, spittin’ mean glare and not a single word, the woman stormed back out the same way she came. Somehow, Quinn managed to maintain her composure. Until the bell above the door stopped quavering, that is. Then and only then did she allow herself to expel the breath she’d been unknowingly holding the entire time.

Hooooly
shit.

Feeling a migraine building, Quinn picked up at the furiously delivered letter and opened it slowly, cringing as if it had a ticking red clock on it.

Not quite. But close.

The letter, written on Ocotillos stationary, had a single, waspish paragraph, addressed to the owner of Desert Confections. It demanded that he or she attend to: 1) the unauthorized videotaping and resulting abuse of Ocotillos’ patrons via underhanded advertisement goals that weren’t fully disclosed to participants, 2) the insulting and offensive display of unprofessional business ethics, inclusive of but not limited to slander, and 3) the overall questionable treatment of a fellow business in the neighborhood that would be considered
actionable
with the town commission.

The sentences following went on to describe, in detail, just how hellish life could quickly become for them in Cactus Creek if they didn’t take this official grievance seriously.

Quinn squeezed her eyes shut and unloaded a string of words she never got to use around her four-year-old son.

“Luke is going to kill me.”

* * * * *

DANI PLUNKED
down into her office chair and stared at the Phoenix address business card in her hand. Rewinding the last hour in her head, she tried to wrap her brain around all that had happened since she’d stomped out of Desert Confections.

Did that really just happen?

In one impromptu meeting, did she really just find the missing key that would unlock a way to make her brother’s dreams of a winery a reality? Her eyes widened in continued disbelief as she replayed the blur that had been the last hour with Harold Jameson, the devoted town business council member and longtime family friend who—together with his citified, intensely stoic son Noah—owned most of the commercial property in Cactus Creek.

Including the space currently being leased out by Desert Confections.

When she’d first barged into Harold’s office in the town center, she hadn’t even noticed the tall, dark, and foreboding Noah sitting off to the side throughout her entire just-to-be-heard tirade. But by the end of her rant, the small-town-boy turned big-shot Phoenix tycoon she’d known since grade school definitely made his presence known.

Mostly because the latter half of her complaints to Harold had ended up morphing into a heatedly pieced-together suggestion for booting out the building’s not-right-for-this-town chocolate shop owner.

“Do you have a replacement business in mind? Or should the town just take a retail hit because the owner insulted you?”
Noah’s voice had boomed from the corner, startling the wits right out of her. Surprised at the sight of him, and thrown off-balance by this valid question regarding much-needed town revenue, she spoke the first words that had come to mind.

“We could open a new country-chic winery there.”

That her brother Derek could run
.

Since the tasty products of Derek’s winemaking hobby had made its way to a number of town functions and local celebrations over the years, the winery idea hadn’t exactly come as a surprise to Harold or Noah; both knew Derek’s dream had always been to open a winery. But Harold clearly wasn’t pleased with the turn the conversation had taken.