“It’s, like, a three-thousand-dollar order. You’ll lose that if we don’t figure this out.”
She shot me a pained expression. “I don’t know who I could get to come in time. I can text a few drivers, but I’m sorry. It seems like a stretch, and I have a meeting after I close.”
“I’d appreciate it. It would be really helpful. I don’t know what else we’re going to do.”
Sophia patted my hand across the desk. “Let me shoot off those texts. Hopefully we can fix this.”
“Thanks,” I said with a sigh and then pulled out my phone to text Cézanne about the disaster. I had a feeling Bryan was about to get eaten alive by her after she found out.
I waited for news from Sophia when the bell over the door jingled.
I glanced up from my phone, praying to whoever would listen that one of the drivers had come back for some reason or another. Some serendipitous reason that would save my shitty day. We could pack up the van and drive out to the ranch, and I’d look like a hero.
Instead, I turned around and found the last person in Lubbock I wanted to see. The one person who had fractured my trust and left me a little more cynical than I’d been before. A line had been drawn in the sand. No matter that we’d had a one-night stand with the best sex of my life, I wouldn’t open myself back up to be shattered by Jordan Wright again.
2
Annie
“Annie,” Jordan said warily. He still held the door open, letting freezing air into the lovely heat of the boutique, as if he needed an escape route. Just in case. “What are you doing here?”
I crossed my arms over my chest, immediately hitting the defensive wherever Jordan was concerned. “Believe it or not, but some people frequent the same places as you.”
“That wasn’t what I meant.” He clenched his jaw. “I just…”
“I know what you meant,” I snapped, turning back toward Sophia.
Her dark eyes were wide and bright when she saw Jordan standing there. He closed the door at her approach. Escape no longer needed.
“Hi, Sophia,” he said with an enthusiasm that I hadn’t heard from him in years. His normal response to seeing and talking to me was tightly controlled warfare.
“Jordan,” Sophia gushed. She brushed past me and swept into his arms. “So good to see you again.”
I bit my tongue to keep from gagging. Instead, I clenched my hands into fists in the pockets of my peacoat.
Ah, so when Sophia had mentioned that she had a meeting, she’d meant, date. Sophia, the owner of The Wine Boutique, was dating Jordan Wright. My not-quite ex. If you could even call our one passionate night together and subsequent months of anger and deterioration a relationship. Most days, I didn’t. Today I did.
Three years ago, Jordan and I had fallen head-over-heels in a matter of hours. It still felt indescribable even to me. That one moment he could just be the hot guy at the bar and the next, I couldn’t get enough of him. Then he’d left for Vancouver, forever in my mind as that perfect one-night stand. Until he’d moved to Lubbock and ruined everything.
“Sorry about this. There was some miscommunication with a client,” Sophia said. “I’m going to try to work this out, and then we can have our meeting.”
“Sure. No problem. What’s going on?” he asked.
Our eyes met across the space, and heat blossomed in my body. I stifled it, ignoring the way he still ignited something hot and needy in my core. It was purely sexual. I couldn’t help that he was probably the hottest guy I’d ever met in my life, and who wouldn’t want to fuck a guy this attractive?
He was six foot four of pure muscle with wind-tousled dark hair that sometimes swept into his chocolate eyes, which always looked straight through me. He peeled off his overcoat to reveal the black suit underneath that molded to his muscular physique. I could picture the six-pack and V-lines beneath. Somehow, my imagination had only intensified his body in my mind.
With that body and a quick mind that missed nothing, all signs should have pointed to us banging constantly.
Instead, here we were. A chill colder than the January wind against my bare legs settled between us.
“Some idiot at the medical school wrote down the wrong date for our party,” I told him. “Sophia doesn’t have any drivers tonight and there’s no way to get three thousand