Tailored for Trouble (Happy Pants #1) - Mimi Jean Pamfiloff Page 0,1

awning and a sign in the window that read “Happy Pants. Now Available Here!”

Weird.

“Sorry about that. Go ahead,” she said, covering her exposed ear and noting her sad reflection in the glass. Her long wet brown hair and the mascara streaming down her pale face made her look like a cast member from The Walking Dead.

Rarrr…fabulous.

“Miss Reed, Bennett Wade here.” His deep, silky, unhurried voice instantly made her entire body tense up and her adrenaline kick in. “I’d like to speak to you. In person if you can make the time.”

How the hell did he get my cell number?

“What do you want?” she growled.

He made a sound that was half-chuckle, half-throat-clearing. “To speak. Didn’t I just say that?”

SOB thinks he can just call me? After what he did? “There isn’t anything you could possibly say, Mr. Wade, that I—”

“I want to hire you.”

Ha! Funny. “What? It wasn’t enough to ruin my—”

“Miss Reed.” She could hear the impatience in his voice now. “I’m a busy man, so—”

“Ms. It’s Ms. Reed,” she corrected sharply.

“Fine. Ms. Reed, I’d like to discuss an offer, but not over the phone. I prefer doing business in person.”

Business with me? Maybe his brain has been polluted with too many supplements. She seemed to remember he looked like one of those guys who obsessed over his body as much as he did the cut of his suits to show it all off. Although, it was hard to tell with all that pious condescension oozing from his general direction.

“Sorry,” she said in the bitchiest tone possible, “but my schedule is booked, and I’m on my way to a meeting. I’ll have to call you back next lifetime….” As she spoke, Taylor turned toward the street, noticing the long, gleaming black limo now parked against the curb. She couldn’t see past the tinted windows, but…

“You’re sitting right there, aren’t you?” she said into the phone.

The back window lowered and those pale blue eyes, edged with annoyingly thick dark brown lashes, stared back, just as void of warmth as she remembered. But this time, his handsome face—with its chiseled cheekbones, cleft chin, and a strong jaw covered in a charcoal black five o’clock shadow—was missing that patronizing smirk. The man actually looked pissed.

Four Months Earlier

Taylor pulled into the crowded parking lot of HRTech Solutions, sweating bullets and cursing like a sailor—a habit she’d sworn off for New Year’s but had just decided was completely impractical.

This can’t fucking be happening. She was now thirty—Nope. Make that thirty-one—minutes late for her big presentation to the CEO of Wade Enterprises—the man who had a reputation for lacking a soul and for having an unfailing ability to see the world as his personal mound of dirt meant for bulldozing. The man who had announced, last minute, that he’d be flying in from his San Francisco headquarters to hear about their managerial recruiting services.

The request was strange to say the least, considering she and her team usually went to the client, not the other way around. In any case, Taylor had been trying to snag a meeting with Mr. Wade ever since she’d landed contracts with several of his golfing buddies, who were all CEOs of various companies themselves.

The Prius in front of her suddenly spotted an open space. Shit. Dammit. No! She hit her brakes and watched the driver take his sweet time pulling in as she dug her nails into her steering wheel. Then, almost out of the way, the Prius driver began backing out, deciding he wasn’t positioned just right.

Sonofabitch! Come on! She sighed and then focused her frustration on the A/C button of her red Audi TTS, poking it ten times. But all the poking in the world wouldn’t magically make that Prius go any faster, just like it wouldn’t make the temperature go any lower.

It was nine-thirty on this fine February morning and already five-hundred-hell-in-a-hand-basket degrees outside. Not even the devil would let his nuts live in this inferno.

She checked her makeup in the mirror to ensure it hadn’t melted down her face and noticed the incredibly attractive ring of red encircling her brown eyes. The result of having had two and a half hours of sleep.

Wonderful. I look like I’m stoned. Her phone buzzed on the passenger seat. It was her VP texting again.

VERA: Where are you now?

TAYLOR: Pulling into the lot. Is he there yet?

VERA: No. Hurry!

Taylor couldn’t believe her luck. This day might be saved after all.

“Take your sweet fucking time, buddy!” She pounded on the steering wheel