KITTY CLAYBORN stared out the window of Auntie Bea’s Cards and Gifts watching a smiling couple stroll arm-in-arm down the boulevard.
“Oh, that’s just wrong.”
Jennifer, her part-time assistant, glanced up from a display of half-off porcelain Christmas angels. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s the day after New Year’s. Everyone’s supposed to be broke and hung over, yet this is the fourth couple I’ve seen going into Beekers in the past twenty minutes. It’s not even the dinner hour. Will he really be as busy tonight as he is every night?”
Jennifer pulled the fifty-percent-off sign from the shelf and replaced it with one that upped the discount to seventy-five percent, solidifying the fact that Kitty would now lose four dollars on every one of the silly angels she sold—if she was lucky.
“I think it’s great his restaurant’s doing so well,” Jennifer said cheerfully. “It’s good for the neighborhood.”
Right. And if even a handful of Josh Beekers’ happy diners stepped into her store on occasion, Kitty would agree. Plenty glanced at her window displays before crossing the street, but their resulting looks of bland disinterest would make a herd of zombies seem like a lively bunch. She had to face the fact that, while the dwindling population of local farmers might love her country bears and sweetheart tchotchkes, the new wave of business flooding into town was looking for something else.
Something Auntie Bea’s apparently didn’t have.
In nightly droves, people swarmed into Shiloh, California, from as far as San Francisco, brought in by a riverfront revitalization effort that had turned the old dairy town into an upscale tourist destination. And while the rest of the community was reaping the benefit, Auntie Bea’s was dying a slow and painful death.
“Beekers might be good for the neighborhood,” Kitty grumbled, “but he’s not doing anything for us. And if I don’t do something to turn this business around, CrownCraft is canceling our contract.”
Jennifer scoffed. “We’ve been their dealer for decades. I can’t believe they’d drop us just because their bitchy sales representative didn’t like the store.” She stacked the last of the singing snowmen on the discount shelf next to the angels.
“Believe it,” Kitty replied. “Andresen’s Drugs has been trying to steal our account ever since Bea retired, and if I don’t come up with a plan to boost sales they might get it.”
Especially once the holiday sales figures went out. If CrownCraft hadn’t been disappointed enough by her Halloween and Thanksgiving sales, they’d certainly be sharpening the ax once Kitty closed out her dismal year-end. And if they pulled her contract as an exclusive dealer for their greeting cards and stationery, she’d lose the only merchandise that was keeping her store alive.
It was obvious now that if she wanted Auntie Bea’s to survive the store would need a complete makeover. But to what? That was the question.
Absently, she chewed on her pearl necklace, worrying over her situation as a group of women stopped on the sidewalk and waited to cross the street. One glanced at Kitty’s window display, looking interested in something, but when the woman touched a finger to her lipstick, Kitty realized she was only interested in her own reflection.
Kitty’s low mood sank further. “What are all these people looking for?” she mumbled.
“Huh?”
“These people who drive all the way up here to dine at Beekers. He draws in over a hundred customers five nights a week. What gifts could I sell that they’d come in and buy?”
Jennifer shrugged. “Why don’t you ask Josh?”
“Josh?”
“Sure. He’s the one talking to them all.” Jennifer stepped to the window and eyed the restaurant across the street. Through the large picture windows the two could see the group of women being escorted toward the back of the dining room. “He spends half his night wandering from table to table chatting with his customers,” Jennifer went on. “Haven’t you ever noticed?”
Noticed Josh Beeker? Every woman with a pulse had an eye on that man. Ever since he’d brought that gorgeous cowboy body of his into town from Denver last May, he’d been stealing hearts. Most women swooned at the mere sight of him. He’d won the stronger ones over with charm. And if there’d been any left not desperate to spring naked into the man’s big burly arms, he’d won those over with his award-winning menu. It was nearly impossible to be female and not take notice of Josh Beeker, and from Kitty’s vantage point, she knew plenty of them had.
Kitty lived in the second-story apartment above Auntie Bea’s, and often over the past six months she’d caught sight of Josh closing up shop for the night with someone tall and beautiful on his arm. She hadn’t needed the rumor mill to guess that Josh liked his women the way he liked his wine—bold, smooth and full-bodied—three things Kitty wasn’t. But that didn’t stop her from drawing her shades and dreaming that someday she’d be one of those women, if just for one night.
Silly, since she could barely hold a conversation with the man without tripping over her tongue. Asking for his help with her store?
She took a deep breath and sighed. “That’s actually a really good idea.”
“Of course it is.” Jennifer beamed. “I thought of it.”
“I suppose I could go over and ask him to coffee.” She toyed with the pearls around her neck. “Or I could ask him to stop by one night after he closes the restaurant. I do live right upstairs.”
Okay, so that particular idea filled her head with so many fantasies she was sure she visibly blushed.
“Josh Beeker up in your apartment after hours?” Jennifer goaded. “I can only imagine how that would end up.”
Kitty already had. In fact, her sex-starved mind had flashed past four erotic scenarios before she mentally jabbed herself back to reality.
Unfortunately, Josh picked that very moment to step into view as he brought a bottle of wine and that tongue-twisting smile to a couple seated at the window.
Kitty’s heart skipped a little. Oh, the man was a meal for the eyes. He kept his sandy-blond hair cut short but mussed on top, perfect for accentuating a pair of beautiful green eyes the color of fresh moss. He was habitually tanned but for the pale circles around his eyes from the sunglasses he wore outside. He had that classic Colorado sportsman look, an adventurous cowboy without the drawl, with a bright white smile and full soft lips that made a girl want to kiss him. Or be kissed by him. All over.
But the pull that was Josh Beeker didn’t come from his looks alone. The man had an aura, a special vibe that said wherever he stood was the best place to be. One got the impression life was good for Josh, or if it wasn’t, he took his problems in stride. He oozed easy days and sensual nights, forever exuding the assurance that time spent with him would always be time well spent. And like everyone else, Kitty would love to catch a few of those sunny vibes for herself. If only she had the nerve to put herself in his path.
Unfortunately, she didn’t. Because, despite all her yearnings and lusty thoughts, she was still the great-niece of sweet old Auntie Bea—too rural, modest and ordinary for a guy his friends called “The Beek.” On Josh’s wine list, Kitty would be grape soda, sweet and bubbly but nowhere near the piquant seductress that could compete in his league. But, oh, if things were different…
With a heavy breath, she sighed. “Okay, so maybe coffee is the best plan.”
“If you’ve still got your sights set on Howard, I’d say so.”
Howard.
Kitty groaned.
“Unless you’ve been keeping secrets,” Jennifer added, “Santa never brought you a boyfriend and Valentine’s Day is only six weeks away.” She followed Kitty’s gaze to Josh’s restaurant across the street. “Instead of ogle-eyeing the town playboy, maybe you should start thinking about plan Howard.”
Jennifer was right. After making the pact with Sam and Tori at last year’s GCA Winter Trade Show, Kitty was determined to make her love life top priority. She’d spent much of her spring and summer dating a little, but mostly analyzing her choices in men and trying to get to the bottom of why, at the age of twenty-nine, she was still single with not an interesting prospect in sight. She’d concluded that her problem was that she picked men solely on the basis of attraction: case in point, Josh Beeker—dreamy on the eyes, sinful to the imagination, but a lousy option for anything involving futures, commitments and happy-ever-afters.
Yet she’d spent six months drooling over him, hadn’t she?
Howard, on the other hand, was everything a wise, goal-driven woman would go for. Assistant manager-on-his-way-to-manager of the Shiloh branch of Hollies Paint Stores, Howard was a local, two years her senior, reliable, capable and intent on settling down with a house and family. And he’d been smitten with Kitty for as long as she could remember.
Howard was kind, boring, gentle and personable, boring, responsible and career-minded, boring. Everything she should be looking for in her quest for the long haul. Except—okay!—he was boring.
But that didn’t change reality. Life with Howard had to be better than this endless string of going-nowhere relationships she always managed to stumble into. And who knew? Maybe if she gave the man a chance, she’d end up uncovering something special. So she’d promised herself that if she rang in this New Year just as alone as she had the one before it, she’d march down to Hollies and ask Howard on a date. No way was she going to be the lone survivor of the Valentine’s Day pact, chugging down drinks in Chicago with Barry the Bartender while speculating what kind of wonderful, romantic evenings Sam and Tori were currently enjoying.
Just the thought made her shudder.
Of course, if she didn’t have a plan to revamp her store, there wouldn’t be a trade show for her this year. So putting thoughts of men and dating on hold, she turned her mind back to the business she sorely needed to save.
“You’re right,” Kitty announced. “Coffee it is.” Definitely the safer bet.
Although, as her gaze lingered on the sexy man across the street, she wondered if, when it came to Josh, there was such a thing as safe.