Love You, Mean It (Blushing) By Laura Pavlov NovelM80027 Love You, Mean It (Blushing) (Chapter - 5)

Love You, Mean It (Blushing) By Laura Pavlov

It smelled like garlic and warm bread, and my stomach growled. My pizza rolls weren’t sounding as appetizing as they did when I’d arrived here, desperate for an oven and some processed food.

We turned the corner into the kitchen, and Violet’s whole mood had turned around.

Hell, even mine had turned around.

“Daddy, what you got cookin’, good lookin’?” Harper giggled.

She was so cute it was hard for me not to unleash what I really thought about that mean girl, Denise. I knew the type. I’d seen the girl in action more than once. She picked on her little brother, all for attention that she never got, from what I could tell. Her mother ignored her, and I was certain she was jealous of Harper.

Harper Huxley was the rare jewel of children. She was an old soul, and we’d actually had a very nice conversation. She wasn’t bratty. She was reasonable. She was sweet. And she was the cutest kid I’d ever seen.

So it was ludicrous to suggest that her physical appearance was the reason her mother had left.

Trust me, I’d experienced abandonment in a very similar way, and I knew it had very little to do with me. But it took me a long time to get here.

Charlie scooped up his daughter and hugged her, his eyes finding mine over her shoulder.

He didn’t say anything, and he didn’t need to.

I saw the gratitude there, and I nodded before making my way toward the oven to collect my pizza rolls off the pan and go back home to finish my pity party for one.

“I cooked your favorite, baby girl. You feeling better?” Charlie asked before setting her back down on her feet.

“I’m feeling all the way better. Can my best friend Violet stay for dinner?” she asked.

“Oh, I’ve got my pizza rolls here,” I said, dropping them all onto the paper plate I’d brought with me.

“We’ve got plenty, and I think our dinner looks a lot better than your dinner.” Charlie’s lips twitched the slightest bit, and I’d come to learn that was what he did when he was trying to suppress a smile.

“Says a man who’s clearly never had pizza rolls.” I tucked my lips between my teeth as I considered the offer.

His dinner did look much better than mine.

And Violet was standing there with her little hands in a prayer position, smiling up at me.

Charlie surprised me when he popped a pizza roll in his mouth and chewed. “Ours is definitely better than yours. Just have some pasta and some salad, and then you can head home and think of new ways to torture me tomorrow.”

“Fine,” I said.

“Fine.” He cleared his throat and made another plate.

“Fine! ‘Fine’ is my new favorite word.” Harper took my hand and led me to the table. “You want a beer, Violet?”

“Hey,” Charlie grumped. “Six-year-olds have no reason to ask that.”

“I’m almost seven. And I know adults sometimes drink it.”

I chuckled as Charlie set the plate down in front of me and then held up a beer bottle and raised a brow at me. I nodded, and he poured the bottle into a glass and handed it to me before taking his seat next to his daughter.

“So, is there anything anyone wants to talk about?” Charlie asked, clearly out of his comfort zone, because he stared down at his plate as the words left his mouth.

“Denise Quigley is insector, Daddy. So me and Violet think she’s sad,” Harper said as she twirled her fork in her noodles, preparing for the perfect bite.

Well, I personally think Denise Quigley is an asshole.

But I’d settle for “sad and insecure” because I doubted Charlie would want me to say what I really thought.

“Yeah? Why do you think she’s sad?” he asked, and I wondered if he’d stood outside the bedroom door listening to us, because I sure as hell would have.

“We don’t know, right, Violet?”

I could think of a few reasons, She’s a spoiled mean girl being at the top of my list.

“Right. We don’t know. But we know it has nothing to do with you,” I said.

“Right. And isn’t Daddy’s sketti the best?”

“It’s really good.” Possibly the best I’ve ever had, but we don’t want to give the man a big head.

“Better than pizza rolls?” Charlie asked, his voice lighter now, as he tipped his head back and took a pull from his glass. His hair was longer in the front and shorter in the back. His sapphire eyes were the color of the deepest sea, and his broad shoulders made it apparent that he wasn’t a stranger to physical labor.

Yes. So much better. “Hmm . . . I’ll have to think about it.”

Charlie’s eyes darkened as he looked at me, but he didn’t say anything.

“Daddy, Violet’s daddy is insector too.” Harper popped a large forkful of pasta in her mouth just as I took a sip of beer, and I coughed a few times at how blunt she was.

“Tell me what ‘insector’ means?” Charlie asked his daughter, and the way he looked at her made me look at him in a different light. He was softer around Harper. He was everything a dad should be to his daughter. And now my curiosity was getting the best of me, wondering where Harper’s mother was. She was clearly alive, because she saw her every year on her birthday, which was weird as hell.

Even my father had better stats than that, and he was an epic failure in the parenting department.

Who sees their kid once a year and only on their birthday?

Harper looked at me as Charlie told her to take a few bites of salad.

“Insector, or ‘insecure,’ is someone who isn’t happy with themselves, so they make others feel bad because they’re so miserable,” I said, reaching for a piece of garlic bread.

Damn. The man could cook.

“Ahh . . . I know a lot of insectors.” Charlie laughed. I rarely heard the man laugh, and when he did, it felt like a gift that you were lucky enough to witness it.

“Daddy, we need to feel sad for all the insectors.” Harper was coming up with that all on her own. I wanted to tell her to put up boundaries with people who weren’t kind to her, but it wasn’t my place. And she quickly changed the subject. “Can Violet come to my Pinkalicious party? It’s going to be so fun.”

“It’s here at the house in a couple weeks, and you’ll probably still be living out in the guesthouse at the rate you keep changing your mind on every finish, so if you want to stop by, you’re welcome to.” Charlie smiled the slightest bit.

“That was the worst invite to a party ever. You insulted me while extending the invite.”

Harper’s eyes widened, and she wiped her mouth. “But Daddy’s not insector, right, Violet?”

“I assure you. Daddy’s a lot of things, baby girl, but he’s not insector.” Charlie’s voice was gruff, and his gaze locked with mine.

Yeah. The man was a lot of things.

But insecure was not one of them.

I chuckled. I hadn’t thought this night could turn around, and here I was having a good time at dinner with a man I normally despised and a kid I liked more than I ever thought possible.

Life was full of surprises.

“I’ll for sure stop by,” I said as I cleared my plate, and Charlie stopped me from rinsing it in the sink.

He said I’d done enough, and I knew there was a compliment in there somewhere.

“That’s the best present ever, Violet. And you can even see Denise at the party.”

“Sounds great. I hope she doesn’t pour orange juice on my food.” I looked at the little girl staring up at me as she burst into giggles.

I wondered if I’d meet her mother at the party.

But I wasn’t about to ask. I just thanked them for dinner and made my way back across the yard.

And I didn’t even feel the need to return to my pity party when I got home.

---

The Blushing Inn was our new venue for hosting weddings, and we were partial owners of the property. Montana’s ridiculously wealthy fiancé, Myles St. James, had purchased the old farmhouse and allowed the Blushing Bride to invest in it, and Huxley Construction had done the renovations to make it exactly what we wanted. It was nice that we had control over the venue where we hosted the majority of our events now.

And today was wedding day for Jacoby and Geneva Whitacre, from Pennsylvania. Like many of our clients, they were not local, but they wanted to get married in the quaint town of Blushing, Alaska. My best friend and I worked well together. Like a fine-tuned machine. She liked dealing with the clients more than I did, and I preferred all the behind-the-scenes excitement. Blakely, our executive assistant, would oversee things and let us know when issues came up, so the bride and groom could enjoy their day and we could handle every challenge without a hiccup.

And when it came to weddings, we always had some sort of unexpected challenge.

I loved it. One could never be prepared, and just when I thought I’d seen it all—the shit would hit the fan.

Literally and figuratively.

Blakely’s voice came through the radio earpiece, which was how the three of us communicated when it was game time.

“Uh, we’ve got a, er, issue in the main bathroom,” Blakely said, and what followed sounded like she was dry heaving. “The FOG just dropped a bomb in there, and the toilet has overflowed. And let’s just say that things are not contained to the toilet area.”

The FOG was code for “father of the groom.”

Serves him right, because who eats two chili dogs a few hours before their son’s wedding?

Thankfully everyone was still getting ready for the big event, and guests hadn’t arrived yet. I’d get this fixed immediately.

“Heading your way. Can we get Wayne over here pronto?” I asked.

“I already called. Wayne is down with the stomach flu,” Blakely said.

“Shit. Pun intended,” Montana groaned, and we all laughed, because that was the perfect description of the situation.

“How bad is it? Can we use a plunger?” I asked as I walked through the main entertaining space and down the hallway toward the guest bath.

“This is well beyond a plunger. It’s like a murder scene in there,” Blakely said, keeping her voice low. “And Jacoby’s dad is lying on the floor near the bar area, and he doesn’t look right.”

“Monny, you handle Frank Whitacre, and I’ll get the bathroom fixed.”

“On it,” Montana said. “Me and a large bottle of Imodium A-D are on our way.”

When I turned the corner, Blakely was standing there with wide eyes, beside the closed door.

“It’s that bad?” I asked.

“It’s an epic shitstorm in there.”

I blew out a breath at the smell coming from the bathroom. We didn’t have a lot of time to remedy this situation. I grabbed both of Blakely’s shoulders, and my gaze locked with hers. “Go get a few pine candles and infusers from the storage closet and place them on every surface surrounding this bathroom that you can find.”

She nodded before hurrying away, and I opened the door.

Holy shitballs.

She was not exaggerating.

My God. The man had had the blowout of all blowouts. I reached in my belt bag and placed a face mask over my nose and mouth. Under the sink were all sorts of cleaning supplies, and I sprayed down every surface with disinfectant. And then I pulled out my phone and texted Charlie.

Me: We have a serious toilet situation at the Blushing Inn and we only have an hour to get it fixed before the guests arrive.

Charles: I suggest calling a plumber. I don’t fix clogged toilets.

Me: Wayne has the stomach flu, and we have 125 guests arriving in an hour.

Charles: And I’m your first call? Interesting.

Me: I have no time for games. You strike me as someone who knows how to deal with a shit situation.

Charles: Good assessment. I’m dealing with a nuisance living in my backyard.

Me: Fifty-eight minutes and counting, Charles. Please. I’ll owe you one.

Charles: I’ll tell you what. I’ll fix your shitter, if you help me with Harper’s birthday. She wants some pink and white balloon thing with tons of balloons that hangs down the wall and I don’t have a fucking clue what it is.

Me: It’s a balloon swag you fool. I can make that in my sleep. If you handle operation shit show, I’ll make Harper’s balloon dreams a reality.

Charles: On my way.

“Charlie is on his way. The floors and walls are soaking in disinfectant. As soon as he gets the shit water to flush and I am not at risk of passing out from the foul smell, I’ll go in with the mops and have it back to normal before the guests arrive,” I said, placing one hand over my ear so I could hear better.

“Good work, Vi. Frank is groaning, and I sent him back upstairs to his room to rest until the Imodium A-D kicks in.”

“I’m heading back with so many pine candles people will think they’re shitting in the woods.” Blakely chuckled, and I moved out to the hallway because I couldn’t take the smell any longer. She was on a mission, lighting candles and placing them on every surface in the area.

I checked on the kitchen staff to make sure all was on track. Just then, Charlie came through the front door with a duffel bag over his shoulder like he was going into battle. I held out a face mask for him.

“You’re going to need this,” I said, arching my brow.

“This deal doesn’t quite seem fair. I’m dealing with shit, and you’re paying me back by blowing up a few balloons?” he grumped.

I held up my hands. “Do you see these? Yes, they have a beautiful French manicure, so it’s easy to miss. But if you look closely, there are battle scars from the hundreds to thousands of balloons I’ve tied over the last few years. You have no idea how much goes into this. You have the opportunity to make your daughter’s pink birthday dreams come true. Man up and get in there.”

He shook his head and pulled the face mask over his mouth and nose. After he opened the door, he said something under his breath, but I got called to the bar and told a brooding Charlie that I’d be back.

“Hey, Vi,” Benji said as I walked to where he stood behind the bar. He owned the Moose Brew, the local pub that everyone loved, and he handled the alcohol portion of all our events. Sometimes he tended bar himself, and other times he sent someone from his staff. Tonight we were lucky enough to have him.

“Hi. You all set up?”

“Yep, but we’ve got a little situation,” he said.

“What’s that?”

He leaned forward before clearing his throat. “The groom’s brother has put back more shots of whiskey than I would have thought humanly possible. I’ve never had to cut someone off at a wedding before it actually started.”

I glanced over to see Jamison Whitacre harassing one of the bridesmaids, and she didn’t look happy about it.

“The freaking Whitacre family is a giant pain in my ass already. I’m about done with them. Okay, if he dares to come over to you the rest of the night, you pour a Coke in the glass and tell him it’s whiskey. I’ll get some coffee into his system, and if he can’t pull himself together, we’ll lock him in one of the guest rooms upstairs.” I chuckled.

“I expect nothing less from you, Vi,” Benji said with a smile.

I spoke to Jacoby, the groom, just to make sure he was aware that his brother was no longer going to be served alcohol. Blakely brought in a pot of coffee, and I sat Jamison on the couch in the men’s parlor and told him that he had to drink two full cups of coffee, or he wouldn’t be attending the wedding.

“You’re not the boss of me,” he slurred, and there was nothing worse than a sloppy drunk who was supposed to be the best man at a wedding.

“Oh, you’re very wrong about that, my friend. Today is about your brother and his beautiful bride. And I won’t hesitate to lock you in a room if you don’t straighten up now. Drink this coffee. You’ve got a best man speech to give tonight, and I’m sure you don’t want to make any more of a fool of yourself than you already have.”

His eyes widened, and he didn’t argue.

My job was to keep our clients happy, and Jacoby’s brother was not my client.

And I think he got the message loud and clear, because he didn’t say another word for the next thirty minutes.

It was just another day at the office for me.