Chapter 2

Daisy sat in a conference room at work while her boss, the sole proprietor of an event planning company, droned on about a new event at the opera house in a few months. It was important, and Daisy was trying to pay attention.

But it wasn’t work that she had on the brain. Not even close. Nope, all she could see was Diego’s face from earlier, just before she’d walked away.

He’d gone from boy to man in the past ten years. It didn’t help that he still had a way of drawing her in, even by just standing there on the dock, eyes lit with a restrained temper. Even pissed off, he was all kinds of hot. His body was hard and muscular, with an ass that looked amazing both in and out of jeans. He was six feet plus of pure sexiness, with black hair that fell over his forehead and curled around his collar when it got too long—which it always was. He had eyes the color of well-aged whiskey that darkened whenever he felt something deeply, like anger.

Or arousal…

“Are you even listening to me?” her boss asked, sounding unhappy.

But since that was Carol’s default mood, it was hard to tell. The woman was in her seventies, but thanks to good, ahem, genes—AKA the best plastic surgeon in the city—she looked mid-fifties. She catered mostly to her own generation, which meant that she wasn’t getting younger clients.

That’s what Daisy had supposedly been hired for. But it turned out that Carol really didn’t want younger clients.

Which left Daisy working a whole lot of fiftieth-anniversary parties. She’d tried to bring in Rocco’s wedding, but Carol hadn’t been comfortable with it, saying that the timing was too tight.

So, Daisy had happily taken it on herself as a side job. Planning a good friend’s wedding seemed infinitely more appealing than some huge IT tech company’s annual employee party and the opera event her current workload consisted of. “Sorry, yes, I’m listening,” she said with an inward grimace. “And I agree wholeheartedly. The opera event will be wonderful, thank you for trusting me with it.”

Carol nodded frostily and started to leave but stopped. “I count on you, Daisy. I hired you because you’re focused and you work hard.”

“And because you know I don’t have a personal life, so I’ll work all the overtime you need,” Daisy said.

Carol let out a rare smile, small as it was. “Yes. So, don’t go getting a life on me now.”

Even if Daisy wanted to…

Carol shrugged. “Your good work might pay off in ways you never imagined. You never know.”

That was true. One never knew. When Daisy was young, the future had been some intangible thing that she couldn’t begin to grasp because she’d been too busy worrying about surviving the present.

Some things never changed. Thirty years old and still worrying about her present.

“In any case, I’ll need the specs for the new job by the end of the day,” Carol said, turning to walk away. “Hope you don’t mind working late tonight.”