Every Little Thing (Hart's Boardwalk 2)

For a moment she looked from me to Dahlia to Jess and then back to me. Studying me, sensing my sincerity, Emery straightened her spine and threw back her shoulders. “Okay.” She still seemed unsure despite her bold body language. “I don’t want to be alone. Man lessons. But . . . not today. Later, okay?”

I grinned, happy and determined to help her. Jess and Dahlia shared a smile at my infectious excitement. “Later.”

“Well,” Jess mused. “If we’re not doing any lessons . . . we could talk about the fact that Cooper proposed and we’re planning to get married at the end of the summer.”

This of course was met with a chorus of delighted shrieks.

Vaughn

“These figures aren’t looking any better, Grant.” Vaughn’s voice was cold with disappointment as he spoke with Grant Foster, the manager

at The Montgomery, Vaughn’s boutique hotel in Greenwich Village. He’d named it after his mother, Lillian Montgomery. Unlike his father, Lillian was a blue blood; a descendant of Nicholas Montgomery, an Englishman who’d settled in New York and established himself as a huge player in the industrial revolution. The Montgomerys had their fingers in all sorts of pies, mostly in aeronautics and other transportation-shaped pies. As far as his dad told it Lillian was the darling of New York society and it had caused quite the scandal when she’d ignored her parents’ wishes and married a nobody upstart from Augusta, Maine.

They disowned and disinherited her, and consequently Vaughn had nothing to do with that side of his family.

But his mother was a Montgomery and he was proud of who she was, no matter her family’s attitude. He wasn’t hiding from that side of his heritage, and naming his Manhattan hotel after them was a “fuck you” to his grandparents and a “love you” to his mother.

To see the monthly accounts in front of him showing further decreasing profits at that particular hotel burned more than it would with any of the others.

“Vaughn, I’m telling you it’s the restaurant. The new chef just doesn’t compare to Renata.”

“This is the third chef we’ve hired since Renata moved on. Surely to Christ there is a cook out there just as good as or better than goddamn Renata.”

“We just haven’t found him or her yet.”

“Then try harder. And Grant . . . Don’t just blame it on the restaurant. The room occupancy rates are down, and the online reviews are not improving. There are complaints of inefficiency with the concierge service, rude customer service, dirty pillowcases, and unclean showers. What the hell is going on at my hotel? You have twenty-four hours to give me a detailed, concise report on the root of the problems or I’m flying out there. And if I have to fly out there to fix this, you can kiss your job good-bye, Grant.” He slammed down his phone just as his secretary, Ailsa, popped her head around his door.

She winced at the sound of his phone crashing against his desk. “I’m sorry if this is a bad time, Mr. Tremaine, but Dr. Huntington is here to see you and insists that she has to see you now before her lunch break ends.”

Vaughn closed his eyes as he rubbed at the throbbing pain between his eyes. What the hell could Jessica want? It wasn’t like her to just show up. If it were anyone else, he’d tell Ailsa to say he was in a meeting.

“Send her in.”

A few seconds later, Jessica strode in looking pretty as a picture in a silk blouse tucked into a figure-hugging navy pencil skirt. How good she looked, however, was overridden by the concern creasing her brow.

“Jessica, what brings you to the hotel?” He stood up and gestured to the seat opposite his desk. She took it as he leaned against his desk.

“I’m worried about Bailey.”

Those four words made his heart rate pick up speed, but ever the consummate businessman he kept his expression bland. “How so?”

“I think Ian Devlin is gearing up to cause her trouble at the inn.”

“And you think this why?” His tone belied the sudden heat in his blood. Every protective instinct inside of him wanted to demand Jessica tell him what she knew so he could go straight to Devlin and threaten to castrate him.

Jesus Christ. That damn redhead had turned him into a caveman.

“I just had lunch with Bailey. One of the Devlins caught her arguing with Tom the other night and made comments about her being stressed out. The next thing you know Bailey’s dad and brother both get calls from Ian Devlin asking if they were reconsidering selling in order to reduce Bailey’s stress during the difficult time of her breakup.”

“You think they’re going to come after her while she’s vulnerable over the breakup?”

“Yes.” Jessica cocked her head to the side in study of him. “Although, just so you know, Bailey is doing fine. Better than fine. Breaking up with Tom was the right thing to do and she knows it.”

He ignored her pointed info-share. “But Devlin doesn’t know that.”

Jess looked disappointed at his avoidance but repeated, “But Devlin doesn’t know that.”

Processing this, Vaughn stood up and moved around to his side of the desk. “Okay.”