“Good.” Claudia looked at her watch. “I’ll check in with you again in fifty minutes. If you need me, I’m on my headset. The number’s—”
“On the schedule,” I finished. “I know.”
The coordinator Jackson had hired to oversee the event was a sleek-haired brunette, lanky as a giraffe and the most efficient person I’d ever met. She had everyone running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to keep to her exacting schedule, which counted time in precise five-minute increments. Though she was perfectly pleasant, I got the impression she’d turn into a screaming meemie if her schedule wasn’t followed.
As of now we were two minutes behind, and her left eyelid had already begun to twitch.
“Ladies. How’re we doing?”
Jackson stood in the doorway of the kitchen, looking at Claudia and me. It was the first time I’d seen him since I’d arrived at his house early this morning to start the setup.
“Everything’s under control,” I said. “Claudia’s doing a great job.”
She smiled tightly and adjusted her glasses again. I felt her gratitude for my small show of support. It was obvious how intimidated she was by Jackson. She could barely look him in the eye, probably because he was wearing a scowl as black as his outfit.
But I was used to that by now. I didn’t let it alarm me.
I asked him, “Is that what you’re going to wear?”
Jackson looked down at himself, then looked up at me with his brows drawn down over his eyes.
Seeing his murderous expression, Claudia ran out of the kitchen like her pants were on fire. “Fifty minutes, Bianca!” she called over her shoulder, then disappeared through the French doors.
Jackson didn’t seem to notice she’d left. He demanded, “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”
I shrugged. “Nothing, if you want people to think you’ve been living under a bridge.”
He crossed his arms over his chest. I tried to ignore how that made the muscles in his biceps bulge.
He said, “You must be mistaking me for someone who cares what people think.”
Propping my hands on my hips, I examined his untucked T-shirt, wrinkled jeans, and scuffed boots, his unshaven jaw, and his hair that appeared to have last seen a comb when he walked by one that had fallen out of someone’s pocket into the street.
I said, “Lord knows I’m no style maven, and I dress for comfort more than anything else, but your guests deserve the best version of you, Mr. Boudreaux. I’m sorry to say this isn’t it.”
His glower was so searing it could have melted a weaker woman. But after the past few days I’d had, I was in an ornery mood. An ornery truth-telling mood, because I’d recently decided life was too short to beat around the bush.
Plus, his check had already cleared the bank.
“Oh, really?” said Jackson, his voice acidic.
“Yes, really.” We stared at each other. It must have been my imagination, but it felt like the temperature in the room jumped several degrees.
He snapped, “So what would you recommend I wear, then?”
“Do you own a suit?”
His expression turned even darker. “I hate suits.”
“But do you have one?”
When he didn’t answer and just stood there glaring at me like he hoped a stray asteroid would smash through the ceiling and land on my head, I said, “That’s what you should wear. With a tie.” I looked at his boots. “And dress shoes.”
He ran a hand over his face—probably deciding whether he was going to pick up the toaster from the counter and throw it at me—and I added, “Also, a shave wouldn’t kill you.”
His looked at me with a strange new expression. “You don’t like beards.”
He said it flatly. It wasn’t a question.
“Beards are fine. But that thing carpeting your jaw? Honestly, I’ve seen tidier jungles.”
For a moment I thought he would let loose a string of expletives so loud it would deafen me. But then his lips twitched, and I realized he was trying not to smile.
He said, “You’re in fine form today, Bianca.”
It was the first time he’d used my given name. I nearly fainted in surprise but managed to control myself. “I’m sorry,” I said, looking down at the schedule I still held in my hands. “You’re right. It’s just . . .” I cleared my throat. “It’s just been a rough few weeks.”
There was silence for a moment, then he walked closer. “What’s wrong?” he demanded, gruff and growly as a bear.
I glanced up at him and was surprised again. I could’ve sworn he was looking at me with concern in his eyes.