Unwrapped (34 page)

“Honestly though, Tristan,” she said once she’d drained her glass and poured herself another, “she was utterly incompetent. I mean, she couldn’t do a single thing right. And it wasn’t like I was asking for the moon. I just expect that when I ask for something to be done, it be done on time.”

Tristan, only half-listening, made a sympathetic noise. What the hell was he going to do with
this
one? Getting a grown woman down from the fifteenth floor of a busy building out to the even busier streets of Manhattan wasn’t easy, even for a demon.

Really, he was the one who deserved the damned champagne.

“I simply asked her to get me the fabrics that an artist in Milan was creating specifically for the Alber Elbaz photo shoot. This was not an unreasonable request.”

“When is the photo shoot?” Tristan asked, considering the white hand woven Persian carpet in Finola’s office. It was big enough to wrap the body in, but Finola would have a conniption that he was using her handmade, original flown in directly from Nain, Iran. But then again, this was her doing. He couldn’t help if her damned rug was another casualty of her temper.

“It’s tomorrow,” Finola said, a hint of peevishness making her tone a little defensive. “I didn’t say it wouldn’t be easy. But it was absolutely doable.”

Tristan looked from the carpet to the body then back to the carpet. “What time did you tell her about this absolutely doable feat?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her wave her hand, “Oh, I don’t know, Probably one-ish.”

His gaze shifted from the rug to the cabinet behind Finola’s desk. That would be heavy all on its own, and with a body in it . . . he returned his attention back to the carpet—also heavy, the best bet.

“When is the photo shoot?”

“Eleven,” she answered, topping off her glass again, the golden liquid, sparkling, bubbles dancing.

Tristan didn’t feel like dancing, he was furious, but he pushed it aside, remaining cool. Giving in to his own emotions wouldn’t help the situation.

He returned to the body, crouching down to slide an arm under its neck and under its knees. With only a slight grunt, he hefted it up. Thank Lucifer and his many minions, this one was thin. The last one had been a good twenty-five pounds overweight, which hadn’t helped her with Finola’s wrath and ultimately was a large part (no pun intended) of her . . . early retirement.

“You do realize that gave her less than twenty-four hours to get the material for you, don’t you?” he said, his tone breathy as he struggled to carry the body over to the rug.

“Well it can’t be impossible. It could have been flown on the Concorde of something.”

Tristan dropped the body rather unceremoniously onto one side of the carpet. “The Concorde stopped flying about five years ago.”

“Oh,” Finola sighed, clearly weary of their conversation, “well whatever, she was a terrible assistant.”

She settled back in her lounger, replacing her mask over her eyes. Tristan arranged the body so the limbs were straight, then he lifted the edge of the carpet and started to ease the carpet and body over, rolling the body up like the filling of a jelly roll. A very complicated, costly jelly roll.

Finola lifted the edge of her mask and peered at him. “What are you doing?”

Saving your ass.

“Playing it safe,” he said, with a grunt, shoving with both arms to finish rolling the carpet. “You should really require height and weight to be included on all your employee résumés.”

“You are so right,” she agreed, but not for the reason he wanted the measurements on there.

He rose, running his hands down the front of his Armani trousers, smoothing any wrinkles. Ah, there was an analogy there.

“I quite like that carpet, you know,” Finola said, but then released her mask back over her eyes.

Well, at least she accepted that better than he’d expected.

“I’m going to have to go get one of the moving vans to dispose of this,” he told her.

She made a noise of acknowledgment, disinterested acknowledgment. But why would she care? Finola just made the messes, he cleaned them up.

He strode across her office, heading out to get the van and get this done.

“Wait,” Finola said, sitting up, her voice suddenly panicked, “I don’t have a personal assistant.”

“No,” Tristan agreed, his voice wry, “this is true.”

“I need an assistant. I mean, look.” She took off her eye mask and waved it in his direction. “My mask is absolutely cool now. A cool mask is not going to help this wretched headache behind my eyes. I need someone to warm my mask.”

Tristan fought back the urge to roll his eyes. Instead he walked over the cabinet he had considered using for the body disposal. He opened the bottom drawer and pulled out a thick manila folder. Then he went to Finola and placed it onto her lap.

“Pick one.”

She considered the file for a moment, then opened it. She flipped through several of the résumés, scanning them very briefly.

Finally she sighed, and randomly tugged one out of the dozens. “Hire this one.”

She held the page out to him without even glancing at the person’s education, abilities, or experience.

“This could be why your assistants never work out,” he said dryly, but accepted the résumé.

He raised an eyebrow as he perused the information there, but he walked over to Finola’s desk and picked up her phone. After punching in the numbers, he waited as the phone rang.

Finally, just when he would have hung up, a woman answered, her voice breathless, and heavily laced with a Southern drawl.

Tristan cringed. Not a good start. Finola wasn’t fond of the South.

“Hello,” he glanced back to the page in front of him, “I’m trying to reach Annie—Lou
,
”
Lou?
Really? “Riddle.”

Oh yeah, this was
not
going to go well.

The woman on the other end excitedly told him that was she.

“My name is Tristan McIntyre and I’m calling from
HOT!
magazine. I’m pleased to tell you that Ms. Finola White had decided to hire you as her personal assistant.”

Tristan nodded impatiently as Annie Lou thanked him profusely—and lengthily.

“Great,” he said, finally cutting off her sweet, golly-gee gratitude. “We’ll see you tomorrow morning. Eight o’clock sharp.”

Annie Lou Riddle was still drawling away as he hung up the phone.

“Done,” he said.

“You are the best, Tristan.”

Yes, he was. But he didn’t say anything, he just left the office. As he strolled past the large, ultra-modern assistant’s desk, he made note to himself that he had to get rid of all of the last assistant’s personal items that were still there.

Annie Lou Riddle. She had no idea that by accepting this job, she’d just sold her soul to the devil. Literally.

Annie stared at the receiver still clutched in her hand. The faint dial tone hummed signifying no one was on the other end of the line, but she still didn’t hang up.

Finola White’s assistant.
HOT!
magazine.
HOT!
magazine!

She managed to pull herself together enough to press the OFF button on the cordless phone and drop it back into the receiver. Then with total abandon, she started to hop and dance around the tiny living room, laughing like a madwoman.

HOT!
magazine! Finola White!

“Oh my God . . . oh my God,” she repeated over and over, still dancing.

Only the pounding from the downstairs neighbor on his ceiling, her floor, made her stop her happy dance. She collapsed onto her worn circa 1970s tweed couch.

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Copyright © 2011 Kensington Publishing Corp.

“Blue Christmas” copyright © 2011 Erin McCarthy
“Santa in a Kilt” copyright © 2011 Donna Kauffman
“Snow Angel” copyright © 2011 Kate Angell

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ISBN: 978-0-7582-7390-1