No wonder she was a landscaper. She was obviously damn good with plants even if she didn’t know squat about brooms or mops. Something about her gentle touch as she handled her foliage made him wonder…
He stopped himself cold, allowing her words to sink in. Could it be a coincidence that his uncle had hired a young woman who, Vito was beginning to realize, was actually very attractive underneath all that grass stain? And could it be random accident that Giuseppe had invited a woman to sleep in the house when he knew damn well Vito would be coming home for his sister’s wedding?
Not a chance in hell.
“I’m afraid I have to apologize.” Setting his empty lemonade glass on the counter, Vito thought he had a better handle on this whole bizarre situation now. Uncle Giuseppe, eternal matchmaker, strikes again.
“My uncle is a notorious family cupid and I have the feeling that he set us up to stumble on one another like this. Once he hired a pool boy for my aunt Lorraine who didn’t even own a pool. Another time he wrote love poetry for his brother to help him land a woman. He takes a lot of joy putting people in one another’s paths and seeing what happens. And since I’m way past marrying age in Uncle Giuseppe’s book, I’ve apparently become his new target.”
“Wait a minute.” Christine frowned, her wide blue eyes turning a shade darker. Her shoulders straightened and her cheeks flushed pink. “Do you mean to imply your uncle only hired me as a potential hookup for you and not because of my landscaping skills?”
“Hell no.” His uncle had been raised in a culture that didn’t approve of hooking up. He approved of marriage. Kids. Family. But Vito wasn’t about to share that with this gardening goddess who looked mad enough to spit nails. Although he had to admit that her pink cheeks were turning him on and making him think of wholly inappropriate other ways to make her flush like that. “He probably just wanted me to meet some more nice women—”
“I am not a nice woman.” The female who’d been so gentle with her ivy plant and so protective of her fire bush looked ready to personally take him out if he dared to suggest otherwise. “And I will sue your uncle for breach of contract if he thinks he can pawn me off on some overgrown, flashy playboy who is so far removed from nature he wouldn’t know what to do with a bag of birdseed if he tripped over it.”
“Now wait a minute.” Vito had always prided himself on having more patience than his hotheaded brothers who made a habit of speaking before thinking. But where did this woman get off calling him an overgrown playboy? And did she have any idea what it made a guy think when a woman told him she wasn’t nice? “I don’t think we need to start launching personal attacks to solve this. I was simply trying to share with you my uncle’s motivations.”
“Well you can tell him I don’t appreciate being hired for my ass and not my professional assets, okay? I agreed to a job, not a blind date.”
And before he could think of a comeback, Christine Chandler pivoted on her heel and walked right out the kitchen door.
If that didn’t beat all.
Of course, Vito couldn’t help moving to the kitchen window and watch the ass in question saunter away, hips twitching with her snappy walk down the drive-way. He felt a little bad for enjoying the view and the residual sparks in the air when she was clearly mad, but hell, wasn’t the urge to ogle tattooed across the Y chromosome?
Reaching for the door to follow her outside, hormones kicking to life, it occurred to him he didn’t feel tired anymore.
2
CHRISTINE HATED to muck up her big exit by simply digging her hands right back in the dirt to continue working for a guy who saw her presence as pure fluff.
Then again, what choices did she have? Pausing in the middle of Vito Cesare’s driveway, she scanned her brain for more options. Her beat-up secondhand truck was parked in the carport, so she possessed the means to leave. But where would she go?
She had no ready cash, and she was between apartments. Actually, she hadn’t even thought about looking for a new apartment for another month since this job was supposed to have taken at least that long. And if she left now, she could kiss her dreams of owning her own landscaping business goodbye. If she went bankrupt, no one in their right mind would ever give her a loan to start up again.
Peering around the yard for inspiration, her gaze landed on the fire bush already wilting in the Florida heat. She couldn’t just let the plant die so she could make a great exit.
Swallowing her pride, she trudged across the tilled up ground that would one day be a lush flower garden. As she finished securing the bush into the ground and giving the shrub a nice long drink, she couldn’t help but think of the fat investment account her older brother had started in her name.
She had the money to finance this dream. But damn it, she didn’t want to start her own business with money someone else had earned. Her older brother Seth had worked long hours for years after their father walked out, slowly growing adept at reading the stock market and knowing where to invest. He’d made huge profits on his investments, funneling money to both Christine and their brother Jesse.
But she’d never been comfortable with the idea of someone else making money on her behalf. What kind of satisfaction would she take in owning her own business if the whole operation rode on the shoulders of Seth’s hard work and not her own?
The answer remained the same as it had been for the last six months she’d struggled to start All Natural.
None.
Rinsing her hands in the stream from the hose before tossing aside the nozzle, Christine prepared herself to go back and face Vito Cesare. To somehow eat humble pie and pretend it tasted good.
Definitely not her forte.
But as she straightened, he was already there in front of her, dressed in olive-colored shorts and a white knit collared shirt. He held two glasses of lemonade in his hands.
He stepped over the hose to offer her a drink, his feet now visible in black flip-flops. “I would have come out sooner to apologize for that whole misunderstanding, but I thought it might be better if I cooled off first.”
He looked far more approachable in flip-flops. The gold wristwatch was gone, as were the slick shades. She wholeheartedly approved of the more laid-back Vito. In fact, if she hadn’t seen a glimpse of Vito the worldly jet-setter, she could almost be attracted to him.
Gulping down the lemonade he handed her, she decided she was the one who needed cooling off. No way would she develop a thing for the man who held the future of her fledgling business in his hands. Too unprofessional. Too tacky.
“Actually, I was just about to come looking for you to apologize, too.” She pressed the bottom of her cool glass to her hot forehead, the icy cold condensation a welcome relief from the sultry temperature outdoors and her hot flashes inside. “I was sort of taken off guard to think your uncle didn’t care about having the yard look really great. I wanted to be impressive with the best landscaping job I could provide and not because I look better in shorts than my competition, you know?”
His eyes flicked south at the mention of her legs and Christine found herself wondering how many other women had fallen victim to that hooded stare. Been there. Done that. Lived the public humiliation of having been taken in by a pro.
She swigged the rest of her drink and kept her mind on business.
“I understand better than you think.” He nodded toward the house. “There are some chairs around back on the patio if you want to sit for a minute.”
Nodding, she followed him since they obviously had a few glitches to iron out together.
“So, are you suggesting you know what it’s like to be hired for your bod instead of your brains, Cesare?” She could hold her own with this guy as