Kate Hoffmann - A Fare To Remember

“Nope. Nix. Nyet. Non. Negative. Not going there, Mario. You’d better dig deep in your Bag o’ Bachelors and come up with another candidate, because I’m so not meeting the woman you picked up at the airport.”

“How can you make a statement like that? Sheesh. And I didn’t even tell you about the tuna!”

THE PEARSON HOTEL LOBBY wasn’t much bigger than Hannah’s living room back in Phoenix, and there were exactly two armchairs available. She probably should have guessed that her room wouldn’t be ready at eight-thirty in the morning, but she hadn’t spent much of her life in hotels and wasn’t totally familiar with the routine.

Both lobby chairs were occupied, one by an elderly man reading a newspaper and the other by a young woman filling out a job application. So Hannah stood, being careful not to jostle her duct-taped suitcase. The desk clerk had offered to keep the suitcase in a storage room, but Hannah was afraid it wouldn’t survive being manhandled by a bellhop. She hadn’t seen a bellhop, but this was a New York City hotel, so there had to be a bellhop somewhere on the premises.

Well, this was awkward. The desk clerk had predicted it might be another hour or two before a room became available. She could feel the hum of the city just beyond that lobby door, and she was desperate to get out there and take her first New York City walk.

On the drive in she’d spotted some homeless people who probably could use her tuna. At this point she could use some of that tuna, herself. The peanuts and Coke she’d had on the airplane had worn off quite a while ago. But she had no can opener and she’d also promised herself a hot pretzel from a street vendor once she hit the pavement.

The lobby door opened and she turned to see if it might be the bellhop returning from a coffee break. Whoops, not a bellhop. Not even close to being a bellhop. Instead she was eyeball to eyeball with a gorgeous specimen of New York manhood tricked out in a crisp gray suit, power tie in red-and-gray stripes, and a shirt that looked white at first but upon closer inspection displayed fine vertical lines of gray running through the fabric.

She wondered if he’d dressed to match his eyes, which were the color of campfire smoke. Add to that a movie-idol smile and wavy brown hair. If this guy was staying at the Pearson, she had definitely picked the right hotel.

His gaze moved from her face to the duct-taped suitcase at her feet. “You’re Hannah.”

Her mind clicked rapidly through the possibilities. She only knew one person in New York, and that was the man who had duct-taped her suitcase. He’d promised to mention her to his friend. She wished he’d left out the part about the duct tape.

She swallowed. “And you’re Zach.”

“Right.” He held out his hand. “Zach Evans.”

“Hannah Robertson.” She shook hands with what she hoped was the right amount of firm, businesslike pressure. He was so delectable that she wanted to hang on a while longer, but she didn’t dare. She was supposed to network with this Adonis, not jump his bones.

“I called the hotel and they said you weren’t registered. That got me worried, so I decided to come over and make sure you were okay.”

Hannah’s faith in the desk clerk slipped a notch. They darned well knew she was standing in the lobby. “I tried to register. The room wasn’t ready.” Surely the desk clerk could have said she was here, couldn’t he? Maybe not. She didn’t know New York City hotel procedure.

Zach glanced around the small lobby. “So you’re kind of stuck.”

“Oh, not at all! I was just about to ask them to store my suitcase so I could leave the hotel and explore the city.” To hell with the suitcase and the potential for tuna cans all over the storage room. She was not about to appear helpless and stranded in front of her network, all one of him.

“Oh! Well, that’s a good idea.” He eyed the suitcase. “I guess.”

“It’ll be fine. I know the suitcase looks a little…”

“Compromised?”

“You could say that.” She wouldn’t mind being compromised by Zachary Evans. But she had to cool it. There were probably lots of guys like him walking around this city. He happened to be the first certified NYC hunk she’d seen, so she was probably overreacting. And she was starving, too, which didn’t help.

“You could ask them to tie something around it,” Zach said.

“I’ll do that.” She realized that the networking hadn’t begun yet, and maybe it was up to her to do something about it. “Mario mentioned that you had a contact in publishing.”

“I do. He’s an editor.”

“Really?” Hannah hadn’t expected to be this lucky. “For what house?”

“I can’t remember the name, but I have it at the office. I know they mostly do cookbooks and travel guides. Is that what you’re interested in?”

She was tempted to say yes, just to make the connection stronger, but she hadn’t come all this way to work on cookbooks and travel guides. “I have a degree in English literature. I’m hoping to edit fiction.”

“Oh.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Then Percy might not be the guy to help you.”

“I’d be glad to talk to him, even so.” Maybe she could learn to love cookbooks. No, probably not. She was a nuke-’em-and-scarf-’em-down kind of person. Her theory was if you took enough vitamins and ate tuna once in a while, you’d be okay.

“It could be a waste of time if you’re into fiction.” Zach checked his watch. “Look, I have to get to the office, but I can ask around. Someone else might have a better lead than I do.”

“I hate to put you to the trouble.” Actually, she didn’t. Anything that would keep that tenuous connection between them worked for her. But she had to give him a graceful way out if he wanted to let this go.

“No trouble.” He paused. “If you don’t have other plans, we could go to dinner tonight. I could tell you what I’ve found out.”

Other plans? She’d arrived in the city less than two hours ago! She knew no one! How could she possibly have other plans? But she hesitated, as if considering her packed schedule. “That might work.”

“Seven?”

“Seven would be okay.”

“I’ll ring your room.”

“Great. See you then.” She watched him walk out of the lobby and controlled the urge to jump up and down.

Her first night in New York and she had a date! Not only a date, but one with a guy who came recommended by her very friendly taxi driver. Even better, this highly recommended, date-worthy person looked like he’d stepped out of the pages of GQ. New York was going to be incredible.

MARIO RETURNED TO THE coffee stand feeling smug. Maybe he shouldn’t take credit, though, because he’d been wrong about not leading with the tuna. The tuna had made all the difference. He only hoped this Cupid operation wasn’t too late.

After finding a parking spot near Iris’s stand, he sauntered over, unable to hold back a smile of triumph. He waited until Iris had finished serving an espresso to a long-haired college student toting a heavy backpack.

She counted out change to the student. “Gracias, señor.” Then she turned to Mario, her dark eyebrows arched. “Well?”

“He’s calling her this morning.”

“Bueno!” Iris clapped her hands together. “That boy needs a sweetheart.”

“You’re telling me. He’s so focused on success after Adrienne worked him over that he’s ready to bulldoze some poor guy out of a corner office.”

“That’s bad.”

“It’s not so much him as that boss of his.” Mario took the small porcelain cup of espresso Iris handed him. “Thanks, Iris.” He reached in his pocket and pulled out some money, but she waved it away. “Hey.” He tried again to give her the money. “You can’t be serving me free coffee.”

“You can give free taxi rides but I can’t give free coffee?”

He met the challenge in her dark eyes. She had spirit, and he admired that. “Thank you.”

“Da nada. So Zach will take away someone’s job?”

“I don’t know about that, but he definitely has his eye on a big bonus and a better office, which is currently occupied by a guy named Ed. Ed’s older and isn’t producing like he used to. Zach thinks the big boss wants to squeeze Ed out, even though he’s a nice guy and treats his clients great.”

Iris clucked her tongue.

“Yeah, it sucks. I know it happens all the time, but I hate to see Zach buying into it. If he doesn’t watch out, he’ll get as ruthless as the boss.”

“This woman, you think she’ll be good for him, then?”

Mario pictured Hannah Robertson in her yellow sundress and flowered suitcase held together with duct tape. “Oh, yeah. She’s exactly what the doctor ordered.”

ALL THROUGH THE DAY Zach kept telling himself that just because he was taking Hannah Robertson to dinner didn’t mean he’d end up taped to Mario’s dash. If and when the time came for him to find someone and settle down, he would do the picking, not some guy who’d seen Fiddler on the Roof once too often. Although matchmaking was cute when it happened to other people, Zach wasn’t about to fall for that program.

But a guy would have to be made of stone not to be kind to a woman who brought cans of tuna to New York so she could pass them out to the city’s homeless population. It also didn’t hurt that she’d looked like a ray of sunshine standing in that dingy hotel lobby. Her red hair was glorious, a deep copper color. She also had brown eyes, which might explain why her sundress had revealed a golden tan rather than pale skin dotted with freckles.

Taking Hannah Robertson to dinner would be no hardship. Getting her the right publishing contacts might be. Zach had asked around, and the consensus seemed to be that Ed had a client who was a publishing bigwig. This was the day that Drake Medford would inform Ed that he would probably be losing his corner office come the first of the month. Under the circumstances, Zach thought asking Ed for a personal favor today was just wrong.