Love, Chocolate, and Beer (Cactus Creek #1)(76)

Not even attempting to hide her smile, Dani made a zipping motion of her lips and slapped Sam on the back sympathetically. They’d all heard about little Jenna’s last recital—it had lasted five hours. And since it had been during Terri’s shift waitressing, Sam had been on video duty while Terri had been in Ocotillos, crossing her chest in thanks every time he’d sent her a pained text from his seat in the auditorium amidst a sea of rabid dance moms.

“Hey, what’s this?” she asked Sam, belatedly noticing the big file box on her desk.

Amusement twitched across his lips. “Your mail, madam. We eventually had to box it all because it was overflowing your similarly neglected in-tray this week.”

Ah yes, that sounded about right. When her head was focused on a new brew, there were times her workers had to club her over the head with day-to-day business things. The year she’d made her award-winning black lager, she’d completely forgotten to renew their logo napkin contract. For a week, they’d had to use picnic napkins—the big country-cute square ones that had no place in a bar—to tide them over until she’d gotten everything straightened out.

That was what had given birth to Sam’s ‘Dani, open me!’ folder hanging from a string in her office doorway, right at nose-level. She was embarrassed to admit that on two occasions—okay, maybe three—she’d walked face-first into it while she was deep in thought about a beer recipe.

No one said brewing wasn’t a dangerous business.

Particularly lately, it seemed that Dani had suffered two more face whacks from the folder just this week. “I’ll be better once I fix this recipe, Sam, I promise.” Dani opened the file box. “Hey, if you need to hide out from Elle, why not eat here and help me sift through all this mail?”

Sam gave her a strange look and backed away slowly. “You don’t remember, do you?”

“Remember what?” Her blank expression turned more suspicious with every step he took toward the door. She peered in the box to take a look.

And fell into her seat in shock.

There were dozens and dozens of pink and red envelopes in the box. “No.” Her voice was hoarse as she picked one of the cards up delicately. “People actually sent us Valentines?”

“A lot of people.” Sam’s shoulders lifted in a hey-it-was-inevitable way. “Luke pretty much became the most romantic guy in Arizona since his little concession speech. It was just a matter of time till the right people read about his whole ‘send a valentine to Ocotillos’ request. Hell, all of us here were prepared from day one to get slammed with letters. We’ve been getting dozens a day for the past two weeks. Hence the box.” With that, he quietly moved to the door to give her some privacy.

“Wait, stop! You can’t leave me alone with these. You have to help me open them.”

“Nooo.” He took two more steps back. “Sorry, I’m allergic.”

“To Valentine’s Day cards?!”

“To the ones in that box? Oh yeah. Remember, I’ve been working with you long enough to know exactly what kind of stories are going to be in those cards. If I read ‘em, my allergies will hit and turn my eyes all watery. Not good. Sorry, boss.” He exited the office quickly.

“Vick!” called out Dani when she saw her headwaiter outside. “Help me out will you?”

Vick started in the door with a smile until he saw Sam shaking his head slowly, eyes closed. Then he saw the box. “Nuh-uh,” he jumped back out to the hallway. “Sorry, Dani, but those there are addressed to you and it is a crime, a federal offense in fact, for me to open another person’s mail.” Clearly, his acting classes were not paying off since laughter was bubbling out with the bullcrap dribbling from his mouth. “You know how I’m a stickler for the law.”

“Are you frickin’ kidding me? I’m the one who bailed you out of jail for fighting a few years ago!” she blasted out, smacking his arm with one of the big pink envelopes.

“Yes, and I know you want me to stay on the straight and narrow. What you’re asking is what they call a gateway crime.” He tsked as if devastated there weren’t a better solution.

“Argh!” She pushed past both exasperating men to make a plea to Javier, who’d come over to see what was making Dani have a near meltdown. When he saw her holding one of the Ocotillos Valentine’s Day cards, he spun around to run right back to the kitchen.

She caught him by his apron strings. “Javier!”

Slowly, Javier turned and gave her a polite look. “Si, Miss Dani?”

“Please, please, you have to do this with me.”

His round eyes turned thoroughly perplexed. “Lo siento, no entiendo. No hablo Inglés.”

She glared at him. “Really? You don’t speak English suddenly?”

He blinked innocently and replied in more Spanish.

Dani’s head flipped back. “You guys are just plain mean!”

“Naw, we just think it’s time you saw how great you are, boss,” shrugged Vick.

“Plus, it is Luke’s gift to you,” reasoned Sam.

Javier shook his head with a dopey, lost smile, staying impressively in character. Another sentence in Spanish, undoubtedly a beautiful sentiment, came flowing out of his mouth before he kissed the top of her head and pushed her back into her office.