but you might have to do some adjusting yourself. You're not in Michigan anymore. I'm going to let
you get back to work here.'
And she was going back to her plants. They generally gave her less trouble than people.
'Roz? I know I can be an awful pain in the ass, but I really do want to help you grow your business.'
'I figured out both those things already.'
Alone, Stella sulked for a minute. Then she got her bucket and climbed up the ladder again. The unscheduled meeting had thrown her off schedule.
* * *
'I don't like her.' Logan sat in Roz's parlor with a beer in one hand and a boatload of resentment in the other. 'She's bossy, rigid, smug, and shrill.' At Roz's raised brows, he shrugged. 'Okay, not shrill—so far—but I stand by the rest.'
'I do like her. I like her energy and her enthusiasm. And I need someone to handle the details, Logan.
I've outgrown myself. I'm just asking that the two of you try to meet somewhere in the middle of things.'
'I don't think she has any middle. She's extreme. I don't trust extreme women.'
'You trust me.'
He brooded into his beer. That was true enough. If he hadn't trusted Roz, he wouldn't have come to
work for her, no matter what salary and perks she'd dangled under his nose. 'She's going to have us
filling out forms in triplicate and documenting how many inches we prune off a damn bush.'
'I don't think it'll come to that.' Roz propped her feet comfortably on the coffee table and sipped her
own beer.
'If you had to go and hire some sort of manager, Roz, why the hell didn't you hire local? Get somebody in who understands how things work around here.'
'Because I didn't want a local. I wanted her. When she comes down, we're going to have a nice civilized drink followed by a nice civilized meal. I don't care if the two of you don't like each other, but you will learn how to get along.'
'You're the boss.'
'That's a fact.' She gave him a companionable pat on the thigh. 'Harper's coming over, too. I browbeat him into it.'
Logan brooded a minute longer. 'You really like her?'
'I really do. And I've missed the company of women. Women who aren't silly and annoying, anyway. She's neither. She had a tough break, Logan, losing her man at such a young age. I know what that's
like. She hasn't broken under it, or gone brittle. So yes, I like her.'
'Then I'll tolerate her, but only for you.'
'Sweet talker.' With a laugh, Roz leaned over to kiss his cheek.
'Only because I'm crazy about you.'
Stella came to the door in time to see Logan take Roz's hand in his, and thought, Oh, shit.
She'd gone head-to-head, argued with, insulted, and complained about her boss's lover.
With a sick dread in her stomach, she nudged her boys forward. She stepped inside, plastered on a smile. 'Hope we're not late,' she said cheerily. 'There was a small homework crisis. Hello, Mr. Kitridge. I'd
like you to meet my sons. This is Gavin, and this is Luke.'
'How's it going?' They looked like normal kids to him rather than the pod-children he'd expected someone like Stella to produce.
'I have a loose tooth,' Luke told him.
'Yeah? Let's have a look, then.' Logan set down his beer to take a serious study of the tooth Luke wiggled with his tongue. 'Cool. You know, I've got me some pliers in my toolbox. One yank and we'd have that out of there.'
At the small horrified sound from behind him, Logan turned to smile thinly at Stella.
'Mr. Kitridge is just joking,' Stella told a fascinated Luke. 'Your tooth will come out when it's ready.'
'When it does, the Tooth Fairy comes, and I get a buck.'
Logan pursed his lips. 'A buck, huh? Good deal.'
'It makes blood when it comes out, but I'm not scared.'
'Miss Roz? Can we go see David in the kitchen?' Gavin shot a look at his mother. 'Mom said we had
to ask you.'
'Sure. You go right on.'
'No sweets,' Stella called out as they dashed out.
'Logan, why don't you pour Stella a glass of wine?'
'I'll get it. Don't get up,' Stella told him.
He didn't look quite as much like an overbearing jerk, she decided. He cleaned up well enough, and
she could see why Roz was attracted. If you went for the ubervirile sort.
'Did you say Harper was coming?' Stella asked her.
'He'll be along.' Roz gestured with her beer. 'Let's see if we can all play nice. Let's get this business out of the way so we can have an enjoyable meal without ruining our digestion. Stella's in charge of sales
and production, of managing the day-to-day business. She and I will, for now anyway, share personnel management while Harper and I head up propagation.'
She sipped her beer, waited, though she knew her own power and didn't expect an interruption. 'Logan leads the landscaping design, both on- and off-site. As such, he has first choice of stock and is authorized to put in for special orders, or arrange trades or purchases or rentals of necessary equipment, material or specimens for outside designs. The changes Stella has already implemented or proposed—and which
have been approved by me—will stay or be put in place. Until such time as I decide they don't work.
Or if I just don't like them. Clear so far?'
'Perfectly,' Stella said coolly.
Logan shrugged.
'Which means you'll cooperate with each other, do what's necessary to work together in such a way for both of you to function in the areas you oversee. I built In the Garden from the ground up, and I can run it myself if I have to. But I don't choose to. I choose to have the two of you, and Harper, shoulder the responsibilities you've been given. Squabble all you want. I don't mind squabbles. But get the job done.'
She finished off her beer. 'Questions? Comments?' After a beat of silence, she rose. 'Well, then, let's eat.'
FIVE
It was, all things considered, a pleasant evening. Neither of her kids threw any food or made audible gagging noises. Always a plus, in Stella's book. Conversation was polite, even lively—particularly when the boys learned Logan's first name—the same name used by the X-Men's Wolverine.
It was instant hero status, given polish when it was discovered that Logan shared Gavin's obsession
with comic books.
The fact that Logan seemed more interested in talking to her sons than her was probably another plus.
'If, you know, the Hulk and Spider-Man ever got into a fight, I think Spider-Man would win.'
Logan nodded as he cut into rare roast beef. 'Because Spider-Man's quicker, and more agile. But if the Hulk ever caught him, Spidey'd be toast.'
Gavin speared a tiny new potato, then held it aloft on his fork like a severed head on a pike. 'If he was under the influence of some evil guy, like . . .'
'Maybe Mr. Hyde.'
'Yeah! Mr. Hyde, then the Hulk could be forced to go after Spider-Man. But I still think Spidey would win.'
'That's why he's amazing,' Logan agreed, 'and the Hulk's incredible. It takes more than muscle to battle evil.'
'Yeah, you gotta be smart and brave and stuff.'
