Priced to Move (The Shop-Til-U-Drop Collection Book #1) , livre ebook

Baker Publishing Group - Ginny Aiken

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117 pages

English

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Description

Gemologist Andrea Adams is suffering a bad case of burnout at her plum job in the New York Diamond District. So she swaps the Big Apple for Louisville, Kentucky, and joins the S.T.U.D. television shopping network as its newest host. When she's paired up with a hunky but clueless Ken doll of a cohost, Andrea wonders if she made the right move. Top it all off with foul play, a trip to Myanmar, and lots and lots of rubies, and you've got a story any woman would like to read. This exciting and fast-paced novel kicks off Ginny Aiken's Shop-Til-U-Drop Collection.

Informations

Publié par	Baker Publishing Group
Date de parution	01 octobre 2007
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781585586226
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0202€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

Priced to Move
Priced to Move
A NOVEL
Ginny Aiken
2007 by Ginny Aiken
Published by Revell a division of Baker Publishing Group P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287 www.revellbooks.com
Printed in the United States of America
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means-for example, electronic, photocopy, recording-without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Aiken, Ginny. Priced to move : a novel / Ginny Aiken. p. cm. - (Shop- til-you-drop collection ; bk. 1) ISBN 10: 0-8007-3227-8 (pbk.) ISBN 978-0-8007-3227-1 (pbk.) 1. Gemologists-Fiction. 2. Shopping-Television-Fiction. I. Title. PS3551.I339P75 2007 813 .54-dc22
2007023070
Published in association with the literary agency of Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard St., Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.
For wisdom is better than rubies, and all the things one may desire cannot be compared with her.
Proverbs 8:11
Table Of Contents
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1 00
NEW YORK, NEW YORK
It s so not fair. Why doesn t anyone tell you ahead of time your dream job s going to morph into a nightmare if you stay in it long enough?
Like I have.
C mon, Roger, I reason. You can t ask me to take off for New Delhi tomorrow. Give me a break. I just got in from Hong Kong last night.
My boss, the oh-so-distinguished Roger Hammond, frowns. The gears in his steel-gray-haired head practically spew smoke from his warp-speed thinking. Then he smiles.
Uh-oh.
Yeah, right. Butter up the fall girl again. You know I don t
But that s why it s so perfect, my girl. Have I ever noticed the ultrabright whiteness of his teeth? Now you don t need to unpack. And you know you re the very best. No one, but no one, can compare. You re simply the only one I can trust with this deal. say it. You also know I cave. Especially after Roger describes, in flamboyant Technicolor, the loot I m supposed to bring back.
What can I say? I m a sucker for the beauty God plants under layers of plain old mud.
Here. Roger plunks his index finger on a fax on his desk. Take a look at this. Sudhir Singh says the new find s the finest vein of top-grade garnet found in Orissa to date. That s saying a lot. We ve bought how many of his parcels in the last few years?
My vivid imagination paints a series of picture memories. Have you seen samples of the new material?
No, and that s why I need you in Orissa. Roger slips his right hand into the pocket of his custom-tailored Italian suit trousers, strolls to the meager excuse for a window in his office, and pauses. He doesn t bother to check out the view; the high rectangle features a grimy back alley.
He goes on. Sudhir s not about to leave this new find to bring us the goods, Andrea. Poachers, of course. And I would go, but for this . . . this . . . His voice trails off while he waves his free hand in helplessness.
I really, really have to fight a laugh. Do the words dinner party escape you?
When he turns, a red haze creeps up onto his chiseled cheekbones. Well, you do know Tiffany. She makes such a production of everything.
Oh yeah . Do I ever know the infamous Tiffany, the trophy wife. Roger treated himself to Tiffany after his first wife left him for their starving-artist pool boy four years ago. At first, he was understandably livid. Then he turned morose. By the time he d dabbled in all the colors of emotion, the ink on their amicable ( not! ) divorce had dried. Three months later, the beauteous, extravagant, and too young Tiffany became the second Mrs. Hammond. The rest, including lavish parties and astronomical Saks, Macy s, and Cartier bills, is now history.
I don t remark on Tiffany.
Well, Rog, I say instead, my hip propped against the corner of his desk, it s not nice to invite the mayor and senator to din-din, then stand them up while you take a trot around the world, now, is it?
His sigh of relief is funny-almost. I knew you d understand. That s why I pay you the big bucks.
I wish. Does he have anything else you re interested in right now?
Sudhir said something about a parcel of emeralds. But you know how I feel about Indian emeralds. They just don t compare with the Colombian material or even that from Zambia. I ll leave it up to you.
Swell. What price range do you have in mind?
He takes a couple of steps, then gives my shoulder an awkward pat. I ll trust your judgment-within reason. You know your gems. Better than I do, actually.
Well, yeah. Roger owns a store in New York s diamond district; I own a BS in geology and a Gemological Institute of America certificate that declares me a master gemologist. But why quibble?
Ohh-kay, then. I grab the fax and head for the door. I guess I m off to India bright and early in the morning.
The smile blazes again. That s wonderful, my girl. I always know I can count on you. You re the most valuable employee a man could ever have . . .
I am thankful for all Roger has taught me over the years, but I still block out the effusive flattery. You see, besides that BS in rocks and piece of paper from the GIA, I also have a torn-up gut, the result of seven years work in the stress-filled gemstone industry. My mangled middle lies in wait until something like this stirs it up, and then that holey gut of mine starts in with a zesty hula. Like it does right after I agree to New Delhi.
So once I chow down a fistful of extra-strength Tums, I grab my Coach handbag and head home. What passes for home, that is.
Do you have any idea what rent runs you in New York City these days? No? Well, let me tell you. It s downright bad for your health. Big Apple rents ll take a juicy bite out of you each and every month. Sometimes I feel like I work just to keep my landlord in Jaguars and homes in the Hamptons and Bahamas.
As always, the subway jostles me the whole ride long. That motion joins the gyrations of my twitchy digestive system, and together they- bam! -kick it all up a notch. Gotta love that Emeril, you know.
When I reach my stop, a sea of humanity shoves me out onto the platform. Every morning and every evening I spend a good chunk of time in prayer over that platform. Well, not the platform itself, but rather the track. There s nothing there to keep a girl from getting crammed off the narrow platform and flung down onto the rails just as the next steel behemoth belches in.
Not a pretty picture.
Then there s what passes for my apartment. You can t do a whole lot with five hundred square feet of space. I m sure that my petite pad has a posh past as a dressing room in the vast apartment home of a well-to-do Roaring Twenties flapper. Now? Let s just say that Murphy and his famous hide-in-the-wall bed save me from the hassle of inflating an air mattress on the floor every night.
Brrriiinnng!
I run inside that expensive cubbyhole of mine and yank the receiver off its cradle before my caller can hang up-I m call-deprived, you know.
Hello?
Where you been these last ten days, sugarplum? My Aunt Weeby s homey southern-flavored voice flows over me like a balm.
I drop my Coach bag on the floor, then I wince. That bag didn t cost me chump change. But my daddy s sister trumps Coach any day. Hang on. I just walked in.
I throw the deadbolt, slip the doodad into the chain lock s slot, then turn the tab in the regular doorknob before I feel safe enough to relax. That s when I flop back on my diminutive armless slipper chair-all I could fit in my living room after I placed a love seat against the one wall-and finally smile. Aunt Weeby! How come when a two-year-old dubs a relative something too cute, it sticks forever? It s so good to hear you. How ve you been?
No, no, no. That s not how we play this game. I asked first. You tell me, and then I ll tell you. So where you been?
Hong Kong, remember? It s almost the end of June. The gemstone show ended only day before yesterday.
That s right. My, my, my. Time plumb flies by too fast when you move into the Metamucil and Centrum Silver lane. She clucks her dismay. So, tell me now, did you get yourself any a them chopstick thingies? You gonna teach me to use em? How bout any pretties? You get yourself anything special? Aunt Weeby is a world-class shopper.
Nope. Prices were outrageous this time around. I didn t even buy a whole lot for Roger. He wasn t any too happy with me, but there was nothing I could do with the budget he gave me.
So what s the hottest stone a the moment?
I shrug and toe off my classic black pumps. Aaahhh . . . It depends on who you ask. The big four are always . . . well, big. My mind ticks off the list: diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and emeralds.
Phhhht! I know that, sugarplum. I don t wanna hear about the usual. I m after hearing about new and fabulous finds. I tell her about my trip, which, to anyone but me, sounds exotic and exciting. Me? I just relive the exhaustion. But Aunt Weeby s Aunt Weeby. So while I describe the goods I saw in exquisite detail, I leave out all mention of my adventures with the cab driver who hit another cab on the way to the hotel from the airport, the subsequent argument-midstreet, mind you-my lost suitcase, the emergency room visit for my torn-up gut, and my overall sense of burnout.
Aunt Weeby tends to worry about me. I strive to prevent that worry.
So why don cha tell me what kinda fun things you gonna do tonight in that Big Apple a yours? she says when she s had her fill of gemological tidbits.
Fun things? Me? Uh . . . I m about to wash my underwear so I have enough clean, since Roger s sending me to New Delhi. I leave tomorrow.
Dead silence.
Then, You sure that s wise, Andie?
I happen to like my undies clean.
That s not what I mean! It s that deli thing. Is it wise?