Natasha ~ Present
“HAVE YOU HEARD FROM MILLIE yet?”
I looked up from my planner to see my sister Dru coming into the office. She looked nervous, which was weird, because Dru didn’t get nervous.
“No, why? Does Claire need help out front?” I asked.
Dru waved her hand and said, “No, she’s got everything under control.”
I narrowed my eyes, took in the way she was bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet and fisting her hands at her sides. She wasn’t nervous, nervous, she was excited, nervous. Something was going on.
“What is it?” I asked, pushing my chair back and standing. The movement caused my back to twinge, so I placed my hand on my lower back and stretched from side to side. I guess I’d been sitting too long.
“What’s what?” Dru asked quickly, suspiciously. “Nothing’s going on.”
“Oh, something is going on . . . You know something that I don’t and you’re going to tell me what it is.”
“Or what?” she asked, jutting out her chin and cocking a hip. Now she was trying to deflect her lie by getting feisty. I knew my sister’s game all too well.
“Or, I’ll get suddenly sick on Saturday and you’ll have to deal with Mrs. Gunderson, Mother of the Bride from Hell . . .”
Dru lost all signs of feistiness and cried, “You wouldn’t!”
“You know I would,” I taunted. I wasn’t bluffing and she knew it.
“But, she made Big Stan at the flower shop cry,” Dru protested.
“She makes everybody cry. Now, spill. What’s happening with Millie? Did something happen in Graceland?”
Dru bit her lip, looked at the clock, then sighed.
“Oh, fine, they’ll be back any minute, so I kept my promise to Jackson and didn’t spill his secret.”
“His secret?” I asked, then my eyes widened and my mouth dropped. “Did he propose at Graceland?”
Dru squealed and nodded, and we clasped hands as we both started jumping up and down.
“Either Kate Spade is having a seventy percent off sale, or someone spilled the beans,” I heard Millie say dryly.
Dru and I turned to see her standing in the doorway of the office, her hand out in front of her to show off the ring. We took our jumping and squealing to her and both grabbed her hand at the same time.
“You said yes!” I exclaimed.
“She said yes,” Dru mimicked.
“I said yes!” Millie cried, and started jumping with us.
“Oh my God, it’s beautiful, and so totally you,” Dru said as she leaned in to get a bird’s eye view of the ring.
“Tell us everything,” I urged. “Did he get down on one knee? Recite poetry, or . . . oh, more Keats? Was Kayla there? Where did he do it?”
Millie laughed at our exuberance and suggested, “How about we grab some coffee and I’ll tell you everything.”
“Okay, but let’s go down to Rooster’s,” Dru suggested. “I know you’re just getting back, but I could use a change of scenery.”
Millie nodded.
We walked through the kitchen, Millie stopping to give Claire a hug and ask how things had been while she was gone.
“She can give you the lowdown on the kitchen later,” Dru said impatiently, pulling Millie toward the door. “I only have thirty minutes until my next meeting, and I don’t want you skipping any details.”
Millie laughed and said, “All right. Claire, I’ll come talk to you in a bit.”
“Sure thing, Mills, everything’s great here. Go catch up with your sisters.”
We made it through the kitchen and into the storefront, where Millie had to stop to say hi to a couple other people, then we were finally out on the street in front of Three Sisters Catering.
“Maybe we should have snuck out the back,” I said with a laugh, then allowed my eyes to drift across the street, like they always did when I went out the front door, and I stopped dead in my tracks, ‘cause he was there.
Standing outside of Prime Beef, the steakhouse he’d opened mere months before we’d opened up shop right across the street, was Jericho Smythe.
The man I’d fallen in instant lust, and almost as immediately in love, with, in accounting class my freshman year of college. The man who’d consumed my thoughts and feelings for over a year after that meeting, and who I’d unceremoniously left without so much as a Dear John letter years ago.
The man who still hadn’t spoken to me, but had only glared at me from afar.
The man who still made my heart yearn, my breath quicken, and my knees go weak with just a glance.
I turned my head quickly and grabbed my sisters by the hands, urging them to keep walking toward Rooster’s.
“I’m guessing you two didn’t talk things out while I was away,” Millie said softly, her eyes on Jericho.
I shook my head.
“Well, I’m pretty sure Jackson’s going to have him involved in the wedding in some capacity, so you won’t always have the luxury of having Main Street between you. You need to swallow your pride and talk to him, Tash. Explain what happened and clear the air so that you can at least be civil to each other.”
I smiled sadly and nodded, but stopped myself from correcting her.
It wasn’t pride that kept me from talking to Jericho, it was fear. Not fear that he wouldn’t understand, and would never forgive me. But, fear that he would . . .