Page 58 of The Cask

“Who?”

He smirked. “Exactly.”

He walked out the door without another word.

A couple minutes later, Alexis burst through the kitchen door. “I’m so sorry! I assumed they were from him!”

I shook my head. “It’s okay.”

“Oh my Gooooooooooood,” she wailed dramatically. “Is Omari mad? I wish I would’ve read the card in my head first. I was just so surprised to see that name that I said it out loud. And what is Luchi doing sending you flowers?”

The words were flying out of her mouth fast.

“Calm down,” I demanded in a soothing tone.

“Calm down?! You went from having zero men to having two men in twenty-four hours!”

I made a face. “You are being dramatic!”

“I’m not,” she argued. “But first things first”—she pointed at the flowers— “where did Luchi come from?”

“He called yesterday and said he was going to be in town tonight and he wants to take me out. He said he wants to talk,” I told her.

“And what did you say? What are you going to do?”

I shook my head. “Nothing. I told him no. That relationship didn’t work out for a reason. I’m not interested in revisiting it. He asked me to think about it and I guess the flowers are his way of trying to convince me to change my mind.”

“Well, if you didn’t have Omari in the picture, would you go on the date?”

I opened my mouth to say that Omari wasn’t in the picture, but I quickly snapped it shut. She stared at me expectantly as I remembered that I couldn’t tell her anything. For my plan to work, I couldn’t give anyone any reason to doubt my goodwill.

“I wouldn’t get back with Luchi for any reason in the world. He is not the man for me. He is looking for someone to make him look good. He wants a trophy. He doesn’t want an ambitious woman with goals. He’s not a bad guy, but he’d be bad for me.”

“I’ll never forget the night he tried to convince me to take over the bar for you.”

My blood boiled just thinking about it.

Luchesi had the audacity to go behind my back and try to broker the sale of my business and wanted to put all the pieces in place. He’d found a buyer and he’d tried to talk Alexis into running the place. He claimed he was doing it for us; but really, he was doing it for him.

“That was the week before he proposed,” I mentioned with a shake of my head. “He had some nerve.”

“That’s why I like Omari for you!” She was grinning. “He doesn’t seem like the type to try to control you.”

I pointed at her. “Word to the wise, most of them don’t seem like their worst characteristics when you first meet them.”

“Yeah, I know,” she sighed, looking longingly out the window. “But he seems different. I can tell by the way he looks at you.” She looked back at me. “And you’re different with him.”

I rolled my eyes. “You’ve seen me with him twice.”

“And both times I’ve never seen you smile harder. And you look like you’re in a daze with him.”

I sucked my teeth. “You are so dramatic.”

“No, I’m serious!” She giggled, clapping her hands. “The two of you look at each other in a way that’s just different. I’ve never seen you look at anyone like that before. Even when you were head over heels in love with Luchi, you didn’t look at him like that. And as wrong as he may have been for you, he was good-looking, too.”

I put my hands on my hips. “Are you done?”

“Almost.” She held up a finger. “One more thing… did Omari get mad?”

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