Marriage For One

“Now? At this hour?”

I clenched my jaw. “I’m afraid so.”

“Okay then. I hope it’s not something too important.”

“We’ll see. If I don’t see you around when I come back… Goodnight, Rose.”

Riding the elevator down, I put my jacket back on and tried not to lose it. When I was back in the lobby, the doorman rose again.

“Good evening,” I said, trying my best not to sound angry.

He looked startled for a second, making me feel even worse, but then gave me a quick smile and nodded. “Good evening, sir.”

Before I could step out of the building, my phone started to go off again. Anger surged through my body and my fingers tightened around the phone. I had known I would eventually hear from him, but hadn’t thought it would happen so soon.

Finding the cold bite of the air refreshing, I took a deep breath and caught a whiff of Rose’s scent from my jacket. With her smell surrounding me, cursing myself, I answered the call.

“What the hell do you want?”

“How nice of you to ask. I think we need to have a talk, Jack. I imagine we have a lot of things to say to each other.”

I gritted my teeth. “When?”

“How about now? Do you think you can get away from your beautiful bride for a late-night drink?”

“Tell me where.”

He was just a few blocks away from us, the son of a bitch also known as Joshua Landon. Rose’s ex-fiancé. Had he watched Rose and I as we returned from dinner? Livid, as soon as I ended the call, I headed toward the bar where he was waiting.

Chapter Eight

Rose

I had known the last few days leading up to Monday, my opening day, would be hectic and maybe not so easy, and I wasn’t wrong. If Jack hadn’t been dropping by to pick me up, I would’ve probably ended up sleeping on the floor inside the coffee shop just so I could make sure everything was ready. But, Jack…he had been…Jack was…a whole other subject.

I had deemed Friday the second biggest day next to the opening day. It was the day the coffee shop’s sign was going to go up and all the people of New York would be able to see it.

The black and white striped awnings had been installed around noon, and the sign was up only a few hours after that. I might have shed a few happy tears looking up at that thing.

Around the Corner Coffee Shop.

I knew I was officially freaking out about the opening when I started making lists for everything I could think of: what kind of freshly made sandwiches I would prepare, the first week’s pastry menu, the first day’s pastry menu…the lists just went on and on. While I was happily busy with all of that, a slow drizzle of rain had started, a pretty soundtrack in the background. As much as some people hated winter in New York, I loved it.

Jack showed up earlier than his usual time. I wasn’t surprised to see him when he showed up anymore, and it felt normal to have him in the space. I was looking forward to it even. It was the first time I’d realized I was starting to enjoy his grumpy company. It’d been three weeks since he had returned from London and started to come around every night. That was a lot of help I hadn’t expected to have, and I thought somewhere along the way something had changed between us.

This time, before he could ask me, I asked for his help as soon as he stepped over the threshold.

“Good, you’re here. Can you help me put the custom decals up on the windows?”

He hesitated only for a moment, as if he was surprised. “Sure. Why not? I’m here anyway,” he said at last, as if he wasn’t there specifically to help me. As he took off his coat and then suit jacket, I settled in for my daily show: the sleeve roll-up. And what a show it was, every single night. You’d think it would get repetitive, but no. Just no.

“Slow day at work?” I asked after wiping the invisible drool from the side of my mouth. He took the word Around from my waiting hands and climbed up the ladder until he could reach the top left corner of the window facing north.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re here early.”

“I was in the neighborhood, had a quick meeting with an old client, so I thought I’d drop by.”

I smiled up at him, but he wasn’t looking at me. “You seem to have so many meetings around here. There was another one the other day, right?” He frowned down at me, but before he could say anything, I pushed forward. “Anyway, as I keep saying every time you’re here, I appreciate the help.”