The Invitation

This morning I’d been going about my regular business, brushing my teeth, when I glanced up to the mirror and found two black eyes reflected back at me. It looked a lot worse than it felt. My nose didn’t really hurt unless I touched it. But both eyes were swollen, with black and purple rings beneath them. I’d slipped on sunglasses before I left my house, so it was easy to forget the problem—until I’d taken them off in my friend’s office just now.

“Who clocked you?” He leaned forward to get a closer look. “Whoever it was did a better job than I did that night we got into a drunken fight over who would win a drunken fight if we had one. I barely left a mark when I sucker-punched you, yet I had to get thirteen stitches when you got up off the ground and socked me back.”

“The person who did this was definitely much stronger than you.”

“Who was it?”

I smirked. “Stella…you fucking pussy.”

Jack’s eyebrows jumped. “A woman did that? Who the hell is Stella?”

“Remember the woman you met at Olivia’s wedding? The one who sniffed the shots at the bar? I won two-hundred bucks from her being able to identify the brand of gin by smelling it.”

“The hot one who turned out to be a crasher?”

“That’s the one.”

“Okay. What about her?”

“Her name is Stella.”

Jack’s face wrinkled. “I thought that woman’s name was Evelyn.”

I hadn’t yet filled my friend in on the shit that had transpired since the wedding, even though I’d actually come today to discuss Signature Scent. Jack was the vice president of one of the largest media conglomerates—that happened to own the most popular home shopping television station. I thought perhaps he could introduce me to some of the bigwigs there to discuss the possibility of getting Stella’s perfume featured as a product on one of their shows.

“She was a wedding crasher, dumbass. She wasn’t using her real name.”

“Oh, shit. Okay, that makes sense. So hot sniffer girl is really Stella.”

“That’s correct.”

“And she punched you because…”

It was probably easiest if I backed up and explained from the beginning, so I did. Starting at the lost phone, I made my way through my sister’s bleeding heart and finally wound up at the purpose of my visit today.

When I was done, Jack sat back in his chair and rubbed his chin. “You’ve had plenty of investments in companies you could have used my connections for. A few times I’ve even told you you were dumb not to come to me. Your response is always that you don’t like to mix business with friendship. What’s changed?”

“Nothing.”

He tilted his head. “Yet here you are...”

“I’m asking for an introduction, not for you to go out on a limb.”

Jack shrugged. “You’ve had a dozen products you could have asked for my help with over the years. Yet this is the first one you’re sitting on the other side of my desk about. You wanna know what I think?”

“Don’t really give two shits what you think, so no.”

He smirked. “I think you’re hot for the sniffer, and you want to impress her.”

Why the hell does everyone in my life ask me if I want to know what they think and then when I say no, they tell me anyway?

I shook my head. “I’m invested financially in the company, jackass.”

The last thing I needed was Jack knowing the woman who gave me two black eyes had basically shot me down. He’d still be busting my balls about it when we were making bets from our wheelchairs.

“You were invested in all the companies you could have come to me about,” he said.

I rolled my eyes. “Are you going to help me or not?”

“Yes, but you know why?”

“Because you owe me four-thousand favors?”

“Maybe, but that’s not why I’m doing it. I’m doing it because it’s been a long time since you made an effort with a woman. You’re used to just walking into a bar, showing that pretty face, and taking the pick of the litter home. This is good. I hate spending so much time with Alana’s sister’s husband. He’s a tool.”

“I’m lost. What does your wife’s sister’s husband have to do with this conversation?”

“Simple. If you had a goddamned girlfriend, we could go out to dinner with you and her sometimes, instead of Allison and Chuck. Who the hell under the age of sixty calls themselves Chuck, anyway?”

“I’m not going out with Stella.” Until she asks.

Jack smiled. “We’ll see.”

My best friend might be a pain in my ass, but he had damn good connections. Over the next two hours, not only did he introduce me to the head of the shopping network’s buying team, he also took me on set to watch the end of the show they were currently taping. By the time he was done, he’d managed to sell the famous host on the concept of Signature Scent and gotten her to invite Stella and me to lunch the next day.