Wash

I winked. “You can.”

She smiled, then paused. “I have a big favor to ask.”

“What?”

“Do you think you could look after the boutique tomorrow? I’ve gotta take my mom to a last-minute

doctor’s appointment two hours from here. It’s with some fancy specialist, so we don’t want her to have to reschedule.”

“Hmm. I have a big article to write, and the deadline is tomorrow night.”

“All you have to do is write your opinion about the fancy party you attended.”

“Well, I also have to detail all the fashion aspects and choose the accompany photos out of all the ones I took.”

“Can’t you do it at the shop? Just download your pics to the computer.”

“You’re right. I can do that and crop them and stuff. Don’t worry. I’ll cover for ya.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.” Between working my real job that paid the bills and working at the boutique, I rarely had time to myself, but I couldn’t refuse to help a friend.

“Oh, and some more inventory came in from the Hope Collection. Can you take care of it?”

I smiled. “Of course. I’m on it.”

“As always. Thank you so much. Speaking of that, we need to ship out all those online orders too. I took care of about half of them.”

“I’ll get the rest shipped out.”

“You’re a gem.” Nadia slipped a wad of cash into the black folder that held the check. “Listen, Ashly, I gotta run. Darrin’s waiting for me at home. It’s movie night, and he’s already a little peeved at me for working all those hours at the boutique last week. It took me forever to categorize that order for the Moonlight Collection.”

“You’ve been working too much and too hard, Nadia. I would’ve helped more, but I had that big assignment last week with my job.”

“I know. It’s hard doing both.”

“Well, you guys have fun and enjoy your movie. Tell Darrin I said hello.”

“I will. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Thanks for dinner, by the way. It was nice to get out for a change.”

She smiled widely. “That was the game plan.”

I grinned, and she walked away. It was eight p.m., and I dreaded going home to my lonely apartment. Most of all, I didn’t want to think about Jake. His betrayal was still too much to bear, and sulking and crying my eyes out didn’t seem like the ideal way to spend a Friday night.

I turned my phone back on to see if I’d missed any important messages. Just as I was about to turn it off again, the phone rang, and Jake’s number was on the caller ID. I sighed and answered it. “Jake, this needs to end right now. Please stop calling me.”

“Ashly! You finally answered.”

“I’m not sure why. There’s nothing left to say,” I said sternly.

“Please just hear me out,” he said, his voice deep and pleading. “Will you just have one drink with me? I’m at the White Coyote.”

“No.”

“Okay. I respect that. Actually, I deserve it. But if you change your mind, I’ll be here till midnight.”