Just One Kiss. Isabel Sharpe
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course it was Alexandra, which he pronounced Alex-ahn-drah. Names like Matilda or Priscilla were entirely out of the question. She was tall, exotically dark, Selma Hayekish, wearing a dress—black cap sleeves, red lace-up corset and a black tutu skirt—over stiletto boots, and not looking at all stupid. Looking, in fact, like the Goddess of Fashion Elegance. If Bonnie put on an outfit like that people would fall over laughing in the street.
Goddess looked eagerly around and parted her beautiful mouth to exclaim, “Oh, what a great shop!”
Bonnie suppressed a chortle of satisfaction. Alex-ahn-drah’s voice brought to mind angry chipmunks. See? No one could have everything. Though this woman did have an unfair number of the characteristics particularly dear to Seth. Namely big boobs and long legs.
“Ooh!” Alexa glided—yes, glided—on heels that would make Bonnie walk as if she were drunk, over to the bucket of cut jasmine sprays, where she bent down to sniff. “These are sooo pretty! And they smell sooo nice.”
“They’re one of my favorites.” In a faintly bitchy gesture, she made her voice as smooth and throatily sexual as possible, and got a satisfying double take from Seth.
“How much are they?” Alexandra bit her lower lip anxiously.
“Allow me.” Seth plucked out several stems and handed them to Bonnie, not taking his eyes off of Alexandra’s assets.
“Oh, wow. Thank you, Seth,” the Goddess squeaked. “Those are so beautiful.”
“How about roses, too? Red?”
“You are just too nice. Those would be perfect.”
Seth turned to Bonnie, chest puffed like a knight who’d just rescued his lady. “We’ll take these and a couple of—”
“Yeah, I’m on it.” She was already heading for the red roses, rolling her eyes. She’d been standing three feet away. Did they think she couldn’t hear?
Still gritting her teeth, she arranged the jasmine and roses with greenery and wrapped the bouquet while Seth led Alexandra around the shop and got to hear her chipmunking over everything. Bonnie wanted to charge him triple. He and Bambi were probably on their way to his studio to make beautiful music together. Nice of him to flaunt that in front of her.
No. No. She took a deep breath. Another one. Seriously, Bonnie … think.
Seth didn’t owe her that kind of consideration after five years. Not his fault he didn’t know she couldn’t quite put out the lame torch she still carried for him. Bonnie couldn’t punish him for moving on to live his life the way he wanted, or for assuming she’d done the same.
She’d tried to move on. Truly. And in many important ways she had. But what had made her believe junior year with all her naive little heart that she and Seth were meant to be together was the way he opened up to her, the way he became unguarded and warm around her. Only her. The way they shared stories, sometimes vulnerable painful stories, about their origins and paths, noting how many of the emotions and the resulting damage were the same in spite of their radically different backgrounds. Seth’s parents had been too caught up in their globe-trotting and social life to spend time with him, and Bonnie’s were too busy just trying to cope with six kids and a mortgage.
Similar as their experiences had been, as adults they processed the reaction differently, and that was where she felt she could be the most help to him. Bonnie had craved the intimacy she’d been starved for during her childhood, surrounding herself with close friends and lovers. Seth had withdrawn into his music and let only a few trusted friends near him, but no one ever as close as she’d gotten during that blissful year they were together.
“Here you go.” She handed the flowers to Alex-ahn-dra with a warm smile, determined not to act the pathetic hangeron ex-girlfriend.
“Thanks.” Alexandra buried her perfect nose in the bouquet and sent Seth a whitened smile under eyes glistening with gratitude. “Really, thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Sir Galahad’s voice oozed humble nobility.
Bonnie was ready to hurl into one of her buckets.
“Ready?” Seth put a hand to the spot on Alexandra’s back where the red corset met the sudden flare of black netting, and gestured toward the exit. They left together, Seth sending Bonnie an unreadable glance as they passed. She watched them go, unable to keep herself from hoping they’d turn left, head out of the building and into the city.
They turned right. Maybe to pay a visit to Jack’s photography studio down the hall? Or Demi’s physical therapy studio?
Bonnie came out from behind the counter and nonchalantly strolled toward a potted ficus, which she examined closely for yellowing leaves, keeping the couple in her peripheral vision through the line of windows across her storefront.
Her heart sank. No. They were waiting for the elevator. Going up to Seth’s apartment.
She turned and stalked back to her counter. That was it. Bonnie could not spend the rest of her life skulking around ficuses spying on a guy who broke her heart five years earlier and hadn’t shown any sign of any desire or even awareness that he had the power to change into someone looking for a serious, healthy relationship.
How many times had she told herself she had to let him go? Too many. This time she had to dig down really deep, face really hard truths and make damn well sure she meant it.
4
ANGELA SMILED AT the group of moms leaving her shop, laughing and chatting, pushing babies in strollers, holding sticky hands of cookie-finishing toddlers. Adorable. If she and Tom were still married, Angela would probably be pregnant by now. They’d wanted kids, boatloads of them, but had decided to wait a few years before trying—thank goodness. Maybe he’d have that boatload now with the Princess of Perfection.
The thought still managed to hurt.
It shouldn’t. Tom was not worthy. Angela would meet someone else, someone who wanted her for herself, not in order to rebel against his parents. She and Mr. Wonderful would have perfectly flawed children and a perfectly flawed marriage like real, perfectly flawed people were supposed to.
Of course to do that, she’d have find Mr. Wonderful, and to do that, she’d have to start dating. Yesterday when she told Bonnie she wasn’t ready, for the first time the response had felt more like reflex than truth. Angela had lain in bed last night and thought about how when the sexy bicycle guy came in for white cupcakes, she’d felt not just ready, she’d felt ex-treme-ly ready. Ready to drag him into the back and show him how hot her ovens could get. So maybe it was time to start? Maybe. She could always take refuge in delay if the reality proved even more terrifying than the thought. Just because Bike Guy happened to send her to the moon and back didn’t mean she was ready for a relationship. After such a spectacular failure with her marriage it would be hard to trust any man again.
The pack of moms cleared the entrance and Angela’s eyes snapped into focus on the devil himself. She did a cartoonish double take, her system burning with that exhausting and all-too-familiar combination of pain, anger and lingering tenderness.
Tom.
What was he doing here?
He looked good. He’d lost weight, had color, probably from a vacation with what’s-er-name in St. Thomas, his favorite destination. Had he made love to her out on the warm sand at sundown? Watched the stars come out, more than Angela had ever seen before? Had the cooling air washed over their naked bodies? Did he tell her she was and always would be the only woman for him?
Angela wanted to cry. And she wanted to find a large blunt object to brain him with.
Divorce was so peaceful.
“Hi, Ange.”
There was nothing she hated more than the sound of that nickname on his lips. “Hi, Tom. I’m surprised