“The finances aren’t looking good,” he said, his voice heavy. “I’ve emailed you the numbers, and while that place is a good spot for a Luxe Hotel, it doesn’t look good for The Galley.”
I placed a hand on the back of my neck, trying to find a sense of stability in this very rocky situation.
Losing my mother at an early age had affected me in ways I hadn’t predicted. It’d made me a person who wanted to protect the people around him at all costs. Even if it meant holding back information that I knew could hurt them, until I was very sure there was no other way.
Because I had known very early on that there was noway I’d raze Ava’s mom’s restaurant to the ground unless it was my last resort.
Until I’d met Ava, I’d thought that scoring my team’s touchdown at football was the best high I could get all day. I didn’t realize I could score that touchdown and still be waiting—looking at the clock, willing the game to get over—for her to run up to me for a kiss. Her kisses gave me such a high that a man with a terrible voice like me wanted to sing.
That last year in high school had ruined me.
Now that I’d run into her again, a rebellious streak I hadn’t known I had in me reared its head, making me think I could get over my fears. That I could date the woman of my dreams and that my fears of losing everyone close to me were unfounded.
I wanted something more from Ava. Something more than just a fling. And that wasn’t easy, considering that everyone I’d ever really cared about ended up dead, gone, or suffering somehow.
I needed to be honest and to trust Ava. Instead, I’d lied to her. The woman who’d placed so much blind faith in me that she trusted me to handle her mom’s restaurant. The woman who’d trusted me enough to give me another chance at being together. The woman who knew of milestones in my career from the years we never spoke to each other. The woman who always made me feel special, even when we were working on different floors. I didn’t want to let her down.
I needed to come clean with Ava about what was going to happen with her restaurant. One step at a time.
33
AVA
Gabriela took the hookah hose to her mouth and inhaled slowly. I watched her from across the small table as she waited a moment and exhaled the smoke, her eyebrows rising in mild surprise.
“Are you still so nervous about this?” Freya asked from next to Gabriela while the server prepared her mix with mint.
“No,” Gabriela answered while Lily, next to me, attempted and failed to blow a ring of smoke on her exhale. “But I can always trust you to introduce me to something I would never have done before, Freya.”
Freya smiled. “You’re welcome,” she said as she put the hose of her hookah to her lips. “One of my exes brought me to this place, and I think it was the only thing I held on to from that relationship.”
I stared at my hookah with some hesitation. Freya had prepared us for this, letting us know that it wouldn’t be a smoke-filled cavern, like I’d predicted, and she was right. The lounge had rectangular wooden tables with comfortable,deep, high-backed chairs, and the lighting was just dim enough that you could convince yourself that you were in an exclusive restaurant. We sat by the window, which was partly covered with deep plum-colored curtains, and the curtains parted a little to show us the rainy street outside.
I took another small inhale of my apple-flavored mix. It was fruity and refreshing, and free of tobacco and nicotine. I closed my eyes in momentary satisfaction. This ought to be perfect to get my mind off Desmond. Somehow, all I could think of was that I wished I could come back here with him sometime.
“Remind me never to turn down new experiences again,” Lily muttered as she turned her hookah around a little. An entire half pineapple made up the head for her hookah, and she couldn’t get over marveling over it. “It smells like we’re in Hawaii.”
It had been five days since I’d seen Desmond. Five full days. He’d texted me every morning, asking if we could meet and talk it out, but I was still angry with him and had told him I didn’t want to.
When Freya and the others had asked me to meet them at the Helix Hookah Lounge, I had been glad for the excuse to get out after spending all weekend by myself at home.
Gabriela leaned back against the seat while a gleam from the dim yellow lights above us caught her new earrings. She had been looking happier lately. She informed us that her new workplace was going great; she got paid better in tips than she ever had at The Galley. Lily seemed to have made her peace with her manager, Matt, and confessed that she actually looked forward to working every morning.
I leaned back in my chair and crossed my legs. I filled them in on my eventful few weeks at work. They got caughtup with my disastrous interview with Bianca, including the way it had left things with me and Desmond. It raised some confusing questions, particularly for Lily.
“Why would Bianca make up a fake kiss between you and Otto?” Lily frowned. “I mean, that was so obviously made up. Wouldn’t she have expected you to laugh in her face?”
Freya tsk-tsked and gave Gabriela a knowing look that I didn’t miss. I opened my mouth to correct her and then sighed.
Lily looked between the three of us, not understanding, and threw her hands up and said, “Will someone please tell me what’s going on?”
Freya turned to her. “I think … that was Bianca trying to test out a theory,” she said. “A theory that Desmond would be upset at Ava’s supposed kiss, and that would give Bianca a clue to dig into whatever is going on between them.”
Lily gave a low whistle.
I didn’t look at the two of them, but continued to stare out the water-streaked window. Why was it always raining?
“There’s nothing going on anymore,” I added hurriedly while the others turned to me. “We had a temporary two-week fling. And what’s more, our temporary fling is over.”
