I brought my hands up to cover my face for a moment, then returned my attention back to them. They were staring at me with expectancy.
“He is just being helpful. I’ve only seen him maybe three times. I wouldn’t count that as a lot or enough reason to talk about.”
Jessa leaned on the counter with her bottle of water and craned her head to the side with a smirk.
“How exactly is that man being helpful? I know some of the ways he used to be helpful back in the day. So I just wanted to double check,” Jessa responded with a smirk.
I rolled my eyes as Miss Lottie chuckled, then walked back over to the countertop and started wiping it down.
“Well honey, Virgina tells me she saw you two sitting really close at a table and flirting. Her words, not mine. If I do say so myself, that is a fine young man. I would be smiling and flirting too if I was still a young woman back in my prime.”
I chuckled with a shake of my head.
“He is attractive. But he is really just helping me. You know I’ve been cleaning the shop by myself at the end of the day.According to Duke, that wasn’t safe, and he just wanted to help me. So I took him up on the offer until I could afford to hire a full-time employee to help me at the end of the night.”
Jessa stopped smiling and stood straight with a serious expression.
“Now you know I would have come down to help you. If you don’t want his help, I can help you.”
I smiled, knowing my friend would’ve dropped everything to be there with me if I needed it. But I also knew that Miss Lottie still needed her and would hurt herself if she were alone. She would be around this big ole’ house doing everything she could get her hands on. Even though she wasn’t supposed to be doing them.
“I know that, but I also know you’re needed around here. I didn’t have a problem with what I was doing. I could’ve continued listening to my music and cleaning at the end of the night. He just presented a few good points, and all he wanted was a few treats as payment.”
Jessa rolled her eyes then smirked before rolling her hips then bumping her grandmothers. “What kind of treats?”
I couldn’t help but laugh, and Miss Lottie shook her head with a smile. I’m sure Jessa’s antics kept her feeling lively and young. It sure as heck kept me entertained.
“Not those kinds of treats, you hussy. You know the man has a sweet tooth.” I added.
“That’s what I hear—” she started before I hopped up from the chair.
She yelped as I chased her through the kitchen with one of the many placemats on the island. Miss Lottie laughed and warned us that if we caused her to drop any of her food, she was going to tag our behinds.
After we’d gotten tired of running around the house, we made our way back into the kitchen for dinner. We sat around the dining room table like old times, talking about everything under the sun. It had gotten late, and Miss Lottie had already excused herself for the night.
She’d placed a kiss against my temple before heading for the steps. After enough urging to head to bed, Jessa and I made our way into the kitchen to clean. We wanted to take as much off her plate as she would allow. Jessa washed and I rinsed before placing the dishes into the rack beside the sink.
“How have you really been doing, Solana? Is Duke really cool? He isn’t giving you any weird vibes, right?” she asked, question after question.
I released a sigh as I thought back on Duke. He was giving me everything but weird vibes, which was scary to me. I don’t have time for none of that. I just wanted to exist here, and his presence was causing me to lose a bit of my focus. But I also enjoyed having him near.
“You know the answer to that. The man is everything but that, and that’s what makes it worse. He’s been providing this… silent support. Do you know he comes by at the end of each day and literally just helps me clean? Then he leaves with thepromise he’ll be back the next day. He doesn’t say much either while we’re cleaning. The most he’s said to me was that first day—asking where the cleaning supplies were and telling me he was helping me.”
Jessa nodded and continued washing the dishes silently for the moment before speaking again.
“You didn’t answer all of my questions. How are you doing?”
I exhaled, trying to ground myself as I rinsed the last dish, then grabbed a towel to dry my hands.
“I love it here and the new life I’m building. But my old one will be here in no time. I can feel it, and it’s making me wonder if I should even be here waiting when it does. I didn’t tell you the day it happened, but on the opening day of Sugar Kissed, I was on social media, and my old manager was hosting a damn press conference, telling my fans to help him find me.”
I paused and looked over at Jessa, who was frowning.
She dried her hands and walked over to the counter to pick up her phone. I watched her poke around until said video was playing low. I hated listening to it all over again. He blatantly disregarded everything I put in that damn letter or text message. I might as well had left the damn letter blank if this was how he was going to go about it.
I stayed quiet while she finished watching the video. Then turned to face me with a frown.
“How did you work with him so damn long? This man’s face is even pissing me off.”
