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“But what?” he asked, facing her back as she stared out the window.
“I’m sorry, Blake. I just can’t…besides…” She was distracted by the door chime as another customer came into the shop, which was too bad. She was about to ask, wouldn’t Rose or his other girlfriends mind?
“Listen, I’ll talk to you later, okay?” His voice was so deep and low it sent shivers down her spine and a tingling between her thighs.
Stop it, Jen! He’s off the market. Ignore him.
That was easier said than done.
***
The next day when the door chime sounded at the flower shop a woman walked in carrying her little poodle in her arms. She had a large red hat over a headscarf tied to her head. She looked quite beautiful in a classic way. She must have been around middle age or older. But she looked stunning. She had on what appeared to be custom jewellery. Large earrings and a long beaded necklace.
“Good morning. How can I help you, today?” Jen asked, cheerfully.
“You must be Jen!” The woman narrowed her eyes with a smirk on her face.
“Um. I’m sorry. Do I know you?”
“I’m Rose!”
Jen thought she was going to have a heart attack. The word Rose almost knocked the wind out of her lungs. For a moment, her eyes widened and she could not speak. Why was Rose looking for her? She guessed it had to do with Blake.
“Don’t worry, sugar. I don’t bite.” She grinned. “Well, actually, little Angel here is a different story.”
Jen froze.
“I’m kidding, honey. Lighten up.”
Jen let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. “I’m sorry, it’s just that…”
“Listen, I’m not going to be long and please, please whatever you do…don’t tell Blake I
was here, got it?”
Jen nodded.
“Now as you know, my guy Blake sends me and other women flowers every day.”
“Yes…I…I know.” Rose actually knows about the other women?
“Well, it ain’t what you think, sugar!”
“It’s not?”
“No.”
“Listen, I’m not sure I understand what you’re talking about…”
“It’s simple. Blake came to me yesterday with a spirit of a dead donkey. It was as if
someone knocked the wind out of his lungs or something. I kept prying until he told me. You turned him down. He thinks he’s lost his touch. He was going to ask you out again. But I told him unless you come clean about your little secret flower delivery thing, she ain’t gonna wanna see you. That’s what I told him.”
Jen listened attentively.
“You see, Blake could be my kid. Only he was my best friend’s kid.”
Jen looked as if she was going to turn blue.
“Relax, kid! Ain’t nothing going on between Blake and I. Ever!” She sat down on a stool, stroking her poodle as she continued her talk with Jen. “You see, his mama died two years ago. We had this club. The survivors club. Cancer survivors. Well, when we all lost our hair and what we thought was our looks, Blake came back and made us all feel special. He promised after his mama died that he would still visit the rest of the survivors. He’s a good man, he is. My husband decided to leave me when I was going through treatments. Bastard! Well, anyway, Blake tried to make up for it. That’s why he calls me and all the women going through their treatments and recovery ‘the most beautiful woman in the world’ to make us all feel special. Boy that woman, Sarah! That’s his mama. She was a good woman with a good kid. God rest her soul.”
Jen let out a deep breath. “Oh, my God! What did I do? All this time…I thought…”
“Honey, you can’t judge till you know everything. Sometimes things are what they appear and sometimes they’re not. Besides, it’s not entirely your fault. Silly Blake is nothing but a typical man. He thinks women are mind readers. He feels that his reputation in the business jungle would be ruined if they ever find out he was a mama’s boy that delivers flowers every day to a bunch of cancer survivors. He’s a man that doesn’t always talk about the good he does. He wants the world to believe he’s a force not to be reckoned with. Anyway, he’s been talking about you nonstop. Just so you know.”
