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“I don’t want a pity loan, I want to earn it on my own,” she said fiercely.

Ryker scratched his chin with the back of his fingers. “Hmmm.”

“What does hmmmm, mean?” she demanded to know.

“Did she just offer you money, or did she talk to you about your plans?”

“Lark sent her my business plan a month ago. She said that her mom could probably have one of her people look it over and tweak it so it would look better for the bank. I was all over it.”

“Therefore she didn’t just offer you a loan, sight unseen. She’d seen your business plan. Did she have any suggestions?”

“Yeah, she said I needed to double my space, and suggested that I open between Columbia Heights and the Smithsonian.”

Ryker leaned into his computer screen. “Pretty fancy digs.”

“Right? I said that area has too much competition, but she said that’s where the high-end clientele goes, and that’s who I want to attract. She said with the type of chef I’m thinking about hiring, I have to go all-in. But with doubling the space and rent in that part of town, I’m talking five times the rent.”

Ryker whistled.

“It gets worse. She said I should buy the building. That way I would be able to have consistent cashflow coming in from the current shop owners.”

“Holy shit, Amy. No wonder you’re freaked.”

“I can’t do this. I’m not a grown-up. I’ve only been managing this restaurant for four and a half years,” she wailed. “How can Beatrice have this much faith in me? I’ll fuck it up, and screw up my friendship with Lark.”

“You’ve been best friends for how long? A decade?

“Almost. I met her when she was working the crime beat for the Washington Times. It was when I was working in the shittiest café in town, but she always tipped well, and I made sure to get her the best pieces of pie we had. She was too serious. I got her to go out and live a little.”

Ryker snorted. “I could see that. That’s why I’m telling you, there is nothing you can do that will screw up your friendship with Lark, and you would have to lose about a hundred million before Beatrice Allen would even notice it was gone.”

“She’s talking about putting up three million of her own money so that I can get the bank to loan the rest. It’s crazy. I’m too big a risk. She doesn’t know everything about me. I’m a bad bet.” Amy’s voice trailed off.

“Sweets, what are you talking about? I spent half the night with you when we first met, and we’ve talked for sixteen dates worth on the phone now. You’re a great bet. You’re so much smarter than me, it scares me. I always worry that you’re going to throw me over the side and put your hook back in the water.”

She didn’t reply. She didn’t say anything.

Ryker leaned in even closer, and it was as if the screen had frozen with a deer in the headlights look on her face.

Was what I said really that scary?

“Amy? Talk to me. Did the screen freeze?”

She slowly shook her head. “No, the screen didn’t freeze, I was just taking in what you said. It’s funny, Ryker, I’ve been thinking the same thing,” she whispered.

He laughed. “Haven’t you been listening to a thing I’ve been saying? You’re the whole package.”

“You’re confusing me with Lark.”

“Like hell I am,” Ryker disagreed vehemently. “Let’s get this straight. I see the two of you very clearly. Yeah, Lark has some awesome accomplishments under her belt. But I also know the mother she had and some of the advantages she had growing up, and something tells me you didn’t have that springboard.”

“Has Lark told you something?” she asked suspiciously.

“Absolutely not, and before you get your panties in a twist, neither has Kostya. I’m going off what I’ve observed. You put on a pretty good show, Sweetheart. Actually, it’s not pretty good, it’s a fucking amazing show. But I watched you when you thought no one was looking. I saw the vulnerability in your eyes, the way you bit your bottom lip and looked around, lost. It was like you were looking in those Christmas display windows at Macy’s, like you wanted in, but you didn’t know how to get in there.”

“You did not see that,” she protested weakly.

“Yeah, Sweetheart, I did. Are you going to say I read it wrong?”