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"Trying to decide what I want for dinner?" Ridge didn't sound certain. Probably because he could sense Everly had other plans for him.
"Why is David harassing me?" she asked.
"What kind of harassing? What did he do?"
Everly raised a hand. "Nothing terrible. He just won't leave me alone. He keeps popping up every few weeks trying to talk to me. We ran into him at Barn Sour tonight. Here in Blackwater!"
Ridge looked to Blake as if waiting for a cue.
"I handled it," Blake said, settling in at the bar to watch the show.
Everly was a force to be reckoned with when she was worked up. What did it say about him that he liked to see her speak her mind and stand up for what she wanted? Probably that he was head over heels in love with her and everything she did was worthy of a song or an ode or something equally poetic and classic.
Everly waved her hand in front of Ridge. "Earth to Ridge. I asked you a question."
"I don't know why he's a jerk. Probably a genetic thing, if I had my guess."
Everly crossed her arms over her chest.
"I told her there might be a connection between you two, but you'll have to give her the details," Blake said.
Ridge took a deep breath. "It's nothing. At least not anymore. We had talked about going in together to buy a hotel on the Gulf Coast." Ridge shrugged. "It fell through."
"It fell through because you backed out when I broke up with him?" Everly asked.
"Yeah. I think that's how I remember it," Ridge said.
Everly sighed. "This is ridiculous. Ridge, you can do whatever business dealings you want to do with whoever you want to do it with. I'm not going to stop you from doing things like that."
"I didn't want to do it to start with. I only agreed because I thought you'd be happy if I made an effort to like him," Ridge said.
Everly slapped her forehead with a hand. "For goodness sake. You don't have to do things like that. No one has to do anything like that for me. I would never want you to put up gobs of money for something you didn't want to do just because it might make me happy. I'd like to think I'm totally low maintenance. I like you already. No need to enter into secret mergers with the guy I'm dating."
Ridge looked at Blake. "Should we tell her about the private island?"
Undeterred, Everly continued. "Why didn't you tell me in the first place? Not that you have to tell me everything, but if this is big enough that David thinks that getting back together with me will make you change your mind, it must be pretty important."
"It's not important to me," Ridge said.
"But it's important to him. You know he has a one-track mind and doesn’t stop until he’s accomplished what he set out to do. Has he been harassing you too?"
"No. I blocked his calls a long time ago. He knows better than to mess with me. And now that I know he was bothering you, he'll get the message again."
"I think Blake got through to him tonight,” Everly said.
Ridge nodded at Blake. "Good. Are we done here? I'm hungry."
Everly sighed and leaned back against the counter. "Yes. We're done. Just please don't keep secrets from me when they might pop up while I'm out on a date."
Ridge looked from Blake to Everly. "On second thought. I think I'll go out to eat tonight. I don't feel like watching you two cuddle."
Blake stood and held out a hand to Ridge. "Thanks, man. Don't hurry back."
Ridge slapped the hand and grabbed his keys off the counter. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do."
"No promises!" Blake yelled as Ridge walked out the door. When he turned back to Everly, the sadness in her eyes had him aching to fix it.
“You okay?” he asked.
