What You Do To Me (Unexpected Love) (21 page)

             
“
Yep,
”
I
answer
ed
the phone
as usual
.

             
“I guess this will have to do, but I would rather be looking at your face while talking to you.”

             
“Sorry, take
it
or leave it, either way I
don’t care,” knowing I really did
care.
I had
him on the phone and
I knew I didn
’t want to get off. “So, how was the
show?
Did
you make all the girls swoon?”

             
“I think it went good, but there is only one girl I want to make
swoon.
Actually,
I want to make her do a few other
things
too.
”
I could hear
the smile i
n his voice as he
said it
.

             
“She must be one lucky girl,”
I tried
to mask the
happiness I was feeling
.

             
“Actually,
I’m
the lucky
one.
It
took everything I ha
d to get her to even talk to me
, but it was worth every second of effort.”

             
“Wow,
she must be a real
bitch.
”
That time,
I
had
to laugh.

             
“Hardly, but I love the tough exterior she tries to display,
it’s kind of a turn
on.
”
At
that
moment,
I was
feeling sli
ghtly turned on and
wished
he
were
t
here
in bed
with me.

             
Alex asked
me about dinner with the girls and I ask
ed
about the show. He told me how the guys were pissed about him missing a PR thing, which I knew about from Sam, but after talking to
Steve,
he was no longer mad at Alex for the absence. We talked for
a little over an
hour until I was starting to fall asleep. Alex told me to get some sleep and he would call me in the morning. After I hung
up,
I heard my phone
buzz.  Looking
at the
screen, I
saw
I had
a text from Alex.

             
Since I wasn’t allowed to say it, you have no idea what you’re doing to
me,
knowing you are wearing my shirt to bed.

             
I immediately smile
d
and then
I heard
another buzz.

             
I’m actually jealous of a fucking shirt, night,
XXX
.

             
He was making it impossible to go to bed.

             
I wo
ke the next morning to Josie and Jasmine cr
awling into bed with
me;
one of the things
about lazy summer mornings that I
loved
. The rush to get everyone up and
ready,
hoping to make it to school without a meltdown and on
time,
wa
s far from the peaceful days of the next three months. After talking, tickling and
laughing,
we head
ed downstairs for breakfast. I mad
e my coffee and start
ed
to
come alive. The girls and I ate and I knew I had to make the call to Derek. I was
not looking forward to
the
call,
because
in a
way,
I
didn’t
feel I was wrong, but I knew where
his
concern wa
s coming from. As much as the girls
were
mine,
Derek and Lexi play
ed
a huge
roll
in their lives too.

             
Taking my coffee and phone, I walk
ed
outside to sit on the back porch. I hear
d the ringing and
hoped
he wa
s in the shower getting ready for
work.
That
way,
I could
call back later.

             
“Good morning,” Crap, he wa
sn’t in a meeting.

             
Pausing for a moment, “
I called to say I’m
sorry, but I’m not.”

             
“That’s a pretty shitty
apology.
I hope you didn’t spend a lot of time working on that.”

             
“Shut up, you know you deserved part of my anger. If you want to warn
me,
fine, but do you truly think I would do anything to damage the girls?”

             
“I know, I was wrong and I felt really bad about what I said, I couldn’t sleep last night and I wanted to call
to
apologize, but I knew
if I
did,
we both would say more things we would regret today
.” Derek
and I
were
alike in
that way.
When
we
were
mad, we both
had
tongues with razors. We
could
say mean and cruel things that
could
cut someone deep, but after thinking things
over,
we
felt
awful about what
came
out
in
the heat of the moment. “
Look,
Abbs, I will leave this
alone.
This
is the las
t time I’ll say anything on the
top
ic
of you and Alex, so
just let me say it.” He
paused, as if
waiting
for
the go ahead from me.

             
“Fine, speak your peace, but
remember,
you said you’ll leave it alone after this.”

             
“Abby, if you
had
seen yourself through my eyes after everything with
David,
you would know why I’m so concerned.”

             
“Derek, Alex is not
David,
and Alex and I are not in a rela
tionship. It’s hard to be in
a
relationship
with someone you just met days ago and
is traveling the
country,
” I
said,
hoping he would
save his breath.

             
“I hear what you are saying, but I know what I saw with you two. That is
wh
y
I want you to hear
this
.” I could hear his voice starting to rise
a little,
just as
I
did
when wanting my kids in class to
listen,
because what I
was
teaching
was
importa
nt to learn. “
Abbs,
you are finally
happy, for the first time in a long
time.
Christ, the first time since I’ve been friends with you.
I don’t want him to crush you. 
So, just guard yourself. I’ve said all that I am going to say on this,
but
just remember, I am always here for you.”

             
“I know you
are,
and that is why I always forgive you for b
eing such a dick.” I could
hear him laugh on the other end of the line. “So, about my
surpris
e
.
If
you tell me, I can forgive you for being such an ass lately.”
Now,
Derek was
really laughing.

             
“That isn’t going to happen, so I’ll continue to be an ass.” He m
anaged
to get that out through the laugh. “Hey, how do you feel about me coming for a visit in a few weeks? I haven’t seen the girls in almost two months and I thought we could do the annual trip to the waterfalls and pic
nic. Plus, I love being up in your
Podunk
town
for the Fourth of July.”

             
“The girls woul
d love it and so would I.” I could
feel
the
excitement in my voice.

             
“Hey, I have to
go.
I’ll call the girls
tomorrow.
Tell
them I love them and
bye,
Abbs, love ya.”

             
“I will and
I love you too.” Derek and I hu
ng up
the phone. I felt better about where we were now and I
wondered
if Derek would
be able to keep his word about not saying anything more abo
ut Alex.
I was
pretty sure he
would,
since he wa
s the only man I
had
ever met besides my dad who had
never let me down yet.

             
Lily walked on
to the back porch
, bringing me out of my thoughts
. “
Mommy, there’s
someone at the front door?”

             
“Did you open it
to
see who it is?” I ask
ed
her,
wondering who wa
s at my door at nine o’clock on a Monday morning.

             
“No, you said I was never allowed to open the door unless you said I could.”

             
“Smart girl” I replied. Lily followed
me back through the house to the front door. I open
ed it and saw
Rita, the owner of the only flower shop in town. “Rita, how are you this morning?”

             
“I’m doing good
,
Abby.
I have a special delivery f
or you this morning.” Rita handed
me a vase filled with red roses, and another filled with white lilies. “Wait there are more, I had a call from a very
persistent
man who wanted to send you your favorite flowers, but didn’t know what you liked.
I had to have them here right at nine this morning too.
” She opened the back of the van and grabbed a large box with four vases filled with flowers. One vase had
Gerbera
daisies, the second with different colored
tulips;
the third was an arrangement of wild flowers and the last was filled with my favorite
purple
hydrangeas.

             
“Please tell me that there
aren’t any more
flowers,
” I said
to
Rita,
handing one of the vases to Lily and
putting
the other on the
entryway
table so I could grab the box from Rita.

             
“For now, I told him this is all I could do
for this
morning.
My
flower truck isn’t in until ten today.”

             
“
What? There
are more flowers coming?”

             
“Probably, but not tod
ay, I talked him in to just these
. Who would
have
ever th
ought
I would talk someone out of ordering flowers, but considering he called me at home and I had to come in so early, I had too. I hope you like
them,
Abby, I’ll see you
around.
I have to meet the flower truck at the shop.”