Three Last First Dates

by Kate O'Keeffe

  I watched closely as she looked at Cassie, prompting her to speak. “Yes, absolutely,” she said, nodding her head with vigor.

  I let out a relieved breath. I knew they were both putting on a front and being positive about this man they only just met a matter of minutes ago. They needed time to get used to the idea of him and me. They had only just met Nash, after all. I was certain they would grow to like Eddie the more they got to know him.

  “Now, Eddie. Would you like a cup of coffee?” Bailey asked, standing up.

  “Sure, but I’ll go get it. There’s a barista over there.” He looked around the café. “This is a . . . how would you describe it? A ‘quaint’ place, I guess.”

  I cleared my throat. “Bailey owns this café.”

  “Really? Good for you,” Eddie said, smiling up at her.

  “Thanks.” I felt a twist of discomfort as I noticed Bailey’s perpetual smile drop a fraction.

  “I would like a black coffee, please. No sugar, extra strong.”

  “Coming right up. Cassie, I’ll leave the lovebirds to you.” Bailey returned to the counter, and Eddie and I were left at the table with Cassie.

  “Gosh, in all the excitement, I totally forgot to eat my cake!” she exclaimed, picking up her fork.

  “Bailey and Paige make the best cakes,” I explained to Eddie. “And we all have our favorites. Cassie’s is the flourless chocolate and raspberry cake, Paige’s is the carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, and mine is orange and almond syrup cake. See?” I pushed the plate with the slice of cake on it toward Eddie. “I’m not sure what Bailey’s favorite is. Do you know, Cassie?” I picked up my fork and sunk it into the moist cake.

  Her mouth full of chocolate cake, Cassie shook her head. “Uh-ah.”

  “I must ask her.” I slipped the cake into my mouth and immediately cut off another piece. “Mm, so good. Here.” I offered my fork to Eddie who took it from me and slipped it into his mouth.

  “Wow, yes. That is delicious.”

  “Right?” I grinned at him, happy I could share my love of Cozy Cottage cakes with him.

  “I can see one change in you,” Eddie said with a smile.

  “What’s that?” I took another mouthful of cake.

  “You’re not as concerned with watching your weight as you once were.”

  The cake in my mouth turned to sawdust. I stole a glance at Cassie. Her eyebrows were raised, and she was looking at Eddie, blinking.

  With effort, I swallowed my mouthful and smiled. “Eddie knew me when I was always dieting, you see. I’ve never told you this, but . . . I had a bit of a weight problem when I was a teenager.”

  “Oh, I see.” Cassie nodded at me. “Well, you don’t now. She looks amazing, don’t you think?” she asked Eddie.

  “Oh, yes. Beautiful.”

  I beamed at him. Okay, so he may have made the kind of comment no woman wanted to hear, but he had made up for it. Plus, in his defense, I was always dieting back then, before I knew how important exercise and eating a balanced diet was.

  I slid my fork into the cake once more to take another bite. As I raised it to my mouth, I felt Eddie’s hand on mine. I looked over at him in surprise. He shook his head, almost imperceptibly. I returned the fork to the plate.

  He was right. What was his saying back then? “A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips.” Yeah, I remembered that. Not that I’d had a weight issue for many years. I may not be a supermodel, but I was slim enough, and I enjoyed my food. I could forgo the cake, if it brought up some negative feelings for Eddie. It was no big deal.

  I smiled again at Cassie, who looked down and started shoveling her cake into her mouth as though this were her last meal on planet Earth.

  “Here you go. One coffee, on the house.” Bailey placed a cup of black coffee on the table in front of Eddie.

  “Thank you so much, that’s kind of you,” he said, shooting her his dazzling smile.

  If Eddie were to have a Hollywood doppelgänger, it would have to be James Marsden, for his smile alone.

  Huh. I had never given Eddie a movie star look-alike. I wondered why.

  He picked up his coffee cup and took a sip. “That hits the spot. Now, Cassie, tell me about yourself. How do you know Marissa?”

  “We work together,” she replied, dabbing her face with a napkin, her chocolate and raspberry cake devoured.

  “Cassie’s my boss, the best I’ve ever had,” I explained.

  “Thanks,” she replied, collecting her purse. “Look, I’ve got to run. I’ve got that . . . appointment. Eddie, it was great to meet you.” She smiled at him, stood up, and offered him her hand.

  “You, too,” he replied, standing up as the gentleman I remembered him to be.

  “See you back in the office,” Cassie said to me as she beat a hasty retreat.

  Eddie and I sat back down, and he slipped his hand into mine once more. “That went well,” he commented. “They seem really nice.”

  “Yes, yes, they are.” I bit my lip. I knew Cassie, and despite what Eddie thought, that did not go well.

  Well, that’s just too bad for her. She would have to suck it up. Eddie was here to stay, and I was completely ecstatic about it.

  Chapter 18

  When I got back to work after my coffee date with Eddie, I saw a note on my desk. It was from Cassie, asking me to come to her office as soon as I could.

  I slipped my purse strap off and walked across the sales floor toward Cassie’s office. I noticed a number of people were watching me, so I smiled at them as I strode by.

  I knew exactly what Cassie was going to say. She would tell me she didn’t like the way Eddie had told me not to eat cake and that she preferred Nash over him.

  I locked my jaw, ready for the onslaught.

  “I know what you’re going to say,” I began as I walked into her office.

  “I don’t think you do.” She got up from behind her desk and walked over to me, closing the door. “Take a seat.”

  I sat down on one of her leather chairs and crossed my legs. “Eddie’s a great guy. Please, give him a chance.”

  “This isn’t about Eddie, although I can’t say I exactly warmed to him.”

  Tell me something I didn’t already know. “What’s it about then?”

  She let out a puff of air. “Antoinette.”

  I nodded, awaiting further information.

  “She’s laid a formal complaint against you.”

  “What?!” I levitated off my seat. A formal complaint? This was insanity! “When? Why?”

  “Try and calm down, okay?” Cassie said.

  “Calm down? Antoinette of the Amish has laid a formal complaint against me and you want me to calm down?”

  “I know. It’s crazy, but it’s true. I just got off the phone with Laura Carmichael,” Cassie said, naming Antoinette’s aunt, the reason why Antoinette got the job at AGD in the first place. “Laura said Antoinette came to her with it. She totally bypassed me.”

  I sat back in my seat and crossed my arms. I racked my brain for any clue as to what Antoinette could possibly have to complain about me. I came up with nothing. Tapping my foot on the floor, I said, “Tell me what it’s about.”

  Cassie let out a puff of air. “She’s accused you of bullying in the workplace.”

  My jaw dropped open as I gawped at her. “I haven’t bullied her!”

  “She said you told her she dressed and acted unprofessionally in the office and said she would fail as an Account Manager if she didn’t change.”

  “What? No, I didn’t.” My mind began to race. “Although, she did start to wear those sack dresses like she was in a Laura Ingalls Wilder novel after she asked me whether she dressed appropriately for the office.” I let out a bitter laugh. “Well, except for a bonnet.”

  Cassie sucked in air. “What exactly did you say to her?”

  “I don’t remember my precise words. All I said was that she might like to dial back on the obvious sex appeal a little.”
r />   Cassie pulled a face and shook her head. “That’s not good, Marissa.”

  “Oh, come on!” I leaped out of my chair. “She looked like she was an extra on the set of Baywatch, for goodness’ sakes. You saw her! It was hardly professional with the big hair and the boobs on display.” I gestured at my own modest chest.

  “I did, but I didn’t say anything to her.”

  I began to pace the room. “Look, I only mentioned it because she asked for my help.”

  How could Antoinette do this to me? I had taken her under my wing, shown her how to do her job, given her useful advice on a whole host of things—advice I would have liked when I first started out.

  “Antoinette was the one who decided to take it to the limit. I never suggested she dress like that.”

  “I get it, and I’m talking to you as your friend here. But, there’s something else.”

  I slumped down in my chair. “What is it?”

  “She said you told her not to ‘sexualize’ herself in the office.”

  “Come again?”

  “It’s the term her lawyer’s used.”

  My eyes nearly popped out of my head. “Her lawyer?” I buried my head in my hands. “Oh, god.”

  “Try to remember what you said to her,” Cassie said gently.

  I looked up at her from my bent-over position. I let out a heavy sigh. “I don’t know. Something about not trying to get everyone’s attention.”

  Cassie’s hand darted to her face. She covered her mouth and shook her head. “Oh, no.”

  “I’m a straight shooter, you know what I’m like.” I chewed the inside of my lip. “What’s going to happen to me?” To my utter mortification, tears stung my eyes. I never cried at work.

  I was one of those consummate professionals: I was there to do a job and do it well. Emotions didn’t come into it. But right then, I felt like running to the ladies’ for a decent sob fest.

  Cassie shook her head again. “I don’t know. Laura has asked me to meet with her later. I’ll know more then, even though Antoinette could have come to me with this and we could have sorted it out between ourselves without having to involve the exec team. I am her boss, after all.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Why do you think she went one step up the organization, to Laura?” My mind whirring, I narrowed my eyes. “What’s she playing at?” I drummed my fingers against my chin.

  “I don’t know. She probably only went to Laura with this because she’s her aunt.”

  “Maybe.” Something didn’t fit. If she were genuinely upset with what I had said to her, wouldn’t she have talked to her boss about it? “Where is Antoinette, anyway? I haven’t seen her in the office.”

  “She’s . . . err . . .”

  “Why don’t you want to tell me?”

  “She’s taken stress leave.”

  I let out a sardonic laugh. “Stress leave? Are you serious?” I blinked, running my hands through my hair. All I could hear was the sound of my own breathing as the room began to tilt.

  “Marissa!” The next thing I knew, Cassie was crouching down next to me, her hand on my back. “You’ve gone all pale. Put your head between your knees and breathe.”

  As if on automatic pilot, I did as instructed. After a few breaths, I began to regain my composure. Embarrassed, I smiled weakly at Cassie. “Thanks. Sorry about that. I don’t know what came over me.”

  “You had a shock. Take a moment.”

  “Nothing like this has ever happened to me before.” I had always been professional at work, always giving it my all. I took my job seriously, and I enjoyed it. I looked at Cassie. “What should I do?”

  “I suggest you lay low, get on with your job, and wait. Once I’ve seen Laura, I’ll have a clearer idea of what we’re dealing with here.”

  “And what Antoinette really wants.”

  “Maybe? It’s still too unclear.”

  I nodded, swallowing back those pesky tears. “Thanks.”

  “Hey, I’ve got your back one hundred percent.”

  I smiled weakly at her. For a moment there, I thought I had it all. Now, with my career hanging in the balance, I needed my friends—and Eddie—more than ever.

  * * *

  I bumbled through the rest of the work day, trying hard not to let Antoinette’s complaint get to me. There was a process for these sorts of things, and Cassie would help me as much as she could. I would pull through it, and everyone would be able to see Antoinette was an attention-seeking piece of work who took a well-intentioned comment out of context.

  Sitting across from Eddie at the Thai Elephant, my favorite local Thai restaurant, I let out a heavy sigh. “I don’t get why she’s doing this to me.”

  “It’s because she sees you as a threat,” he replied matter-of-factly.

  “Why?”

  “She’s being an alpha female. She’s marking her territory, and you are in her way.”

  I pictured Antoinette urinating in spots around the office, marking out her territory. I would have laughed if I hadn’t been so depressed. “Is alpha female a thing?” I thought back to high school science. I didn’t recall any reference to alpha females, although there were definitely a whole lot of alpha males, causing loads of trouble.

  “Diva, then. Let’s call her a diva. She wants to get rid of you so she can rule the roost.”

  Unconvinced, I mumbled, “I guess.”

  “Trust me. I know about these things.”

  The waiter delivered our meals. Eddie had ordered my favorite green chicken curry, whereas, after the whole cake thing this morning, I had gone for a small prawn salad. Eddie’s smelled amazing, and I ended up wolfing my meal down in record time, still hungry for more.

  At the end of the meal, Eddie paid and we walked the short distance through the city streets to my apartment, arm in arm. It felt so good to be back together with him, and it was proving to be everything I had ever dreamed it would be.

  “Hey, I’m going to a swap meet on Saturday. I’m hoping you’ll come with me,” Eddie said.

  “What sort of swap meet?”

  “Motorcycle, of course,” he replied as though there could be no other sort and I had, quite possibly, lost my mind.

  I smiled at him, shaking my head. Eddie had always loved motorcycles, and I had to say, it was one of the things I had first noticed about him. He would turn up at campus on his bike, looking super hot and sexy in his beaten up, old brown leather jacket and black helmet. He would slink off his bike, looking all studly and cool, and then, he’d slip his helmet off and ruffle his dark hair with his fingers. It never failed to make me sigh. In fact, half my class were in deep lust with him, and I suspected it was mainly due to his bike. There was simply something about a hot guy on a motorbike I found hard to resist.

  “Of course. Yes, I’d love to go to a motorcycle swap meet with you.”

  Although going to a swap meet with a bunch of motorcycle enthusiasts had limited appeal, bikes were a part of who Eddie was. He was passionate about them, so I needed to at least show an interest. It was a small price to pay to be with the man of my dreams.

  My mind betrayed me, darting to Nash and his passion for dogs. I blinked thoughts of him away. I was with Eddie now. I needed to forget Nash.

  Eddie smiled back at me. “Great. It’ll be just like old times.”

  I threw my head back and laughed. “As long as I don’t have to sit on the side of the road while you tinker with your bike like I did back then.” I had spent many a weekend, dressed up to go out to some party or dinner, waiting for Eddie to finish doing whatever it was he was doing to his bike. I can’t say it was my favorite memory of our time together.

  “I thought you loved that,” he replied, looking wounded. “It was special you and me time, wasn’t it?”

  “Of course, it was. I was only kidding,” I replied hastily, not wanting him to think otherwise. So what if I didn’t have fond memories of being late for parties because I had spent two hours waiting for him to work on his bik
e? It was no big deal then, and it would be no big deal now. “It will be like old times. Just like old times.”

  He stopped and looked at me. His eyes sparkled. “God, I love you, Marissa.”

  My belly did a flip as my heart rate picked up. “You love me?” I asked, breathless, barely believing his words.

  “Yes, silly. What did you think?” He touched his fingers to my cheek. “We’re back together and this is it for me. You are it for me. I want to be your forever.”

  I could have exploded with happiness. I hurled myself at him, collecting him in a hug and peppering him with kisses. “Oh, Eddie! I love you, too. I always, always have.”

  And I knew it was the truth. Even when Eddie had left me, leaving my heart in tatters, I had never stopped loving him. And now he was back, it was going to work—it had to work.

  If he wanted me to be his forever, I wanted him to be mine.

  Only, I didn’t feel quite as happy, quite as euphoric, as I thought I would on hearing him say those three little words. This was what I had wanted for so long: perhaps finally getting it, making it real, somehow diminished it?

  You’re being ridiculous, Marissa.

  I pushed any doubts I had from my mind. I needed to concentrate on being with Eddie, the man I loved.

  Second-guessing anything would do nothing but cause trouble.

  Chapter 19

  At work the following day, I took the flight of stairs up to meet with Laura Carmichael, as nervous as a bride on her wedding day. Only this wasn’t a good nerves situation. Oh, no. Quite the opposite. I was on my way to meet with my boss’s boss, Human Resources, and that conniving backstabber, Antoinette, to learn my fate. Whoever Antoinette’s lawyer was hadn’t seen fit to attend. That at least was a small mercy. Not that it made me feel a whole lot better about it all.

  Cassie hadn’t been able to tell me anything more about the complaint, and I hadn’t seen Antoinette in the office since Cassie dropped the bombshell about what she had done.