I walked down the street to the florist. As I was looking in their cooler at the beautiful arrangement of flowers, a woman approached me.

“Hello, there. Is there something I can help you with?”

“I need to send some flowers to a woman I pissed off.”

“Ah. Apology flowers. I understand. We send a lot of those. I would suggest our apology bouquet, which consists of red and white roses arranged in a glass vase with greens and sprigs of baby’s breath.”

“Okay. That sounds nice. I’ll send one of those.”

“Very good. If you would follow me to the counter, I’ll get some information from you.”

When I approached the counter, the woman showed me the cards they had on display.

“Here are your choice of cards to send with the flowers and here’s a pen.” She smiled. “The name of the recipient is?” she asked.

“Lorelei Flynn,” I replied as I took one of the white cards from the display.

“Address, please.”

“Oh shit. I don’t know her address. Hold on a second.” I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone, dialing Garrett.

“Hey, what happened to you last night?” he answered.

“We’ll discuss that later. I don’t have time right now. I need Lorelei’s address. Do you have it?”

“It’s at the office and why do you need her address?”

“I just do. I can’t explain now. But I need to send her some flowers.”

“Jesus Christ, Jack. NO!” he yelled and the woman looked at me.

Then it hit me. Tony had driven her home so he would have her address.

“Just remembered something. I’ll call you back later.” Click.

I dialed Tony.

“Hello, Jack.”

“Tony, I need Lorelei’s address. You have it, right?”

“Yes. Hold on a second and I’ll get it for you.”

After a moment, he rattled off her address as I wrote it down on the white card. “Thank you.” Click.

I handed the woman the card and pulled another one from the display. She glared at me.

“What? You can charge me for that card.”

She typed the information into her computer and I handed her my credit card as I wrote an apology to Lorelei.

Lorelei,

I’m sorry for what I said. I hope you can forgive me. I don’t want things to be tense between us in the office on Monday.

Jack

“I need these delivered today and as soon as possible.”

“Very well, Mr. Sutton. I hope she accepts your apology.” She smirked.

“So do I.”

Chapter Nineteen

Lorelei

When I arrived home, the first thing on my mind was taking a hot, relaxing bath. My mom and Nick wouldn’t be bringing Hope home for a few more hours, so I had a little time to myself. Walking into the bathroom, I started the water and poured some vanilla-scented bubble bath under the stream. Twisting up my hair, I looked at myself in the mirror. Who did I see staring back at me? A stupid woman full of regret. Before climbing into the tub, my phone rang. It was Stella.

“Hello.”

“I’ve been waiting all morning with my phone glued to my hand for your call telling me all about last night.”

“I’m sorry. It’s been a crazy morning. I’m just getting into the tub. Come over. I need to talk to you.”

“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know. I slept with Jack.”

“Oh shit! I’m on my way!” Click.

I climbed into the bubbly water and sank down until it reached the top of my neck. It wasn’t too long before Stella came over, running into the bathroom, and out of breath.

“What did you do? Run here?” I asked.

“Pretty much,” she spoke breathlessly. Setting her purse down on the bathroom counter, she pulled up the stool I had in the bathroom and sat down next to the tub.

“Tell me everything. I want every last fucking juicy detail.”

I sighed. “One minute we were at the bar talking and the next we were in a private room kissing. Then we went back to his place and had some serious mind-blowing sex.”

“Eeek! How big was he? Was he really extra-large worthy?” She grinned.

“Yes. He is extremely blessed in the goods department. I was really nervous that it wasn’t going to fit.”

She waved her hand in front of her face. “Oh please. You popped out a kid. Speaking of which, did you tell him about Hope?”

“No. I couldn’t.”

There was a knock on the door and Stella looked at me. “Are you expecting anyone?”

“No. My mom won’t be bringing Hope home for a few more hours.”

“I’ll go see who it is, and then, when I get back, I want to hear more about this amazing night.”

She got up from the stool and left the bathroom. Grabbing the loofah from the shelf, I soaked it in the bubbly water and ran it across my arm.

“Look what you got!” She smiled as she walked into the bathroom holding a beautiful arrangement of red and white roses.

“Who are those from?”

“Hmm. I wonder.” She smiled. “Here’s the card.”

“You open it. My hands are wet.”

You’d think I had just given her a gift by her giddy reaction.

“Lorelei, I’m sorry for what I said. I hope you can forgive me. I don’t want things to be tense between us in the office on Monday. Jack. What the hell did he say? Oh my God, did you leave angry? Did you two have a fight? You just had sex. How could you have a fight?”

Taking in a deep breath, I told her to calm down.

“I told him about Brett and how I hadn’t had sex in seven years.”

“Oy. Why did you tell him about the not having sex part?” She looked at me as she crossed her eyes. She knew I hated when she did that.

“First of all, stop doing that, and second of all, I just told him. He proceeded to tell me how ridiculous that was. So I asked him if he’d ever been in love and he told me no. Which I’m not surprised because I don’t think the man is capable of love. He even admitted he was a little insensitive. I just told him that when he does fall in love with someone in his lifetime, to get back to me about how he would feel if something were to happen to that person. Then I left.”

“Damn. What an asshole. But he did send you flowers and apologized.” She scrunched her face.

“Only because he doesn’t want things to be tense at the office on Monday. He said so himself.”

“True. But he could have just sent you a text message saying that. He took the extra step and sent flowers, and you know his PA didn’t do it for him.” She smiled. “He did it himself.”

“Why are you defending him?”

“I’m not. He’s a total douchebag. You had sex. First time in seven years, may I add, and you said it was mind blowing. Take it for what it is and move on.”

“Easy for you to say. You don’t have to sit and look at him all day.”

Stella sighed.

“I’ll meet you out there in a minute. I’m going to get out of the tub before I turn into a prune. Can you pour us a glass of wine and get those flowers out of here?”

“Of course.” She placed her hand in the water and flicked a bubble at me.

****

Jack

She should have received the flowers by now. Why wasn’t she calling me? I threw my phone across my desk. It rang. I grabbed it. It was Garrett.

“What?” I answered.

“Were you expecting someone else?” he asked.

“Sorry, man. What’s up?”

“I’m on my way over to your place with a pizza. We’re going to sit down and talk about why you needed to send Lorelei flowers.”

“Garrett, now isn’t a good time.”

“Sorry. What did you say? I can’t hear you. Seems like we have a bad connection.” Click.

Shaking my head, I set my phone down and sank back into my chair. He was going to kill me. It wasn’t too long after he hung up on me that I heard the elevator doors open. I stepped into the foyer only to catch Garrett glaring at me as he took the pizza to the kitchen.

“I’m going to assume that the flowers you sent Lorelei were a nice gesture for a job well done.” He reached into the cupboard and pulled out two plates.