Second Chance Love by Shawn Inmon Read Free Book Online Page B

your invitation. No need to send her any dresses. We’ll take care of everything. What time does she need to be ready on the 18 th ?”
    Steve looked from Gail's expectant gaze, to Elizabeth's deer-meets-headlights consternation, and back to Gail. “I’d like to pick her up around six. Cocktail hour will start around seven, but I’d rather skip that and go out to dinner first.”
    Elizabeth opened her mouth to begin an epic recitation of objections, but Hurricane Gail squelched them. She turned to face Elizabeth. “Honey, I have been watching you sitting in this shop doing nothing for ten years. You’ve got to get out and live while you can. Look at me. What’s the greatest excitement in my life? When the Bachelor hands out his final rose or when they announce the new Dancing with the Stars cast? Is that what you want?”
    Elizabeth stood silent for two seconds. He looks amused, darn him! And darn Gail for committing me to this . She took a deep breath and said, “Okay. I’ll go. But if you leave me alone with a bunch of social X-rays, I will kill you.”
    “Oh, Tom Wolfe reference. Bonus points! Great, I’m not getting back until the day before the Gala, so where do you want me to pick you up? At your place?”
    Elizabeth pictured herself getting dressed and ready in her small apartment with the tiny bathroom and her white Persian cat Sebastian jumping up on her every two minutes. "Pick me up here.” Gail nodded and smiled.
    “Okay, then. It’s all settled,” Steve said. A wistful look crossed his face. “I really will miss you, Lizzie. I hate having to leave so soon after finding you again. Can I have a cell phone delivered here to the shop for you, so I can call you?”
    Elizabeth shook her head, firmly, twice. “Out of the question. I won’t take expensive gifts from you, Steve. It’s not right. If it’s an emergency, you can call me here at the shop. Even if it’s after hours, there’s an answering machine.”
    Wow. Not far removed from smoke signals and semaphore. Come to think of it, I don't see any computers in here. “I might like to talk to you when it’s not an emergency," he said quietly. "I remember our three-hour phone calls and our parents pounding on our doors, telling us to hang up the phone.”
    Elizabeth softened, then recovered. “I know, and those were nice times. They’ll just have to wait for a while. We’ve got lots of time. Let’s not rush it.”
    “All right,” Steve sighed. “Well, I’ll miss my plane if I don't get going.” He wanted to lean in and give Elizabeth a goodbye kiss. Gail watched expectantly, as if watching a drama unfold from the studio audience seats on Dr. Phil . “Bye, Lizzie. I really will miss you.” He reached out and touched her hand briefly, then turned and left the shop.
    Gail cocked both eyebrows at Lizzie, glanced at the antique clock on the wall, then back. “It is 9:15. I have 45 minutes until I have to open the store. Now, spill.”
    “It’s not a big deal. Steve and I were best friends all through high school. His parents were rich, mine were poor. It didn’t matter, we did everything together. We both got accepted to the same school. We’d always been just friends, but eventually I realized that I felt more than that for him. Finally, halfway through our freshman year of college, I decided to tell him how I felt, but the night I was going to tell him, his father had a heart attack and died. His mother asked him to leave school and take over their family business. He left, and I never saw or talked to him again for twenty years, until two days ago.”
    She looked at the clock. 9:17. It took me less than two minutes to sum up the most important relationship of my whole life. I'm not sure what that says about me. What I am sure of is this: the clothes in my closet will not do to wear to this Winterland thing.
    She looked at Gail, who had started talking as soon as she had finished her story. Elizabeth tried to tune in mid-stream.