Close to You

that
bad?”
    “ Only like your puppy just
died.” Olivia grinned. “Come on. I know the perfect place. Bring a
scarf. I’ll wait for you outside.”
    Eve was bewildered about needing a
scarf until she saw Olivia sitting in her car, an old silver
convertible with its top down. The woman looked like a movie star
from the past with her scarf wrapped around her head and her
driving gloves.
    “ I feel so glamorous,” Eve
said as she climbed in.
    “ I love this car.”
Grinning, Olivia put it in gear and took off.
    She zoned out, focused on the way the
wind ruffled her hair, until she realized they were pulling into a
parking spot. “Rock star parking,” Olivia said, yanking the brake.
Grabbing her purse, she nodded to the right. “We’re going to
Nectar.”
    A wine bar, it looked romantically lit
and cozy inside. “I should warn you that I’m not the kind of girl
who puts out on the first date,” she said as she got out of the
car.
    Olivia laughed. “Say that after you’ve
had a few glasses of wine.”
    “ It’s a school
night.”
    “ Like that’s stopped us
before.” Olivia breezed by her and held the door open to
her.
    A tall sandy haired man looked up as
they walked in, a smile lighting his face when he saw Olivia. He
came out from behind the bar with his hands outstretched. “Olivia,
it’s good to see you.”
    Her friend lifted her cheeks to be
kissed. “You too, Chris. This is my friend Eve.”
    He turned his welcoming smile to her
and took her hand warmly in both his hands. “Have a seat and I’ll
bring you menus.”
    “ Better yet, just bring us
a couple glasses of something red.” Olivia glanced at Eve.
“Something weighty for serious discussion.”
    “ Got it.” He guided them to
two low chairs with a table between them and went to take care of
their order.
    Eve sank into her seat and sighed.
“You have no idea what today was like.”
    “ But you’re going to tell
me.”
    “ Treat is Margaret’s
son.”
    Olivia frowned as she removed her
scarf. “Did you know that?”
    “ No.” She gave her friend a
meaningful look. “And I didn’t find out until after I slept with
him.”
    “ Yikes.” Olivia
winced.
    They paused as the wine guy delivered
their glasses. Taking a moment to approve the wine, they sipped in
silence. Then Olivia leaned forward. “Okay, tell me how you found
out.”
    “ I went to confront
Margaret about the flood in my shop.”
    Olivia’s eyes widened.
“Seriously?”
    “ Well, yes. I wasn’t going
to let her keep sabotaging me.” She frowned. “When I got to her
store, Treat was there. I thought he was defending me but it turned
out she’s his mom.”
    Olivia stared at her for a long
moment, her crossed leg kicking in the air. Then she shook her
head. “You don’t know he wasn’t defending you.”
    “ He lied to me,” Eve said
resolutely.
    “ And that sucks, but if he
had malicious intent, he wouldn’t have been so helpful with
everything. Didn’t he offer to fix the flood damage for almost
nothing?”
    She sank back, pouting. “Probably out
of guilt.”
    “ I’m totally on your side,
and I agree that lying to you was not a good thing to do, but
there’s got to be more going on than there seems. He likes
you.”
    “ We don’t know that for a
fact.” But even as she said it, a niggle of doubt made her
pause.
    “ I’ve seen the way he looks
at you. We can safely call it a fact,” Olivia said with a lift of
her brow.
    “ How does he look at
me?”
    “ Like you’re a Nutella
latte and a chocolate croissant all in one.”
    She sighed. “That’s what I don’t get.
Then why would he lie to me?”
    “ If you’d known Margaret
was his mother would you have gone out with him?”
    She frowned.
    “ Exactly.” Olivia gazed at
her knowingly from over the rim of her wine glass. “I’m not saying
he didn’t do anything wrong, I’m just saying don’t dismiss him out
of hand. Finding someone who you click with, who you love, is such
a rare thing.”
    “ Are you speaking from
experience?”
    “ Yes.” She got a sad,
faraway look in her eyes for a moment before she snapped out of it.
She arched a brow at Eve. “Don’t think I didn’t notice how you
didn’t deny being in love with him.”
    “ I don’t know how I feel,”
she lied.
    Olivia looked disbelieving but didn’t
call her bluff. “Just think about it.”
    “ I don’t have time to think
about it. Daniela Rossi is coming to visit the store in a couple
days and I have a