She had done a number of major repairs to the house she now considered home and was the proud owner of Amber’s Books and Gifts, which was located in the Florida Mall. Her shop sold books by and about people of African descent, various figurines, greeting cards and calendars, children’s books, games, black history literature, and Masonic, fraternity, and sorority paraphernalia, as well as a number of other gift ideas. Because the mall was usually busy on any day of the week, the shop reaped the benefits of its location, and with a small business loan through the city, she’d recently expanded and had decorated it just the way she wanted. She had discovered that she was a natural at dealing with the many customers who came through her doors, some to make a purchase and others just to browse and check out her vast inventory.
Her store hours mirrored those of the mall’s hours, which meant she opened at ten each morning and closed at ten each night. Those hours were no problem for her since she lived five miles from the mall. It also helped that she had two very dependable ladies who assisted her. They were older ladies, both in their sixties, who were retired librarians and loved books.
In a few weeks the store would be celebrating its second anniversary. Already she’d made plans to host a party. Nothing extravagant, but just a little something to let her customers know how much she appreciated their business. Her menu would be simple and several of the distributors she dealt with had agreed to provide free books as giveaways.
Amber glanced down at her watch. It was edging toward five o’clock and she needed to get home to shower and change. There was the monthly Savvy Sistahs Mean Business meeting tonight, as well as dinner afterward with Brandy and Carla.
She smiled when she thought of her friendship with Brandy and Carla. Someone once told her that Philadelphia was the City of Brotherly Love. If that was true then Orlando deserved an award for being the City of Sisterly Love. It had been totally refreshing at her first Savvy Sistahs meeting to become acquainted with Carla and Brandy, and to discover as their friendship progressed that they were women who enjoyed being single and weren’t hard-pressed to find a man. From the beginning, they had felt an intrinsic need to bond and it had been special to get validation and support from sistahs who’d had similar circumstances in their pasts. However, it hadn’t been until their dinner a few weeks ago that she had discovered what those circumstances had been and why her friends, like her, had been standoffish when it came to a brother. All three had had bad experiences with men, but instead of dwelling and wallowing in self-pity, they had found the inner strength and peace to put it behind them and move on. They enjoyed the growth of realizing that there was more to being a woman than getting wrapped up in a man.
She glanced over to where her staff members, Jennifer Claymore and Eileen Brogan, were standing, erecting a huge floor display of the latest romance novels that had arrived that week. She knew the two were die-hard romantics who usually tried to talk any customer who claimed not to read romance novels into trying one. They had even talked her into reading one, and she had to admit she’d rather enjoyed it, although while reading she kept thinking it was pure fantasy and that real life was totally different. But still, it had been a wonderful way to pass a few hours, to rest her mind and escape. She figured there was nothing wrong with wanting to believe that there was some handsome, drop-dead gorgeous man out there who could sweep a woman off her feet and who actually treated a woman like a queen.
“Don’t forget I’m leaving early tonight,” she called out to Jennifer and Eileen.
Eileen raised a brow. “Got a hot date?”
Amber smiled. At sixty-four the woman liked getting the scoop on Amber’s love life—or lack of it. At first it had irked her but now she simply ignored it. She knew Eileen meant well and managed to take both Eileen’s and Jennifer’s lectures to heart. They lived by the theory that when you were young you were supposed to enjoy life to the fullest, married or unmarried—but preferably married. It wasn’t until their age that you sat back and savored the memories or created some new ones.
Jennifer, at sixty, was a widow but had a constant companion by the name of Moses Lakestone and Eileen had been married for over forty years. Both women embraced life and looked upon Amber the same way they would their granddaughters.
But Amber felt that she knew more than anyone else what was best for her. Neither woman had been married to Gary Stuart, so they would never understand her reluctance to get involved with another man. Establishing a relationship took hard work and she didn’t have the time or the desire to do that.
“Sorry to disappoint you but there’s no date. My Savvy Sistahs meeting is tonight and later Carla, Brandy, and I are going to dinner and possibly take in a movie.”
“No men?”
Amber couldn’t stop the smile that began to play around her mouth. “No, there won’t be any men. The three of us have sworn off the opposite sex.”
“That doesn’t mean you’re all turning gay does it?” Eileen asked with concern etched on her face.
Amber couldn’t help but chuckle. “No, it means we’ve all been through hell with the male species and don’t need or want any more of the aggravation.”
“All men aren’t jerks, Amber. My Henry is wonderful,” Eileen said with a firm conviction in her voice.
“Then consider yourself blessed. And I don’t mean to sound like I’m grouping all men into the same category as my ex-husband, but at the moment I have a lot going on in my life and don’t have the time to devote to a relationship, or at least to making one work.”
“You would think differently if the right man came along,” Jennifer said with a twinkle in her eye.
Amber shrugged as she grabbed her purse from behind the counter. Maybe Carla and Brandy would feel that way but she wouldn’t. By staying away from men she was trying to prove a point to herself: that she was not the sex-crazed, hot-between-the-legs person Gary had accused her of being. She had been celibate for over two years and was damn proud of it. There was more to life than great sex. She had a thriving business, a neat house she enjoyed decorating, and according to her doctor she was now as healthy as an ox and had achieved the weight loss she needed to stay that way. As far as she was concerned, for the first time ever her life was in perfect order, and she didn’t need a man messing things up.
Chapter 4
I think I’m having a real moment here,” Amber said, smiling at Carla. “I like what you just said about inner joy and peace. Just this afternoon I was talking to Jennifer and Eileen, and they’re under the misconception that you need a man in your life to make you happy. But from the principle you’ve presented, a person is the source of their own fulfillment, right?”
Carla couldn’t help but grin. “It depends on what type of fulfillment you’re talking about. The only thing I’m saying is that no one, man or woman, should be dependent on anyone else to make them happy. They’re accountable for their own happiness and the less dependent on others you are, then the more free as a human being you’ll feel and become.”
Amber’s smile widened. “Hey, that’s deep.”
“Yeah, I thought so too while I was reading the book and I couldn’t wait to share it with the two of you.”
Carla then turned her attention to Brandy, who she noticed was still picking at her food. “You’ve been awfully quiet tonight. Is anything wrong?”
Brandy’s gaze darted from her plate to Carla, then to Amber. From the look on Amber’s face Brandy knew she’d been thinking the same thing, but Carla had asked first. She hadn’t added much to their discussion on emotional and spiritual fulfillment, and all through the Savvy Sistahs meeting she’d been unusually quiet. She was known to stir up conversation in a group discussion. But her mind was still on the note she had found in her office that afternoon.
She sighed, wondering if she should tell Carla and Amber, and knew she had to tell someone. Once they read the note maybe they could convince her there was nothing to be concerned about—it was just a prank.
&n
bsp; “Someone left a rose in my office today while I was out attending meetings. There was also a note.” The slight tremor in her voice got both women’s attention.
“What did the note say?” Carla asked softly.
Brandy reached into her purse and pulled it out. She handed it to Carla, who read it then passed it to Amber. Both women met her gaze and Brandy could tell they would not assure her that there was nothing to be concerned about.
“What did you do about this? Did you alert security? Did you call the police?” Amber’s outraged voice held anger as well as concern. Before she could respond Carla hit Brandy with another question, her eyes wide and dark.
“Do you have any idea who ‘The Man’ is?”
Brandy shook her head. “No, I didn’t alert security nor did I call the police, and I have no idea who ‘The Man’ is.”
“I can understand why you hesitated to call the police, but why didn’t you alert security?” Carla wanted to know. “This isn’t your typical secret-admirer letter. This note is downright threatening, and how did this person get into your office anyway?”
Brandy rubbed her temple. That was the same question she had asked herself several times over the course of the evening. The only answer she could come up with, since there hadn’t appeared to be any signs of forced entry, was that the person had a key to her office, which meant ‘The Man’ could be just about anyone. There were several people, including members of the maintenance crew and housekeeping, who had keys to her office.
“I think it’s someone who’s trying to scare me,” Brandy said, meeting Carla and Amber’s gazes. “And I hate to admit that it’s working.”
Carla frowned. “Why would anyone want to scare you? Who would benefit from doing such a thing?”
“Lorenzo for one. He came to the hotel two weeks ago asking that I sell it to him. I turned him down and told him not to come back. He left pretty upset.”
Amber nodded. “Do you think he would pull something like this?”
Brandy sighed. She wasn’t real sure of anything. “I don’t know, Amber. Right now I can’t think straight. That note has me off kilter.”
“You should have told your security guy. This is something you should take seriously, Brandy,” Carla said in a worried tone.
“And I agree,” Amber chimed in.
Brandy nodded, knowing they were both right. “I was hoping it was just a joke and this would be the end of it.”
“And if it’s not?” Carla asked seriously.
“Then I’ll talk with the man over security at the hotel.”
Amber took a sip of her wine. “If I were you I’d watch my back. Reading that note gave me the creeps.”
“Yeah, it gave me the creeps as well,” Carla added.
Brandy nodded again. It had given her more than the creeps—it had downright scared the hell out of her. The thought that there was some man who wanted her in a demented way was very unsettling. “Let’s not talk about it any more tonight.”
“But you will alert security if anything like this happens again?”
Brandy forced a smile to her lips. “Yes, I’ll alert them. I promise.”
The town known as “The World’s Best Playground” was certainly living up to its name tonight, Sonya Morrison thought as she glanced around the rowdy, crowded establishment. Sylvester’s was a well-known bar and grill that served high-class drinks, and usually when a woman came in alone it meant only one thing . . . that tonight she was ripe for the picking. Two men had already approached Sonya but she wasn’t a fool, and a quick look at their left hands had shown the indentation of where wedding rings were supposed to be. One thing she didn’t do was married men—no matter how hard up she was.
She inwardly fumed. Tonight was not going as she had planned. When she couldn’t get Carla to agree to go out with her she had decided to do a solo act. Damn, her mother was driving her bonkers. Even after a year Peggy Morrison could not believe that her husband of thirty years had left her for a much younger woman, promptly destroying her self-esteem and confidence and leaving her bitter, argumentative, mean, and hateful. And the sad thing was that Sonya had her own problems to deal with and was in no mood to deal with her mother’s.
She was catching hell at work with her new boss, who seemed to find fault in everything she did; the last couple of men she’d dated had turned out to be total assholes; and she was discovering she no longer had a best friend, at least not one she could count on in times of trouble. Everything had changed since Carla had taken over her family’s business. All her concentration was focused on being a good mommy and a good boss. Somewhere in the mix she had forgotten all about being a good friend.
Things had gotten worse when Carla became friends with Brandy Bennett and Amber Stuart. She wasn’t any fun like she used to be and was always talking about true peace, surrendering to life’s flow, your development as a human being and all that kind of crap. And to make matters worse, according to Carla the three of them had sworn off men, who they felt were the root of their problems. Hell, as far as Sonya was concerned the only thing Carla, Brandy, and Amber needed was to get laid.
She smiled wickedly. A night of good sex with the right man could clear your mind of just about anything. Who would want to stimulate their mind with words when they could stimulate their body with sexual gratification of the most provoking kind?
Sonya glanced down at her glass, wanting another drink. She’d had one too many and doubted that if she ordered another she would get it. Bars were getting downright paranoid about serving too many drinks to people who were driving, and she could tell from the look the bartender was giving her that he felt she’d had enough. Hell, he’d even offered to call her a cab. She frowned wondering what his problem was. He didn’t have to worry about her getting rowdy or boisterous or anything like that. She knew how to act decorously, dignified even while in a drunken stupor.
“Fancy seeing you here tonight, Miss Morrison.”
Sonya glanced up and gazed into the face of the tall man who stood over her with a beer bottle in his hand. She recognized him immediately and smiled flirtatiously. “I could say the same thing about you, Mr. Gregory.”
Of all people, the last one she wanted to see tonight was Dalton Gregory. He had been college friends with Carla’s brother Clark and had been brought into the family business even when Carla had been denied such a right. Everyone knew that Clark had been grooming Dalton to be the vice president of Osborne Computer Network, but upon Clark’s death, the stockholders had decided otherwise and voted for Carla to take over things. Dalton was a sore loser and to this day couldn’t stand the ground Carla walked on.
Dalton gave her a confident smile. He then glanced around the room. “And where’s your side-kick?”
Sonya’s smile widened and she decided to dig into him a little. “I guess you mean Carla, the woman who ended up getting the job you thought you had under lock and key?”
Dalton frowned. “Yeah, that’s the one,” he said, taking a sip of his beer.
Sonya’s smile was suddenly replaced with a frown. “Oh, she ditched me tonight to have dinner with her gay friends.”
Dalton lifted a brow, his curiosity piqued. “You don’t say.”
“Hell, yeah, I do say but forget about it. I was only joking.” Sonya turned back to her empty glass. “Get lost, Dalton, and go back to whatever rock you crawled from up under. I’m not in the mood.”
Dalton set his beer on the counter in front of him, then slid into the seat next to her. “Hey, a woman alone in Sylvester’s usually means they are in the mood. You’re smart enough to know that.”
She turned around on the stool and met his gaze head on. “You think so?”
“Yes, I know so. You’re a highly intelligent woman.”
Sonya’s lips tilted into a smile. “Hey, Dalton, you’re an all-right guy, up-front and straightforward. I like that. And at the moment I can’t rightly recall why I never liked you.”
Dalton leaned back ag
ainst the bar stool and met Sonya’s curious gaze. “Probably because your friend doesn’t like me.”
Sonya chuckled. “Oh, yeah, that’s right. Carla can’t stand you. She thought you were a total jerk and a bad influence on Clark. And because she didn’t like you, neither did I. But I’ve recently discovered that Carla doesn’t have a good sense of character when it comes to people, so I’d like to wipe the slate clean and form my own opinion about you.”
Dalton chuckled as he took another sip of his beer. “That sounds fair to me. How about if I order you another drink to celebrate our getting to know each other better?”
Sonya smiled. “Sounds like a workable plan, but Mr. Bartender won’t do it. He knows I’m driving and I’ve had one too many already.”
A smile tilted both corners of Dalton’s mouth. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll convince him that I’ll make sure you get home safely.”
Sonya gave him another flirtatious smile, leaned back in her seat and crossed her legs. “Yeah, you do that.”
Dalton Gregory smiled as he listened to Sonya chat endlessly away. Ply a woman with alcohol and she’ll have loose lips. And he had to admit they were a nice pair of loose lips. There had been something about her that had always turned him on, but because of her rather close relationship with Carla Osborne, she’d never given him the time of day. Now he wanted more than the time of day from her. He was filled with enough sexual intensity to want her night as well, especially this night. And he had a feeling they were on the same page. Her dark, sensuous eyes couldn’t hide what she was thinking. She was just as edgy, needy, and horny as he was. Hell, she couldn’t keep her legs still. He knew what she wanted and he was more than willing to oblige.
The Savvy Sistahs Page 5