Page 15 of Mr. Delicious
Chapter 5
Wren
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What was wrong with me?
I just put the plates in the refrigerator instead of in the sink. All day, I’d been doing crazy things like that. I would have loved to say it was down to exhaustion and my dire situation, but I knew it had everything to do with a certain man who’d been like a fantasy to me for well over two years.
Mr. Delicious.
With all that was going on, I was appalled at myself.
He had definitely provided a much-needed distraction though. I imagined him to be the kind of man to be able to sweep a girl off her feet with just one look, which was pretty much what he did to me. I still couldn’t get over our encounter.
Although nothing much was said, I couldn’t deny the unmistakable spark I felt when I spoke to him and how I’d acted like the shy schoolgirl I used to be back in high school.
I hadn’t been that nervous around anyone since then, but I had to admit it was perhaps called for. The man was just Hollywood gorgeous with the whole brooding and mysterious personality to go with it. He was exactly as I imagined him to be and I was totally stuck on the fact that we’d spoken after years of not speaking.
What he said about Billy burned vividly into my memory:
He didn’t deserve you.
Would it be weird to say I actually felt a hundred times better? The words had created a buzz of bliss around me that made me feel better than I had in years. And then there was the way he looked at me. He looked at me as if I hadn’t had dark circles under my eyes and as if my hair and I weren’t a mess.
He looked at me as if he found me attractive, and he made me feel exactly that.
I didn’t think I was a beast. Far from it. I knew I could carry my own in a room full of gorgeous women and be just as elegant as one of these high-class, well-taken-care-of women who passed through the coffeehouse.
But I was tired, exhausted more like. Drained out from all my problems, bills, and stress. Those things took their toll on a person and made one pay a little less attention to themselves. Things like deep conditioning and hair treatments were not on the list of priorities when you had to get from one month to the next on nothing.
Same with makeup, clothes, and shoes. All things I used to spend a ton of money on before I took out the loans for Billy. Nowadays it was bare minimum for me, as in literally bare minimum.
However, Mr. Delicious looked at me as if I’d just stepped out of a dream myself. The strength that fueled me from his look was just what I needed to get through the day. I didn’t even get upset when neither Jami nor Pricilla turned up for work, leaving me and Selene to run the place by ourselves.
His attention gave me a buzz.
That buzz continued for the next few days and was rekindled each day I saw him. The silly girly fantasy burned out by Thursday however, when I was so exhausted I slept in late again and missed the calls from Selene letting me know she had to go back to the clinic because her bra was too tight around her newly done boobs and one of her stitches had opened up. She left a voice message in the early hours of the morning.
Stella called me too and left a text. She said she was taking care of the place, but it was just her and Louis my chef.
It was twelve when I eventually dashed insideThe Spot, but what I saw made my mouth drop and I stopped in my tracks.
The place was busy as per usual but there were two waitresses I’d never seen before serving the customers.
But, that wasn’t what made me stop in my tracks.
What made me stop was looking at Mr Delicious behind the counter serving customers their coffee while Stella took payments.
I must have died right?
Because this couldn’t have been real.
My heaven must be this, where I got to keep my place going, and he was here working for me… or something.
When he lifted his head and saw me he smiled. It was a smile I wasn’t used to because I hadn’t dared look at him long enough to elicit such a smile.
I blinked several times, still in disbelief, but at least my brain was still functional.
