“Cherise,” I say. “Are you all right?”
She sighs heavily and replies, “I will be once I get this wedding over with. It really brings out the ugly in people. He wouldn’t even take his portion of the invitations to mail out. He only has twenty guests.”
I look down and see a stack of card stock with engraved, metallic pink lettering. “He said the whole thing is tacky and feels like I’m showing off my fancy job by having the wedding here.”
“You should show off. This is your wedding day, and not to brag, but I happen to like our wedding space.”
A stone sinks to the bottom of my stomach when I hear myself say the words, “our wedding.” I know in this context that’s not even what I’m saying. But my stomach doesn’t know that. My stomach heard, “our wedding.”
Cherise heard it too and stares up at me with those big, searching eyes. “It is a beautiful space,” she says, biting her lip.
She shrugs and looks at the stack in her hand. “Henrietta’s printer did a phenomenal job with this rush order.”
I inquire when the invitations need to be sent out.
“By the end of the week.”
One week, Bishop. You have one week to convince her that mama’s boy Augie is not the man for her.
“May I say something as a friend and not your boss?”
She blows out a breath and lets her shoulders drop. “I do wish you would.”
There’s a line in the sand here, and now I’m stepping right on it. “A good man always sticks up for his woman. Even against his own mother.”
There she goes, biting that plump bottom lip again. How I wish I could catch it between my lips and kiss her so well she forgets all the negative people in her life.
Cherise replies, “That’s the ideal, isn’t it?”
I nod, but then I think some more about it, and I have to disagree. “No. It’s the bare minimum.”
“Bishop. All due respect but you barely know me. Have you ever been married? Been in a happy relationship?”
My arms cross in front of my chest. “That’s a story I’ll save for drinks one day,” I tell her. “But I will say this. That man is marrying you, and he needs to be your biggest cheerleader, not tear you down.”
I’m right on the precipice of telling her flat out that Augie is not suitable for her, that he’s not sticking up for her or cheering for her. But I’m careful to speak in generalities because she’s the one who needs to break up with him.
I should leave it there, but now I’m on a roll. She’s looking up at me with her wide-open gaze as if she wants me to say more. “And one other thing: A man doesn’t come to town to visit his long-distance fiancée only to leave her feeling down. A real man comes to town, hangs ‘do not disturb’ on his hotel room door, and loves his woman so damn thoroughly that when the goodbye comes, she’s climaxed so many times she barely has the strength to stand.”
Cherise’s cheeks blaze in embarrassment, and she gasps quietly. “Bishop!”
I keep going. “And if it were me saying goodbye to you for an entire month, I would kiss you so hard you’d be feeling it last week.”
Yeah. I say all that. Guess I’m not speaking in generalities anymore.
Her cute little pointed chin begins to tremble, and I feel like the world’s biggest asshole. She looks away, trying to hide from my gaze.
Without thinking it through, my hand goes to her shoulder.
“Aw, Cherise. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
I watch her take a deep breath, working hard to control her tears. One trickles down her cheek, and I offer her my pocket square.
Shaking her head, she looks at the silk square and says, “I don’t want to ruin it.”
She won’t take it, so I use it to dab the single tear, then the second, and then the third. Gently, my fingers never touching her cheek directly.
“You’re such a good person, Cherise,” I whisper. “I know you would never do anything to hurt anyone.”