Jack. The man who had taken her from a brilliant, confident, controlled woman to a love sick, low self-esteem, uncontrollable girl at the first glance from his blue eyes. Together they had ruined relationships, friendships, and families with their heated desire and relentless passion. She never thought the day would come where she dreaded the sight of her former lover, but he had forced it upon her by sleeping with her only hours before proposing to his girlfriend, now fiancé.
The familiar lyrics began playing again, and this time Lexi could pinpoint the location of her purse amongst his impeccably clean décor. She sighed heavily wishing the noise would stop allowing her the peace she so desired.
"Perhaps you should attend to that," he muttered into her ear, "while I go fix you some breakfast."
Lexi groaned as he shifted next to her hauling his tight ass across the bed and over to the enormous closet stocked with expensive suits. He threw on a pair of black boxer-briefs and took the stairs two at a time down to the landing. He returned a second later with her designer purse and placed it gently on the bed. She smiled up in his angular face and was rewarded with a kiss on the lips full of promises.
"Answer that," he commanded pointing at the phone that was still lit up from the previous phone call. "Come down when you're finished."
She watched his backside retreat down the stairs and out of sight before picking up her purse and fishing out her new cell phone. Up until a couple months ago, she had had the same old, dinged-up, flip phone since college. The thing had lasted nearly seven years much longer than modern technology afforded. They had had their rough spots along the way when she had lost all the numbers after dropping it in the toilet once, but it had been good to her nonetheless. Chyna, her best friend, had finally convinced her to get something a bit flashier. The day Lexi had been on the way to the store, Chyna had surprised her with the phone claiming it was a graduation present since Lexi absolutely abhorred the thought of mooching off of her best friend's exorbitant wealth.
Her new touch screen came to life at the tips of her fingers and she grumbled at the early hour. Her night had been pretty insane, and the only way she compensated was by sleeping through much of the day. The last thing Lexi wanted to do was be awake at that moment. She groggily clicked on the message that claimed she had two missed calls.
Lexi cursed under her breath as the name filled the screen: Ramsey Bridges.
She could think of a million and a half reasons for him to be calling her. None of which she wanted to deal with at this moment in time. The only good thing about him calling was that it wasn't Jack.
Lexi threw her head back roughly against the incredibly soft down pillow and bit the inside of her lip to keep from cursing aloud. Just as she was about to swing her legs over the side of the bed and trek downstairs, the phone lit up one more time. This time it was a text message and a preprogrammed ding filled the empty bedroom.
Reluctantly, Lexi clicked on the message and read it to herself. "Sorry it's early and for everything else. Call me. Please. Miss you."
Lexi banged her head back and against the pillow case several more times in frustration. This could not be happening to her right now. She knew that she should wait to make the phone call. She had an incredibly attractive male making her breakfast downstairs and the last person, well second to last person if you counted Jack, she needed to talk to in that moment was Ramsey. But she couldn't just ignore him. Something was up or else he wouldn't be calling her. She couldn't just leave him hanging like that and despite her better judgment, she phoned him.
"Lexi," he breathed into the other line.
His voice sent chills up her spine and the intense way he said her name only made it worse…or better depending on how you looked at it. A wave of peppermint seemed to overtake her at the sound of her voice. She couldn't believe that the taste of him could be so alive in her mind when he was thousands of miles away in Atlanta. She shook her head from her imagination and answered him, "That's right."
"Hey," he muttered surprisingly at a loss of words.
"Hey," she said back.
"Uh, how have you been?" he asked obviously fishing for information.
"I've been great Ramsey. Did you need something?" she asked cutting the conversation as short as she could.
"Yeah, we have a lot to talk about."
Lexi shook her head. No. She could not do this right now. "I don't think we do."
"Come on. You know we do," he told her.
"Well now isn't a great time," she said glancing around the loft.
"Oh, yeah, it's early. Sorry about that," he said. She could almost feel him scratching him head at that statement.
"It's fine. Did you need something or were you just calling this early to chat?" she asked being as rude as she ever had been with Ramsey. Depending on the day he could bring that side out of her better than anyone else she had ever met.
"No I have something to ask you," he stated hesitantly.
"Ok," she said curiously. She knew that it would be better if she got off the line with him. She was at some other man's house, and it was too early in the morning for this kind of conversation. The last thing she wanted to do was be reminded of her past right now.
"Look I don't really know how to ask this of you so I guess I'll just spit it out. Will you go to my sister's wedding with me?" Ramsey asked in a rush.
Lexi sat there in silence unable to believe what she had just heard. She couldn't honestly believe that Ramsey would be asking her to go to the wedding. She had been doing everything she could not to have any knowledge of the wedding at all. She didn't know any of the specifics regarding the happenings, and it hadn't exactly been easy to keep her head down and out of the news. She hadn't received an invitation, which hadn't surprised her all that much. On one level, she had been surprised Bekah's vindictive side hadn't surfaced and invited her out of her spite. Another part of her was even more surprised that Jack hadn't been begging her to come back again. After all, another year had rolled around, and it was about time for him to try to ruin her life.
She hated having to think about Jack that way. Even though she had let him go back in the Atlanta airport, she couldn't help but reminisce back to the good times of their so-called relationship. Apparently, he hadn't been thinking about that or else her comments when leaving him behind had struck home.
Either way, she hadn't received the invitation to which she had been silently praying against. Thus, she had no idea of the date, time, or place of the wedding. She told herself this was more for her sanity's sake, but she wasn't sure if that was the only reason. She didn't trust herself enough to not to go, and she knew that she would only make a fool of herself if she made the mistake of attending.
That brought her back to reality. Ramsey had just asked her to attend the wedding she had been pointedly avoiding at all costs for the past year. He wanted her to go with him to see Jack and Bekah say their vows and become legally tied to each other. He wanted her to go to a wedding that he didn't even want to attend.
There was only one explanation. Ramsey had lost his mind. There was no other way to describe it. He must think she was completely crazy or possibly even a different person to suggest this course of action to her. He had to know, if anyone knew, that there was no way she was going to be in attendance.