Just Friends by Delaney Diamond Page A

satisfaction. She
skipped back to the stove. “This is good practice, because I’m
serving it to my new guy friend for dinner on Friday night.”
    A piece of meat lodged in Trenton’s throat.
With difficulty, he swallowed it and then took a big gulp of
lemonade. He cleared his throat. “You’re cooking for him now?”
    She and the mystery man had only been going
out for a few weeks.
    Alannah piled dirty dishes into the sink. “I
like him,” she said. As if that made it okay.
    “You’re doing a lot for this guy and I
haven’t met him yet.” He tried to keep the edge out of his voice,
but this character was now encroaching onto sacred turf. She hardly
ever cooked for anyone else except Trenton, and when she did, it
was usually family or close girlfriends.
    “And you’re not going to meet him.”
    “Excuse me?” He must have misunderstood
her.
    “I said , you’re not going to meet
him.”
    “Why not?” Trenton demanded. He set down the
knife and fork.
    Alannah turned to face him and placed her
hands on the edge of the counter behind her. “I don’t mean you’ll
never ever meet him, but you won’t right now. I really like
this guy and you know how you get—all big brother-ish on me.”
    “Because I care about you. I have to weed out
the bad ones. Is that a crime?”
    “Trust me, he’s a good one.” A beatific smile
filled her face, and his heart sank with the force and velocity of
an anchor in the sea. Was she really that much into this guy?
    “If he’s a good one, let me meet him,” he
said.
    “ No . You’ll intimidate him. He already
knows we’re best friends, and he’s still interested. Most men can’t
handle when they find out I’m best friends with someone as stinking
rich as you are.”
    He gritted his teeth. “Whose fault is that? A
real man wouldn’t fall back because the woman he’s interested in
has a rich best friend.”
    She tilted her head at him. “You know good
and well that’s not true. You men have very fragile egos, and I
don’t want him to run off before we’ve even had a chance to really
get to know each other.”
    Having lost his appetite, Trenton tossed his
napkin onto the counter. “Do you know how ridiculous you sound?
It’s as if you’d rather find out later that he’s a jerk than
finding out now. That’s why I have to screen these guys. I’m a man
and I know what to look for.”
    She sighed dramatically. “You’re a man, and
you chase them off. Between your money and your good looks and the
fact that you can become very overbearing, it’s a wonder
I’ve been able to keep boyfriends over the years. And really,
they’ve only been the ones that you approved of. All the others
have run off.”
    “Because they’re scared punks,” he bit
out.
    “Because you scare them off,” she
corrected.
    Trenton tapped his forefinger on the top of
the bar. “At least tell me this Negro’s name.”
    Something flitted across her features that he
couldn’t decipher, and she bit the inside of her lip.
    “What’s that look?”
    “If I tell you his name you’ll end up doing a
background check, and I don’t want any negativity about him. I really like him, Trent.”
    “Again, you sound ridiculous. As if you’d
rather find out the bad things after you’ve already fallen
for him. Can you at least tell me his first name? That won’t hurt,
will it? That way I can stop calling him ‘that guy.’” All he needed
was a first name. He already knew the competition—er, rather, the
other guy—worked at her job. He could easily figure out the
rest.
    An odd expression came over face again, as if
she was hiding something. “His name is…Connor.”
    “Connor?” Trenton frowned. Then he guessed
why she’d reacted so oddly when he initially asked for a name.
“Wait a minute, is he black?”
    “There are black men named Connor,” she said.
Her eyes briefly darted away from his.
    “But is he black?” he pressed.
    “No, he’s white,” she said, and folded