"Mrs. Harrison, please give me one more chance to prove that I can....wait, what was that?" I backtracked hastily, sure that I had heard the old landlady wrong.
Was she going senile in her age?
"Your lease has been paid off." She replied, "I assumed that you were aware that your lawyer called."
"My...lawyer?" I said uncertainly. I didn't have a lawyer. If I couldn't afford a real bed, I certainly couldn't afford legal aid.
"Yes." Mrs. Harrison said simply, and I could tell that she was quite ready to get off the phone with me. She clearly thought I was insane, and in this moment, I was sure that may very well be true.
How had my lease been paid? Just what was going on here?
"Do I have a guardian angel?" I murmured aloud, more to myself than to the woman on the other end of the phone line.
"A very wealthy one at that, Macy." Mrs. Harrison informed me, "Your lease is covered for quite some time."
"So, like the next couple of months?" I gasped, all but falling off my chair. I gripped the rough wooden counter, blinking back the shocked black dots that swirled in front of my eyes.
"Years, in fact." Mrs. Harrison murmured, "But I have other clients that I need to speak with this morning."
"Of course you do." I replied hastily, "It was a pleasure speaking with you, Mrs. Harrison."
I was on autopilot, struggling to keep my breath from escaping my lungs.
"You as well, Macy." She responded.
It was long after the dial tone had resumed on my telephone that I finally was able to hang it up.
I sat in that chair, still wearing an old t-shirt and too small shorts that I slept in, for even longer. Time had stopped, and though people continued cheerily past outside my doors, I was frozen in this one moment.
How had this possibly happened? Had my parents left an inheritance that I hadn't known about? Had they somehow managed to speak with a lawyer before their accident?
Had they known all along that if anything were to happen to them that I would come running back to try and pick up the pieces?
It was hard to believe that they would have such faith in me, but perhaps, just maybe they had.
Their deaths had been such a shock though, there was no way that they would have been able to plan anything. I was sure of it.
It was only when the door to my shop jingled and a certain sexy blue eyed hunk of a billionaire casually strolled through the door into my shop that the pieces began to click together.
I stared at him, my eyes going huge as saucers, my blood turning to ice within my veins.
A smile slowly spread over his perfect face as he crossed his arms, leaning against the wall of the bakery.
"Good morning, Macy." He said calmly, watching as I struggled to climb up to my feet, taking a stumbling step towards him.
One of my hands reached out, prodding at his firm, muscled chest.
Once again, Sebastian was dressed in a fine black suit that brought out the sun kissed tan of his flawless flesh. His perfectly manicured fingers tapped on his arms as he gazed down at me.
"It was you." I gasped, "There's no one else it could have been."
"Those cookies," He began, glancing downwards to brush a bit of invisible dust off his lapel, "were the best I'd ever had."
His eyelashes were so dark and so long, he could have been in a damn mascara commercial. I was almost so distracted by his handsomeness that I forgot what we were even talking about.
"That's not possible." I mumbled, shaking my head.
Sebastian turned his piercing gaze back to me, smirk twitching on the corners of his full lips, "Oh, it's possible."
"I don't understand." I whispered, clutching onto his arm before I could even think about it, otherwise, I was going down, hard.
My knees buckled under me, the room spinning faster and faster as I struggled to make sense out of all that had happened.
Why would he pay off my lease, why would he choose to help someone like me? He'd only just met me, but he was doing favors for me? Why?
The questions continued to blow so quickly through my mind that I was unable to even come up with a single, coherent thought.
"I don't know how to repay you." I gasped, "I don't have any money. I don't have anything to give. I wasn't...I wasn't expecting this."
"Macy, take a deep breath." He said coolly, as though events like this happened every day. Perhaps to him, it did. Money was a commodity for people like Sebastian, after all.
His voice was so deep and so calm, it was like the ocean on a warm summer day. I could float away in his tenor.
I squeezed my eyes shut, allowing him to help me into a chair. His warm, large hands squeezed my shoulder, all but forcing me to be composed.
Slowly, but surely, my heart began to settle and my body began to relax.