Chapter - 7

"Are you really going to go and see him wearing that?" Casey asked, staring at her best friend as if she had gone crazy.

"What's wrong with this?" Trinity frowned, looking down at her all time favorite navy blue tank top and dark wash jeans. 

"Tri, you're going to see a damn billionaire! You can't go out with him wearing something as simple as that." Casey said, exasperated. How Trinity could do something as crazy as that was beyond her. From what she knew, Dimitri had called her last night and told Trinity that he'd be coming to pick her up this afternoon and they were going to go for a 'lunch date' and 'talk'.

Any other girl would have started picking out what clothes to wear and what shoes would match them the moment she had finished talking had a billionaire asked them out but not Trinity. No, the girl was going about her business as usual making batch after batch of cookies to take with her when she went to see the girls at the orphanage, where she had grown up at, this evening.

"Why not?" Trinity asked distractedly, her back to Casey as she concentrated on decorating the cookies, making a smiley on one with the icing just as she knew Cindy, one of the girls at the orphanage, loved. 

"Why not?" Casey parroted in disbelief. "What if he takes you out to a posh restaurant? He's a rich man, I don't think he'll be settling for anything less than that. If you go there looking like this, you'll be embarrassing not only yourself, but him as well." She explained patiently, as if she were explaining a four year old instead of a fully grown woman.

"Well, he'll just have to deal with it then." Trinity replied, grinning from ear to ear as she finished decorating the last batch of the cookies she knew the kids were going to love.

"You're crazy." Casey replied, shaking her head at her friend with a small smile. Trinity was one of those people who hardly ever paid attention to what they were wearing yet managed to look incredibly ravishing. While Casey was at times jealous of this, she couldn't help but admire the girl moving about in their kitchen, putting all the cookies she had been working hard to prepare into a basket, without a care in the world.

Trinity chuckled to herself before murmuring a ,"I think we established that one a long time ago." Which made both the girls laugh gleefully.

"Well, I need to go get ready for my shift at the diner unlike some people who don't even bother getting ready for a date, let alone work." Casey taunted her friend playfully, glancing at the clock that hung above the refrigerator to notice that it was nearing one in the afternoon. She had to be at the diner by two if she didn't want to hear a good twenty minute lecture from her boss about punctuality and its importance.

"Yeah, sure. We don't want Jimmy to get angry now, do we?" Trinity said playfully, referring to Casey's boss and her own ex-boss.

"You know, I still think you should report what he did to the police." 

Trinity sighed loudly, hearing rather than seeing the scowl on her friend's face as she spoke. "I think the black eye he is sporting right about now is enough for him. I really don't want his grandma to suffer because of that lousy pest. She's a very sweet woman and I don't want to trouble her, besides he would've learned his lesson by now."

"Oh you bet he has. If it wasn't for the fact that we really needed the money, what with you losing you job and everything, I would've strangled his scrawny little neck for what he did to you before throwing his job right in his face, that pathetic little bastard." Casey fumed.

"I know you would've but please don't do something stupid, alright?" Trinity turned around to face her friend, a concerned look on her face. 

Jimmy, the owner of the diner she had once worked at along with her best friend had tried to assault her sexually going as far as touching her inappropriately after 'accidentally' locking her in the kitchen with no one but himself. Suffice to say, he had ended up with a black eye, a few bruised ribs and a vacancy at his already short staffed diner after that. She would've pressed charges against him if it wasn't for the fact that she loved his grandma, who lived just two doors down from her, like her own and putting her through something like at this age was the last thing she wanted to do. Besides, Jimmy had apologized profusely after what he had done realizing just wrong he was and had promised not to do anything like that ever again, too bad it had taken a black eye and a few bruised ribs for him to learn his lesson.

The most difficult part of it all had been to restrain Casey from going out there and sending Jimmy straight to the operation theater but she had somehow managed to knock some sense into her saying that she had already lost her job and Casey had to keep hers if they wanted to survive, before she went after Jimmy with a shovel, literally.

"Yeah, yeah, okay." Casey huffed petulantly, like a kid who had just been refused a present on Christmas. 

"Now go get ready and stop thinking about it." Trinity said, picking up the plate of cookies she had prepared for Casey, pushing it into her hands before gently shoving her off in the direction of their room.

"You know I love you, right?" Casey called out from her room after devouring half the plate and moaning in delight at how delicious they were. Trinity's answering laugh was infectious.

"Yeah, you say that every time I bake something for you." Trinity teased.

"Oh, shut up and let me eat." Came Casey's muffled reply through a mouthful of cookies which left Trinity laughing to herself quietly.

Twenty minutes later Casey walked out of her room, ready to leave and just as she was about to pick her purse from the table, the doorbell rang. Seeing as she was the closest to it, she went to open it.

"Hello, Casey." Dimitri greeted with a small smile, somehow looking extremely out of place in their run down apartment even though he was wearing a simple t-shirt and jeans.

"Hey, Dimitri." She greeted with a polite smile. "Tri, your date's here." She called out into the house.

"I'm coming!" She hollered back.

Moments later Trinity emerged and there wasn't much Dimitri could do other than stare at her like a lovestruck teenager. God, this girl could make a rag look sexy. He thought to himself as he took in her appearance.

"Hey." 

"Hi." He muttered, blatantly checking her out without so much as trying to hide it.

"My eyes are up here, you know." Trinity pointed out, his intense gaze making her feel as though she was completely naked, a rosy blush dusting her pale cheeks as she peered at him from under her thick lashes.

"I know." He grinned boyishly at her, finally looking up and staring straight into her unusual eyes, once again struck by how simple yet how undeniably beautiful she truly was. 

Casey, who was watching all this with amusement twinkling in her dark brown eyes, finally made her presence known. "I'm leaving for work. You guys have fun on your date." She said cheerfully, moving out the door with a bounce in her step, all the while grinning like a loon.

"Okay. Bye, have fun." Trinity waved her friend goodbye before turning back to Dimitri who, she noticed, was still staring at her.

"So, shall we?" Dimitri asked, giving her a small smile.

"Yeah. Just let me grab my purse and we can go."

"Sure." Dimitri followed her inside, taking in the light cream colored walls and mismatched furniture. The place looked well lived in and had a homey feel to it, something he noticed he had never felt at his own place although it was much more luxurious than this, not that he was bragging or anything, just stating things as they were. 

"Hey, are those cookies?" Dmitri asked, his eyes landing on the basket of cookies Trinity had spent hours preparing, just as Trinity was coming back into their living room-cum-kitchen, purse in hand. 

"Yes, they are. I made them for the girls at the orphanage. I'll be going there this evening so I'll take them with me then." She said, feeling the need to explain.

"Orphanage?" Dmitri asked. Jack had told him all about Trinity's family and friends so he knew that she had grown up in an orphanage. It wasn't something he had expected and although he knew most of it, he felt as if something was amiss. But he wasn't going to tell Trinity that, he didn't want her to feel as if he was intruding on her privacy. Also, he knew that talking about one's dead parents wasn't easy and he wanted Trinity to take as much time as she wanted. 

"Yes, orphanage. You know the place where the kids who don't have any parents all live together and are taken care of?" Trinity explained sarcastically, though she knew what exactly he was asking. But she didn't want to tell him that just yet, she didn't think she was ready to tell him everything, or anyone for that matter. Sure, she had told Casey all that had happened but there were still some things she had kept to herself, things she was too scared to recall.

"I know what an orphanage is."

"Then why did you ask?" She asked innocently, trying to suppress her laughter at his annoyed expression.

"Actually, come on, I'll take you to the orphanage and then we can go have lunch after that, okay?" Sensing that she didn't want to talk about it, he tactfully changed the subject, waiting patiently for a reply. Thankful that Dmitri had taken the hint and hadn't pressed on it, she quickly agreed. 

Picking up the basket, she followed him out of the apartment, locking the door behind her and putting the key into her pocket hoping that the rest of the day would turn out well.