Page 5 of Life After

“You have a date? Suzanne, that’s great news.”

“No, I don’t. Not yet, anyway.” Suzanne smiled when she peered out of the window again and at Jen’s van. “It’s my new courier.”

“Hang on. How the hell have you managed to get the attention of someone who literally drops a package off and then runs?”

Suzanne had to wonder the same thing. “I don’t know. But she’s been coming here for a month now, and every time we see one another, it feels as though there issomethingthere. She’s…coming over soon to take a look at my internet.”

“Your internet? Is that a euphemism?”

Suzanne laughed at that. Tracy found a joke ineverything. “No. My internet reallyisplaying up.”

“So, call your broadband provider, Suzanne. This courier could beanyone,and you’re inviting her into your home.” Tracy sighed. “Just because she’s a woman, it doesn’t mean she isn’t dangerous.”

“I know that, but she seems really nice.”

Suzanne’s heart rate spiked when Jen left her vehicle. She no longer wore her high-visibility jacket, just a plain white T-shirt and a pair of jeans. If Suzanne recalled their previous encounter as well as she believed, then Jen had also fixed her hair a little. Though, Suzanne didn’t know why. She loved the unkempt look.

“I’d better go. She’s about to walk through my garden gate any second now.”

“Suzanne, please be careful. And if you get the chance, call me when she leaves, okay?”

Suzanne left the living room and stopped for a moment in the hallway. “I will. Talk to you later.” She ended the call and slipped her phone into the back pocket of her jeans. She took a breath, turned to the mirror on the wall, and stared back at herself. Suzanne wassureshe was ready to live her life. She had done the right thing by focusing on herself and where her life was at prior to today. She had waited until she was in the right headspace, refusing to put her emotional state on anyone else.Nowshe was ready. It was time to live again.

Suzanne puffed out her cheeks and gripped the door handle. She opened the door, smiling back at Jen who looked like a deer caught in headlights. Still, that attraction she felt every time they met was only far more intense than before. Seemed that was a common theme whenever this woman was standing in her front garden.

Jen raked a hand through her short, light brown hair as a blush settled on her cheeks. “Hey. Did you still need a hand with that internet?”

“Mmhmm.” Suzanne grinned, genuinely surprised that Jen had come back here at all. She could have driven straight home, but she hadn’t. That meant one of two things in Suzanne’s mind. Either Jen had enjoyed the flirting on the doorstep lately, or she just had a heart of gold. Perhaps Suzanne would get lucky, and both of those things would apply to Jen. “I would really appreciate the help.”

“Sure.” Jen stepped inside when Suzanne silently invited her in, then shoved her hands in her pockets, where she stopped and stood in the hallway. “Did you call your provider?”

No, she hadn’t. Even though it had been the logical and sensible thing to do, Suzanne had taken one look at Jen this afternoon and decided shespecificallywanted her help. Not some engineer. “I didn’t. I thought maybe it could be something I’ve done wrong.”

“Okay, well, if you just show me to it, I’ll see if I can figure it out.”

Suzanne nodded and held out an arm towards the living room door. She felt Jen following behind her, but Suzanne chose not to glance back. The longer she admired that strong physique, the sooner she would be spewing out words she wasn’t quite ready to verbalise. “The modem is on the floor beneath my desk. Other than that, I couldn’t tell you the first thing about where anything else is.”

Jen removed her boots before she walked onto the cream carpet, then got to her knees beneath Suzanne’s desk.Oh, I’d like to see her on her knees for other reasons.“Gorgeous house, by the way.”

Suzanne stared down at Jen, at her impressive backside, and cocked her head. “Thank you.”

“Are you some kind of interior designer? It looks like something out of one of those home and living magazines you see at the doctors.”

“I am, actually,” Suzanne said, pulling the corner of her bottom lip between her teeth. “But this place in particular was all my husband’s doing.”

Jen sat back on her knees, holding onto a wire. “Maybe you should have asked him to take a look at this.” She glanced over her shoulder at Suzanne. “The power wire was disconnected.”

“O-oh.” Suzanne instantly felt ridiculous. Would Jen think that she had purposely removed the power cable to get her attention? “I’m so sorry.”

Jen dipped her head under the desk again and reconnected it. As she got to her feet and turned to Suzanne, that handsome smile beamed back at her. “I’m not. It means your internet is back, and you don’t have to wait for an engineer.”

“Thank you, Jen. I do appreciate you coming back after work.”

While Suzanne had intended to continue flirting, she was too mortified to bother right now. She knew exactly what had happened. During lunch, she had knocked over her cup of pens, resulting in a spillage down the back of her desk. They must have dislodged the power cable.

Jen lifted a shoulder. “It’s no problem, really. I was only going home.” She cleared her throat as she stepped past Suzanne and moved towards the hallway. When Jen turned back to Suzanne, she wore that soft smile Suzanne had been drawn to on a few occasions now. “So, I guess I’ll see you next time I have a package for you. It was nice to put a name to a face, Suzanne.”

“Could I…buy you a drink to say thank you?”

---