Page 25 of All Your Firsts

But here it sits, mostly vacant. Devoid of warmth and laughter.

I check my phone with a sigh. We need to get going. I hate being late.

I ascend the stairs and knock, only to be met with silence on the other side. I open the door to a very empty room.

What the fuck? My stomach drops as I run around the house, looking for her. I pull out my phone and dial Jess.

“Good morning, and thank you for calling Sweet E—”

“Is Rosie there?”

“Good morning to you, too, Vic, and yes, she is. Do you want to—”

I hang up on Jess the second I know Rosie’s safe.

As the panic subsides, annoyance takes its place. The second I get ahold of her phone, I’m placing a tracker on it.

I pull over to the side and park in front of Sweet Escape, too fucking pissed to park at my shop and walk over.

The bell above the door announces my arrival, and Samantha instantly greets me a little too enthusiastically. After the shit show the night of Rosie’s arrival, I’ve avoided her. Once Rosie left for the main house, she bitched about her staying with me and told me she should stay elsewhere. First, she and I fucked twice—that hardly warrants her opinion to count—and two, she did it because she felt threatened.

Samantha’s pretty, with blond hair and blue eyes, but there’s not a whole hell of a lot going on upstairs, and she wanted more. They always do.

“Morning, Samantha,” I say politely with a tight smile, not wanting to give her the wrong impression ever again.

“Hey Vic, how’ve you been?” she asks, leaning over the counter and into my space.

“Not too bad,” I say, looking around for the brunette I want to strangle.

“That’s great. Hey, I was thinking...”

My gaze halts as I spot Rosie walking toward me from the back with boxes in her hands. “Hey,” I say to get Rosie’s attention.

“Oh, hey there, Vic,” she says, a little surprised before averting her eyes anywhere but at me.

So I guess my little comment in the pool made her uncomfortable. Good. I move closer to her, behind the food display counter and away from her clingy coworker.

“Nothing else to say?”

“Like...?”

“You weren’t supposed to leave the house this morning alone. That’s not part of our agreement. I’m supposed to drive you.”

“Sorry,” Rosie says with a dismissive shrug.

“Sorry? That’s all?”

“I thought you’d be busy this morning with your company from last night,” she says with a bit of a bite to her words.

So she was watching me after she left the pool last night. Interesting.

“Little nosy, don’t you think... or maybe it’s jealousy?” I smirk.

Her head snaps up. “Not in a million fucking years. If anything, I pity the company you keep.”

“Is that so?”

“Four different girls in four days...it’s like they all pull numbers and wait their turn.”

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