Page 58 of The Sharpest Edges

“You’ll find something even better,” he tells her. “I know it. We’ll figure this out, me and you.”

She leans forward, her words a precursor to her kiss. “We will.”

* * *

It’s another half hour before they finally make it to her driveway, too caught up in kissing in her kitchen to hurry.

Once he does get out there, it takes him a grand total of seven minutes to replace the oil container and refill it. Hardly a big job at all and he feels a sense of accomplishment sweep through him at finishing it just like he said he would. It is however, enough time for his boss, Hank, to call him back to work, pleading over the phone about a surprise client with a massive job that he can’t handle alone and promising overtime pay that Dean would be stupid to say no to considering his situation.

He and Ava hadn’t discussed their plans for the night, but he hoped he could stay and she would invite him into her bed again. Only now that’s out of the question, and he sighs in frustration.

Her eyes stray to his phone even after he ends the call, finding a photo of her and Panda as his lock screen. He blushes, pocketing his phone as if he’d been caught doing something scandalous.

Thankfully, she doesn’t call him on it.

“It’s okay, go help Hank with that truck. It sounds dire,” she says. “We’ve still got a date with some houses soon, right?”

“Absolutely.” He nods, pecking her on the lips one last time, briefly wondering if they might be ready for a quickie before he leaves, but deciding against it. They aren’t at the ‘bend her over the sofa and come in sixty seconds or less’ stage and he isn’t going to rush them there.

This eviction has a silver lining after all, he thinks as he backs out of her driveway. He’s never been much for house hunting aside from needing a place to lay his head that wasn’t crime-ridden and drug-filled. Now though, with Ava by his side, he can’t wait to get started.

23

Chapter 23

“Well, that was something,” Ava says over her shoulder as she walks through her front door, her sights already set on the sofa calling her name.

“That’s one way to put it.” Dean flops down beside her and kicks his feet up on the ottoman.

He looks defeated and more than a little disgruntled. They looked at five properties today and it was like a live-action HGTV style horror movie. Each house got progressively worse until they headed back to her place at the end of the evening, in silent agreement to regroup.

“The one with the deck wasn’t bad. Kinda cute,” she offers, side-eyeing him while scrolling through TV show options, settling on a reality show about people who date for ninety days before having to get married.

He eyes her right back. “The landlord was drunk the entire time he showed it to us. Could smell it. He found the bottom of a bottle way before we got there.”

He has a point. The house may have been nice, rambling, and old with enough character around every turn to surprisethem, but having to deal with a landlord that should be in a twelve-step program probably isn’t the best option.

“What about the bungalow? The yellow one,” he tries.

She scrunches her nose. “It smelled like death. Like something crawled into the ductwork, invited its friends and they all curled up and died right there.”

Dean shrugs like the hideous smell is no big deal. “Can figure that out. Rent is cheap. Ain’t nothin’ pest control and some bleach can’t fix.”

She is utterly horrified. He can’t be serious.

He seems to realize his mistake a moment later and leans his head back against the pillows, one hand reaching out to give her thigh a light squeeze. “Alright, alright. Not that one.”

She scoots in closer, one elbow up on the cushion behind her as she faces him, one leg curled underneath her body. “The cottage with the pond? It wasn’t as bad as you think and there was a pond. You could have ducks. It might even have fish in it.”

“Fuck no. It was haunted.”

Ava snickers, remembering the rows of tiny porcelain dolls that greeted them, all lined up on the furniture like a welcoming committee. The landlord assured them that the dolls weren’t staying, that the current tenant was just a little eccentric, but she saw how Dean balked in the front hall, looking for all the world like he was about to call a priest or light some sage. She half expected him to motion the mark of the cross across his chest before they continued.

“It isn’t haunted. You’re overreacting because you were creeped out by the dolls,” she says, getting an over-exaggerated shiver from him in reply.

“Was creeped out because they’re creepy. Don’t matter if thecurrent tenant takes them with her, those things linger. One of ‘em has those eyes that follow you around the room. I can still feel it.”

“I can’t believe you’re going to pass up that perfectly cute house just because it may or may not be haunted by spirits of the undead.”

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