Page 23 of Hypnotized By Love

“Tonight at seven o’clock? I’ll meet you there?” he said. His questions were probably directed at Bridget, but he was looking at me when he asked them.

“I’ll see you there at seven! Let me give you my number.”

He handed her his phone, and she input her digits. “Text me soon,” she said, waggling her fingers at him. “I have to get back to my shop.”

She shot me a look that I couldn’t interpret and walked back across the street with an exaggerated sway in her step.

One of the firefighters came out and announced that it had been a false alarm, that a wiring issue had triggered the sensors and anelectrician had been called to fix it. We would most likely be allowed back in the building tomorrow.

Great. I was going to have to reschedule all of my afternoon appointments.

I really wished that I had enough money to hire an assistant. It would make my life so much easier.

And instead of keeping all of that information inside my head where it belonged, I was apparently muttering it out loud, because Mason said, “I could be your assistant.”

“No, you couldn’t.”

“Do you want to go get lunch with me?”

What was wrong with him? “Lunch with one girl, dinner with another? No thanks. I’m nobody’s second choice.”

“You weren’t my second choice.” His words had so much heft that I felt a little flattened by them.

I stood there, clutching my phone, not knowing how to respond. What was he doing to me?

“So no to lunch. I guess I’m going to the gym and then I’m feeding alligators. Thanks for the session. See you later, Sinclair.”

He walked away, and I sat down on the curb to try to pull myself together. I faced away from him so that I wouldn’t watch him walk away. Even then, I still couldn’t help but look over my shoulder at him.

And because it was me, of course that was the exact moment he turned around and caught me staring at him like the deranged weirdo I was. He waved with a cocky half smile, and I cursed the day that he was born.

He was so infuriating.

I pulled out my phone and started doing some quick research on hypnotic somnambulism. The more I read, the more alarmed Ibecame—because I hadn’t closed the session the way I should have, Mason might now be a danger to himself.

I wanted to call him, but I didn’t have his number. And who could I ask to get it? Both Heather and my mom would read too much into it. Bridget might feel territorial and not give it to me.

I was going to have to crash his date.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“You did what?” Sierra asked.

I had put on one of my favorite sundresses and a pair of espadrilles. I usually dressed up when I went out, but I didn’t want Mason to think I’d made any effort for him. But I couldn’t bring myself to wear something grubby. This dress was older, so it was my one concession.

“I hypnotized Mason, and I think I did something to him. Because of that fire alarm, I didn’t get to properly close the session and wake him up the correct way. We had to flee the building.”

“So you’re saying there was a premature evacuation?” She laughed at her own joke while I glared at her.

“Now I think he’s really suggestible and is going to say yes to everything.”

“Why is that your problem?”

“Because I broke him,” I said as I went through my jewelry box, looking for a pair of gold hoops. “I temporarily wrecked his defenses. If I took a shell off a turtle, I’d have to help him because he wouldn’t have his protection.”

She was eating potato chips and finished chewing the one in her mouth. “If you pulled a shell off of a turtle, I’m pretty sure it would die.”

“That’s not the point!”

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