Page 40 of Too Hot to Sleep
She slid it across the counter.
His hand disappeared below the counter to scratch someplace she couldn't see. "One of our repair guys will have to take a look at it tomorrow. Can we call you?"
She leaned forward, pushed back the straw hat she had bought for today, and enunciated very clearly. "That would befine, except now I don'thavea phone. Why don't you tell me what time tomorrow I can come back?"
They negotiated a time, and Georgia exited the store, aware she was garnering a few strange looks because not everyone in the electronics store wore a long sheer dress, a straw hat, and white wedge espadrilles and carried a huge wrapped package with a big silver bow.
She caught a bus at the corner of the shopping center, then walked a half block to the church, replaying her conversation with Toni. She was right, of course. If Georgia was so distracted by Ken Medlock, she wasn't making herself wholly available to Rob. It was the pushing and pulling that was making her crazy. The prudent thing to do was to suggest to Rob that they take a break from seeing each other.
She entered the church from the back and followed the sound of raised voices and female laughter down a hallway to the room where the bride and bridesmaids were dressing for their photos. She'd never seen so much clutter—clothes, shoes, makeup bags, hair appliances. Stacey looked ethereal in ivory. Her mother fussed with her train while another older woman worked on the bride's chin-length red hair. Toni was one of four bridesmaids dressed in long, straight-skirted gowns in a deep coral color.
"You look beautiful," Georgia said.
Her friend blushed prettily and handed Georgia a curling iron. "Will you curl the back of my hair?"
She helped to arrange Toni in front of a mirror and set to work.
"I don't suppose Rob is here yet?"
Georgia shook her head. "He said he might get hung up at the office since he's so behind from being sick." She couldn't decide whether she wanted to get the breakup over with or put it off another day.
"You'll look back on this someday and laugh," her friend offered.
"Think so?"
"Yeah, when you and the cop have six kids."
Georgia laughed good-naturedly. What she hadn't told Toni was that while shewasplanning to break off with Rob, shewasn'tplanning to go out with Ken Medlock.
"Too bad you couldn't have broken up with Rob before and asked that yummy uniform to bring you to the wedding."
She gave a noncommittal nod. She was taking a hiatus from men—dating them, even merelylookingat them, had awakened her dark side. She needed time and space to regain her perspective.
Toni kept glancing in Stacey's direction with a wistful expression. "Think you or I will ever be brides, Georgia?"
An amusing question, since Toni was two years younger. "Probably. Someday. How goes it with Dr. Baxter?"
Toni made a face. "I haven't told him my name yet."
"Toni!"
"I can't help it. He calls me Terri Strawberry now. How cute is that?"
"Howsexist isthat?"
"I know, I know. I'm going to tell him, no matter how embarrassing it is."
"Good."
Georgia finished curling her hair, sliding her own envious glances toward the glowing Stacey—not because the woman was getting married, but because she was marrying someone she was head over heels for. And Neil seemed to be head over heels for her, too. Georgia looked around the room, surveying the happy, fretting women, taking in the buzz of conversation and hair dryers, acknowledging the charge in the air. Excitement. Happiness. Optimism.
She wanted it. She wanted true love and all the trappings of giddiness. And someday she'd have it... if these overactive hormones of hers didn't get in the way.
Georgia smiled and nodded at another bridesmaid who needed an extra hand with her hair. She dreaded the talk with Rob, but she was grateful for one thing—she'd left Ken Medlock yesterday in the park with a stern rejection, and if she mailed the pictures of his dog, she couldn't imagine a reason she'd ever run into him again.
* * *
KEN WALKEDpast the job postings bulletin board a half dozen times, each time promising himself he would not look. And he didn't. Not until the seventh time. Then, just to satisfy his own morbid curiosity, he quickly scanned the list for churches and businesses in need of traffic control and security for the day.
