Page 9 of Sunny Goes Cold Turkey
“I can fix it! I saw it on YouTube!” Immy runs into the other room, probably to get her tablet.
“Ready?” I ask Oliver.
“Wait, don’t you have instructions for me?” Sunny steps away from the wall, looking panicky.
I hold a hand toward her, “That’s close enough.” I smirk, “Your only job is to keep Imogen alive and figure out how to get rid of that smell.”
She casts a withering glance behind those cute librarian glasses. “Right. But is she allergic to anything? What’s her routine? Do you have any rules I should know about?”
Oliver barks out a laugh. It’s a rare sound, so it startles me. I glare at him. He's such a butthead.
“Immy will tell you her routine,” I explain. “Just keep her alive. And I’m serious about the smell. Do whatever you have to do.” I turn toward the door.
“But—” she looks really worried.
“You’ll be fine. My number is in Immy’s phone if you have an emergency. Or you can always call Darth Oliver here.” I smack my friend on the shoulder. “We gotta get going. Day one.”
“I’ll shoot you an email,” Oliver says to Sunny. He lets the "Darth Oliver" thing slide. He knows how I get on the first day of shooting.
“Bye, Im! Love you!” I call toward the back of the suite.
“Wait!” She darts back into the room with her huge tablet pressed to her chest. She drops it on the floor and wraps her arms around my legs. “I love you, Dad!”
“Love you, too, Immy. See you later, okay?”
Her scrawny arms squeeze tighter. “Just five more minutes.”
Five more minutes is Immy’s thing. It’s how she gets what she wants. “I can’t, kiddo. I have to go to work. You need to stay here and take care of Sunny. Make sure she doesn’t make Hairy sick with that stink, okay?” I peel her off of my legs and hoist her up to eye level, blow a raspberry on her cheek, and put her down.
I turn to Sunny, who is rosy-cheeked and flustered. "Don't forget to grab my number out of Immy’s phone. Good luck today." I wink. I can't help it. It's like my eyelid is hardwired to do that when a tempting female appears. I'm programmed to ruffle calm, pretty feathers.
Oliver clicks the door shut behind us and we're not even three steps down the walk when he says, "No."
"What?" I think I know and it better not be what I think.
"Youknowwhat." He claps a hand on my shoulder with a little more force than necessary. "I get it. She's hot. But we talked about this. Look, don't touch. You pay me to keep your life on track and I'm telling you right now, keep things above board with Nanny Sunny."
I shrug him off. "You know what? That sounds even stupider than Nanny Nan." I chuckle and take a swig of water. I joke because I'm not in the mood to have my nose rubbed in my old weakness, which is doing stupid stuff with beautiful women and losing my mind. But I haven’t done that stuff in a long time. And I haven’t doneanythingwith Sunny. Yet.
"Anders. Just let her be the nanny. You can screw around with whoever you want after the premier. Until then, stay focused and keep your nose clean. Day one."
I kick a pebble into the shrubs by the pathway. This will end quicker if I tell him what he wants to hear. "Yeah. Day one."
5. Sunny Vows to Kill a Skunk
“Wait!” I call toward the door when I realize Anders has left me on dog duty with no instructions and no idea what I’m supposed to do with these two all day. I’m less concerned about caring for a human child and more concerned about keeping this humongous beast from biting my face off.
The door is already closed, the men are gone, and Hairy drops her slobbery tennis ball on my sandaled foot. Cold slime oozes between my bare toes and Hairy whines.
“Um, no thanks.” I nudge the drool-covered ball toward the giant dog. “Sorry, Hairy. I’m not a dog person. It’s nothing personal. I was bitten by my friend’s mini schnauzer when I was twelve and ever since then I’m nervous around animals with teeth that are designed to shred flesh,” I explain with a shrug.
Hairy sighs deeply like she’s weary of being discriminated against.
Imogen looks up from her tablet. “Just so you know, she doesn’t know that many words. She just knows ‘sit’ and ‘outside’ and ‘walk’.”
Hairy sits, and tilts her head to the side with every new word.
“And Hairy is nice. She doesn’t bite.” Imogen goes back to her tablet, clicking away on YouTube. Her compact, bare feet barelyreach past the edge of the couch cushion. Is it normal for a five-year-old to have open access to YouTube like that?
