Page 36 of Single Girl in the City
“What, is this third grade?” he asked. “I’m just being thorough. Making sure she’s the right fit.” She was the perfect fit—in more ways than one.
“Then why does her résumé look like you’ve mooned over it?” Rhett set it back on the desk. “And since when do you dodge a woman?”
“Since, if I hired her, she’d be working for me.”
“So, you essentially cockblocked yourself by procrastination,” Rhett said, a big grin from ear to ear. Owen sliced a glare at Rhett out of the corner of his eye, which only made the asshole laugh harder. “What? Had you hired someone when we first talked about it, you wouldn’t be in this situation.”
No, he wouldn’t be. So there he was, neck deep in a problem of his own making. He liked problems almost as much as he liked complications. His work life was complicated enough without adding his personal life into the mix. In fact every time his personal life even smelled a complication, he broke out in hives.
“Have you called her references?” Josh asked, saving Rhett from a punch to the face.
“Every one. All glowing reviews.” All eleven of them.
It seemed as if Abi hadn’t gotten over her tumbleweed of a childhood. Besides her teaching job, which she’d been at for four years, she’d hopped from state to state, job to job, never seeming to stick in one place for very long.
It answered the question of why, if her sister was here, she’d want to move on so quickly. If he’d been in an accident, his family would rally around him, even cuffing him to a chair if he tried to bail before he’d fully recovered. And while Abi’s body would be healed, the scars inside would take a lot longer.
“What does your gut say?” Josh asked.
“That I’d be an idiot to pass.”
Chapter Thirteen
Happy Things:
Unexpected adventures
Ascream thundered and Abi jerked up straight on the couch, her heart racing as if she’d just finished a two-day sex-a-thon with her potential new boss. Not that she’d been dreaming of Owen. It had been that nightmare. The same damn nightmare that had haunted her for the past few months.
Abi had thought that coming home would keep the horror at bay, but it had followed her from Mobile. She was beginning to fear it would follow her wherever she landed.
“Let go of your sister, young man,” she heard Dotti say. “She is not a toy to be dragged around.”
By the frequency and pitch of the wails, Lemon-Marie agreed.
Lemon-Marie!
Abi leaped up off the couch. She’d promised to make the kids breakfast and get them ready for daycare. And it was after seven. She must have slept through her alarm. Surprising, since she didn’t sleep more than an hour in any one stretch.
Nightmares weren’t just for sleep. They lurked around every corner of Abi’s world, which was getting smaller and smaller. In the past Abi had been big on adventures and travel, teaching English in Costa Rica and yoga in Fiji. She’d also seen a good chunk of the states. But her world had shrunk to three square miles. If she couldn’t get there by bike, then it wasn’t happening.
Abi raced into the kitchen to find Dotti standing at the counter. She was wearing fluffy socks, baggy sweats, and ay’all gonna make me lose my mindT-shirt that had dried pancake batter on the hem. Instead of being smooth and styled, her blonde hair was doing a duster impersonation and her expression said the zombie apocalypse had arrived and she’d been turned.
“I am so sorry I slept in,” Abi said.
“I kept them quiet as long as I could,” Dotti explained, like she was the one who’d been at fault. “I took Koi’s pull–fire engine away so he’s takin’ to pulling around his sister. How has this become my life?”
“It will get better,” Abi promised.
“When?” Dotti looked near tears, so Abi did what she hadn’t done since she was little and she took her sister’s hand. And to her surprise, Dotti fell into her arms.
“Honestly, I don’t know.” She gave her sister’s back an awkward pat. “But I do know this is a phase.”
Dotti wiped her nose on Abi’s shirt. “I just need another cup of coffee. Then I’ll be on my A game.”
Abi took the empty coffee pot and held it up. “Was this full this morning?”
She looked in her empty cup. “I don’t know.”
