Page 27 of Family Bonds: Alana & Brennan
Hours later when Becca was in bed, he pulled his laptop out to try to buy as much as he could for Christmas that was on her list. He wouldn’t go overboard. She’d get spoiled by his mother, so he’d limit it now.
At the end of the night, he stood up and stretched, happy to get that over with. It was pretty sad he felt accomplished over Christmas shopping weeks early.
What happened to those Friday nights he was out with friends? Hitting on a cute girl in a bar?
Never flirting with a coworker like he’d been trying to do with Alana this past week.
Guess it wasn’t meant and it’d be too messy anyway.
8
PUT ON THE SPOT
“We appreciate you helping us this year, Alana.”
“No problem,” she said. “I’m happy to do it.”
“It doesn’t hurt that you’re part of the Bond family. That carries some weight.”
She looked at Diane, the executive director of a local agency she was auditing this year.
They had a lot of services for the underprivileged in the community.
“I’ve spread the news,” she said. “But the fire department does that too.”
She didn’t want any credit to be put on her shoulders for this. The only thing she did was get the staff at work to donate a few things.
Oh, and Brennan told her he’d be dropping off toys with Becca today.
She wouldn’t hold him to it, but he’d been talking to her much more than normal this week.
Not just like coworkers, but more as friends.
She had been asking about Becca a lot. And he shared funny stories about the little girl.
She was looking forward to seeing Becca as much as Brennan.
Not dressed for work, but more casual in jeans. He sure was smoking in casual wear.
When he was on a date with another woman.
She had to remind herself of that.
“That’s right,” Diane said. “They’ve already collected a lot that was brought over earlier this week. But we’ve got the newspaper coming to get a picture today around noon. Hopefully, we’ve got plenty here then for the shot.”
“I’m sure you will.”
It was almost eleven now and her bet was people would come over while running errands, but she could already see cars parking in the street and people getting out.
“Might as well collect them now,” Diane said. “We’ll just continue to sort them the way the Fire Department is doing.”
“Which is?” she asked. She saw three piles of toys and none of them looked like they were by gender.
“Two and under over here. Three to ten here, and ten and up over there. Once we get closer to matching the toys with the families, it will be easier.”
“How is that done?” she asked. “I’d love to help.”
“On the nineteenth we are going to gather at the office and just start going off the list one by one. Nothing is wrapped, just items set aside in bags with names on it.”
