Page 124 of Mr. Flirt

“But I can learn.”

“No, I just... I’m not sure.”

The server came over and took our orders for dinner, along with another martini for me, but this time a single.

“I would love to take riding lessons,” I offered. “I’ve just never had any reason to think about it.”

He looked relieved, as if maybe there was some common ground after all. “Really?”

But I knew there wasn’t.

“Totally.”

“I love to snorkel and dive too.”

I nodded, thinking back to his earlier statement about never having time off. “You dive a lot?”

He shrugged. “It goes along with sailing.”

“Makes sense.”

I looked at Shep clanking his bottle with his friends and scowled. I wanted more than anything to be there with him.

But I knew better. I knew it was the alcohol. I knew what I needed in my life for happiness, and that included stability. Always had.

Shep was an unknown.

A bit of a live wire.

A loose cannon.

God, I missed him. I’d been doing sort of fine staying away from him, but seeing him in person made every cell in my body ignite with longing.

I missed him.

We never had this getting-to-know-one-another phase because we just clicked. Things just came out naturally. There were no I-like-baseball-do-you-like-baseball? conversations.

But he needed to grow up. He needed to be responsible.

Shep was a million red flags balled up into one giant red flag with a big red bow on top.

Cliff was a physician who took his mom out horseback riding for fun. He worked a lot. Spent a lot of time at this bar for Shep to call him a regular. And he probably had some pretty unreasonable expectations.

I gasped at the sudden realization that finally hit me like a dead fish in the face.

The server brought over my umpteenth drink of the night, and I took a small swallow as Cliff watched me carefully.

“You know, Cliff. You are amazing. I have no doubt that you’re a highly skilled surgeon with a kind heart and a vast amount of interest. But that’s not me. I’m a little bit rough around the edges, and I don’t mind staring at my phone playing games in between court cases or finding myself curled up in a ball reading my latest romance.”

He kept his eyes on me. “Okay.”

“I am not perfect, and I need to find that person who’s not perfect with me.”

“And that’s not me.”

I shook my head. “I’m afraid it’s not, and I don’t want to waste your time. On paper, we’re perfect, right?”

Cliff laughed. “A doctor and a lawyer. Can’t get much better than that.”

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