Page 4 of One More Chance

“No, I had to travel in from a business conference in Raleigh,” he says.

“What do you do?” I ask.

“I’m in pharmaceutical sales,” he says, and I didn’t see that coming. I’m a little impressed. Also a little intimidated.

“Can I get you something to drink?” I ask him.

“I thought you’d never ask,” he says.

Slightly embarrassed at my lack of hospitality due to my general distracted thoughts of him, I retrieve a glass of lemonade for him and we sit on the porch swing to wait for his sister, or literally anyone else. Lyla, Gentry, the Pope. Anyone will do. I need a buffer.

I watch him sip the lemonade at first, and then it turns to gulps. I watch his throat muscles work down the liquid and for a moment I’m transfixed by his Adam’s apple. I shake my head. Holy crap. I’ve got to get ahold of myself.

“Looks like we’ve got some time to kill, Harper,” he says, and I like the way my name sounds when he says it. I can’t explain why. The inflection, the tone, I don’t know what it is. Like it could be a song. “So, tell me about yourself.”

Oh no.