Page 25 of One Bossy Date
“Good morning,” I said in a low, collected voice. She shrieked and nearly jumped out of her skin.
“Oh, Mr. Windham! I had no idea you were here.”
“It’s Anders, remember?”
She stood up straight, giving me an opportunity to scan her body. “Yes, of course. Anders.”
Today, in contrast to her first day here, she wore jeans with a yellow blouse and white sneakers. Her hair was twisted up into a bun that sat high on her head. Clearly, she now dressed the part, and it was no disappointment to me.
“I see you’re getting the hang of it.” I gestured to the two tippy tapping at her ankles.
I hadn’t expected her to warm to Ares and Hades so easily, or so quickly. Clearly, she was a determined woman.
She smiled brightly, staring down at them with pride. “I am, aren’t I?”
“About our date.”
She looked up at me, her eyes widening. “Are we…still good on that?”
“Yeah, sure. I just wondered—why was it that you couldn’t get another date?” I’d been thinking about it since our conversation last week.
Her relieved gaze immediately caught on mine and faltered. “You want me to tell you all about my mediocre love life, huh? You must be chomping at the bit.”
She turned away with a dramatic wave. With my eyes glued to her perfectly rounded ass held so firmly in those jeans, I followed her to the kitchen as she gathered the boys’ food. I stood against the counter with my hands in my pockets, awaiting her story and watching her. She made the boys sit like I’d shown her on the first day.
“Long boring story, Anders,” she said, as if she didn’t want to go into detail.
“At least tell me why you couldn’t find a date to the party. Or, why you even need one so badly in the first place.”
“It wasn’t that I couldn’tfindone.” She started to get defensive. “It’s that I really don’t want to go with the one my gran set up for me.”
“I see.” I rubbed my chin, studying her closely. “So, I’m the replacement?”
“Something like that.” Zoe shrugged noncommittally.
“Why don’t you want to go with him?”
“Because Brody’s a douche.” Her lips curved into a half-smirk.
“Can’t argue with that reasoning.”
“Right?” Zoe said playfully.
She stopped dishing the food and shifted to face me. “Basically, my gran isn’t thrilled that I’m still single at twenty-nine years old. How old are you, by the way?”
“Forty-three.”
“Really? Anyway, I’ve told her it’s normal these days, but she insists on setting me up. Except, she doesn’t send me on cute blind dates—oh,no—she keeps throwing one and the same guy my way. Brody. Granny’s expecting that we’ll someday realize that we’re actually madly in love and pop out exactly three children.”
“Three? Not four or five?”
“Yes, she’s got it all figured out. I can’t be mad at her, she means well, and I love her to pieces. She’s not getting any younger, and I don’t want to crush her heart.”
I listened carefully, studying her movements as she explained. Her feisty outburst amused me, and I enjoyed hearing that she was close with her grandmother.
“Now it’s her birthday party, and I don’t want to upset her by literally refusing to do what she so desperately wants. I didn’t think I’d be able to find a date on such short notice, and thenpoof. You came along with your two dogs, throwing tit-for-tat deals my way.” She set the bowls down on the floor. Ares and Hades squirmed expectantly on their furry hinds, but only pounced on their food when she let them with a “go.” That was a lot better than anything I’d expected from her.
“It was actuallyyouwho proposed the deal, however sarcastically,” I said, hands still in my pockets.