Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 67144 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 336(@200wpm)___ 269(@250wpm)___ 224(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 67144 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 336(@200wpm)___ 269(@250wpm)___ 224(@300wpm)
While I read Freddy’s last text, Burt continues his monologue, detailing all the reasons Freddy was a bad boyfriend.
Freddy: Just let me come by and look. I know where I would’ve left them. Besides, you don’t need to waste your time looking for them, baby. I know how busy you are.
“Dating you was a waste of my time,” I mutter, returning to the table.
Me: They aren’t here.
He wastes no time in responding.
Freddy: I just want to see you.
I groan, turning my phone face down next to my food.
“You texted him back, didn’t you?” Burt asks.
“Yes. In my optimistic brain, I could tell him the glasses weren’t here, and he’d go away—at least for a while. But he moved right into I just want to see you,” I say, mocking his tone. “It’s been six weeks. When will he get the picture that we’re done forever?”
“Probably never. Face it—you’re a catch. Any young man with half a brain inside his head would want to date you. Hell, they should want to marry you, but you kids these days aren’t into marriage like we were back in my time.”
I nibble on the end of a fry. “I want to be married someday.”
“That doesn’t surprise me.”
It surprises me. I pop the rest of the fry into my mouth.
As I grew up, marriage was never an aspiration. I saw my single mother navigate her life without a man. She worked two jobs, raised me, and seemed content. All I wanted in life was to be her—independent, strong, and happy.
It was only after her death that I began to understand the truth.
And now, armed with this information, I crave the happily ever after Mom didn’t get. I don’t want to grow old alone. I don’t want to fall asleep by myself every night. I want to know what it’s like to be loved by someone fully and completely.
I also want to love someone back.
“What kind of man could you see yourself marrying?” Burt asks. “I’m guessing I’m too old.”
I laugh. “Well, I do hope to have kids, and I think you had a vasectomy, so …”
He laughs, too, lines crinkling around his eyes. “Yeah. That’s the problem—my vasectomy.”
“Can’t blame that on me.”
“Can’t blame that on me, either. When you’re an over-the-road trucker and want to be sure you don’t knock someone up in your travels, you do what you gotta do.”
We chuckle softly.
“I don’t know what kind of man I’d like to marry,” I say, lifting another fry. “He’d have to be smart. Funny. Someone who could be strong enough to protect his family but gentle enough to hold a baby.”
Burt grins.
My brain immediately envisions Troy with a baby, and I try not to swoon at the table. That would be too hot to be safe. I don’t think I’d survive that reality.
“He’d probably be six-three or so,” I say, picturing Troy standing in the doorway to my office. “Dark hair cut close to his head. Gray eyes. Heavy brows. He’d look just as good in an expensive suit as he does in sweats and a T-shirt.”
“Sounds mighty specific.”
“I’m building an imaginary boyfriend. I might as well get what I want, right?”
“Might as well.” He nods toward my food. “Eat up. I’ll get forks, and we can dig into that cake.”
I nod as he leaves for the kitchen. “Don’t bother my magnets.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
I breathe and try to settle the thudding of my heart.
Troy’s smirk blazes through my mind, sending heat waves pulsing through me.
Our exchange this morning left me thrown off all day. I kept thinking I heard his voice in the office. I smelled his cologne down the halls. Every ping of an email or text message had me racing to see if it was him.
It was ridiculous.
It was the reason I ran five freaking miles. I needed to work that shit out of my body and clear my head.
Troy Castelli is my co-worker. Period. End of. He may be the object of my dreams, but he has to stay in my dreams. That’s unfortunate and unreasonable, but it’s also the way things are.
“Here’s a fork,” Burt says, handing me the utensil. “Do I have to wait on you, or can I go ahead and celebrate now?”
I push the cake to him. “Celebrate away.”
“I saw your daddy on the news today,” Burt says, taking a slice and putting it in the top of his takeout container.
“Fantastic.”
“For the record, I think it’s all a bunch of bullshit. Unpopular opinion, I know.”
“You could say that. But I do appreciate you giving him the benefit of the doubt.”
He shoves a forkful of cake into his mouth, watching me warily.
A lump settles at the base of my throat. I stand, ignoring another incoming text, and gaze out the window.
Being the daughter of Joseph Dallo still takes some getting used to. The mere fact of having a father for the last year and a half after not having one for twenty-four years was jarring in and of itself. But it’s more complicated than that. He’s also a conundrum.