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“And the women…?”
“They have to do all the physicals too. We can’t assure everything—there’s some risk, obviously, as there always is with dating—but we’re trying to lower the percentage as much as possible.”
He considers me for a minute. My hands shake a little, but I hold eye contact. I will not back down.
I mean, given enough time and pressure, I probably, almost definitely, will. But the goal right now is for him not to know that.
I am a steel fortress. These are the terms. Take them or leave them.
Ha. Ha-ha-ha. I’m sweating.
“Fine.”
“Fine?” I ask, my voice far too hopeful for someone who should be a balls-of-steel negotiator.
He nods. “All of it is fine.”
Instantly, relief washes over me, and I let out a breath I didn’t even know I was holding. My God, the stress, the anxiety…finally, I can start to let it go. This is going to be good. I’m not going to get fired, and maybe, eventually, if it goes well, I can put in for a request to move my office location. Get out from in between—
“Except…there’s one thing.”
His words are a pin to my balloon of joy.
“One thing?”
“One thing I want done differently.”
I’m shaking my head before he even gets started. There’s no way they will budge on the doctor’s appointments and the testing and the—
“I don’t want to fill out some questionnaire about dates with women I know nothing about.”
The questionnaire? That’s what he has a problem with?
“It’s just to make—”
He holds up a hand, and I stop talking immediately.
“I want to plan each date before it happens, with you,” he further explains. “We’ll go over some information about the woman so I can take each of them into consideration. It’s the only way I’ll do it. And as far as I’m concerned, there’s no way in hell you’re going to learn all you need to know from a stupid piece of paper. You’ll spend a whole day with me, and then you can draw your own conclusions for your articles from that.”
“This is a deal-breaker?”
He nods. “I’m not doing this to waste my time, Holley. If I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it. I’m not the type of man who likes to half-ass things or, worse, fail at them. I’d like to have some chance at success, and if you ask me, no piece of paper with a questionnaire is going to give me a shot in hell of doing that.”
“Okay,” I agree. I mean, what else can I do? “You and I…we’ll plan each date together, one by one. And I’ll learn what I need to know about you from spending the day with you—not from a piece of paper.”
“Great. You free tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow?” I question more to myself than him. What’s tomorrow? Thursday? “I think—” I almost say yes, but then realize I have a dreaded yearly with my gynecologist. “Wait…I—” And then I almost freaking tell him that I have an appointment with my gyno. Thankfully, I settle on, “Actually, I’m busy tomorrow.”
“Then Friday?” he offers, and I agree with a nod.
“Friday works great.”
“Well, Holley, it looks like you’ll be heading back to the ocean on Friday morning, then.” He winks and turns around to stir the pasta sauce that’s now starting to bubble on the stove.
Back to the ocean? Oh boy.JakeI’m just finishing up checking in at the front desk when the door to the office opens behind me. Curiosity is a human reflex, so I turn instinctively to see who’s coming in.
The results of my reflex, however, are anything but expected.
With brown hair tucked behind her ears and a makeup-free face, Holley Fields steps inside the door and shuts it behind herself without looking up. She’s wearing a simple white T-shirt, jean shorts, and strappy sandals, and despite a huge height deficit, her legs seem to go on for days.
I watch her without guilt or subtlety, but it still takes her almost a full minute and actual physical contact to realize I’m there.
“Oh,” she mumbles quickly as her hands, texting something on her phone, bump into the soft cotton fabric of my baby blue T-shirt. Our toes are nearly touching, which makes the action of her head moving from its downward tilt all the way up to meet my eyes even more dramatic.
Once recognition sets in, her eyes turn wide and surprised.
“Jake.”
“Let me guess, Holley, my homemade pasta sauce last night was so good, you decided to track me down today?” I smile so hard I feel it in the skin behind my ears. “Or wait…don’t tell me, you have to sit in on my doctor’s appointment too? I don’t remember that being in all the fine print.”
“What?” Her face is downright comical as her brain backpedals. “No, no. Wait. What are you doing here?”
“I’m here for my appointment,” I say with a laugh. When she still looks confused, I take my explanation a step further. “This is a doctor’s office.”
