As she whipped around, prancing back to the table, Dylan’s eyes fell to her legs, tan and flawlessly shaped, as they spilled out of the pair of denim shorts she was sporting.

“The beautiful thing about promises”—he couldn’t resist adding—“some are meant to be broken.” Dylan found himself taken further by the way she briefly turned back to face him, with a set of raised eyebrows that said “oh,really?” as if that alone was the only reply needed.

Saying her goodbyes to her new friends, Chloe swung her purse on her shoulder, skillfully chucked her empty coffee cup into the trash bin, and walked out of the shop, never once again acknowledging Dylan.

With a dagger-like look aimed right for him, Mitch—the no-holds-barred one of the bunch—held his cup to his mouth with a chuckle and said, “Now that woman is what a fella back in my day would have classified as trouble.”

They all laughed.

That is, all but Dylan.

Instead, he threw the towel into the sanitizer bucket, feeling defeated.

Because trouble, was the third thing he tried with all his might to avoid.