Page 42 of Falling for the Playboy Pilot

16

JANNA

After my crying jag yesterday, I felt remarkably lighter. It was long overdue. I just wished it wouldn’t have happened at such an inopportune time. It would have been better if I could have made it back to our room to lose my shit, but that was what happened when you held back for too long.

“Ready?” Cheryl asked as she stepped out of the bathroom.

“Yep.”

We were off for the day. Unless there was a fire and we got called in. Cheryl was taking me into town for a girls’ day, which was nothing more than lunch, shopping for basic toiletries, and Cheryl wanted to get her haircut.

“Lunch first,” Cheryl said. “I’m starving.”

Martha’s Diner was a little greasy spoon serving all the basics on the menu. Pictures of deer, bears, and forests covered the walls. The smell of French fries and burgers filled the space and my stomach rumbled in excitement.

“What’s good?” I asked.

Cheryl looked around. “Anything except for the gravy.”

“The gravy?”

“Shh,” she whispered. “It’s lumpy and salty, but everything else is good.”

I laughed. “Noted.”

A waitress appeared and we both ordered burgers. I got mushrooms on mine while Cheryl got avocado and tomato. Our sodas were delivered soon after.

“I can’t believe I’m even hungry,” Cheryl said with a laugh. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so glad to share a living space with a bunch of pigs. I would have devoured those cookies myself. My hips do not need twenty-four cookies. My plane will need extra fuel.”

I chuckled, taking a sip of my soda. “When I’m stressed, I bake. When I’m happy, I bake. Basically, I like to bake. And when I mean bake, I mean cookies. I’m not much of a baker of cakes and pies, but I love cookies.”

“Me too, and judging by the crumbs left behind, everyone else loved them too,” she said.

After a bit, our burgers arrived and we dug in. I moaned and nodded. “Perfection.”

We were halfway through our meals when a woman appeared.

“Martha!” Cheryl jumped up and hugged the woman. “I hoped you would be here.”

“Can I join you ladies?” Martha asked. She was carrying her own basket of fries.

“Please,” Cheryl said.

“And who’s this lovely young woman with you today?”

“This is Janna,” Cheryl said. “She’s new with the squad. Fresh off the boat.”

I smiled and offered my hand, which Martha took with both of hers. Her long hair, brown with plenty of gray streaking its way through, was in a braid draped over one shoulder. Her cheeks were flushed and she wore no makeup. I guessed her to be in her fifties, maybe a little older.

She was wearing an apron with “Martha’s Diner” emblazoned on the front. It clicked she must be the owner.

Martha was a little round but not overweight. Curvy. That was what my mom would say. A woman who enjoyed her cooking.

“You’re one of our new guardian angels, then?” Martha said.

I looked at Cheryl with some confusion.

“Martha calls us her guardian angels,” Cheryl said. “Because of what we do.”