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About a year after Ray had died, he’d waited for Kelly to start dating again, but it never happened. The one time a friend had tried to set her up, she’d called him because she was sick to her stomach. He’d come up for the weekend with ginger ale and a couple movies, and she’d blown off the date. He hadn’t heard her talk about it since. Did she ogle actors in her favorite movies and television shows? Absolutely, but he hadn’t heard her talk about a real man. Not until those papers had shown up, suing her for a lousy date. It was almost comical that anyone could have a bad time with Kelly. She was amazing.
And despite working together and spending most of their free time together, they’d managed to stay friends.
Now, she was going to meet someone and what if it wasn’t like with Ray? What if the new guy was jealous of their friendship? If the guy didn’t get their Star Wars jokes or their obsession with Korean television dramas? Not that he’d ever admit to Kelly that he liked the shows she forced him to watch, but all of that would be gone if she got serious with someone.
Chris shook his head at the direction of his thoughts. He really did sound like a complete, selfish asshole. Kelly was his friend and she deserved to be happy. Just because she was dating, didn’t mean that things had to change for them.
And even if it did, he would still be there for her. They had been through too much to drift apart because of some faceless guy.
A faceless guy who’s going to do everything I’ve been doing for her, but he’ll be getting perks.
Chris jumped as the thought came unbidden. Perks? With Kelly?
No, he didn’t want that. And he didn’t care if she called the future guy to fix her door, or grab her donuts or come over to kill a spider.
Chris was completely fine with it.
Chapter 3
The next day at work, Kelly sat at her computer and scrolled through the emails she’d gotten overnight on TheLastFirstKiss.com. There were fifteen in total, and the first four she’d already slipped into the trash bin on principle. Men who started off emails with Baby, you are so hot or damn, you got a nice frame did not even warrant a response. She clicked on number five, sent from a guy with the username FishGuy79, and smiled.
Hey WeddingGrl31. I promise, if you let me take you out, I will not bore you once. Okay, maybe once, but if you snore, I won’t hold it against you.
This guy was funny, which held promise. She hopped over to his profile and…
Good God, that was a long ass beard. Like Duck Dynasty on Rogaine long.
Kelly tilted her head to the side, considering if he shaved it, he might not be so bad.
She’d put him in the maybe pile. She could handle a guy with a beard if he kept it trim. And the flannel lumberjack look could be sexy.
When she clicked onto the next email for OneFineEvoDude she smiled. He sounded intelligent. At least he could form full sentences with proper grammar and punctuation. Several emails had been nothing but short hand, and it had been hard to decipher what some of the abbreviations meant.
She wrinkled her nose when she clicked on his name and saw his picture. Kelly couldn’t even say whether he was attractive or not. She was too distracted by everything else. He was wearing a neon yellow tank top and sporting a man bun next to his powder-blue Prius.
Nope. Beards she could handle, but hipsters with man buns were out.
Kelly sank back into her chair with a sigh, completely deflated. It was Friday morning, and tonight most single people would be getting ready for their dates. Yet she’d scrolled through what seemed like hundreds of profiles and there was not one that sparked anything in her. No interest. Not even a flick of curiosity.
She stood up and ran her hand along her bookshelf. It was filled with bridal magazines, wedding planning books, and a handful of romance novels mixed in for her down time that Rylie had told her she had to read. Across her office on the red, textured wall were framed accomplishments. Her wedding for actress Mia Ryder splashed across the cover of People. A framed copy of her first commission check. A “Thank You” letter from Governor Marcus Barker after she had managed to arrange for his son to parachute in for his own wedding while on leave from the military.
None of these things filled the lonely space in her heart that wanted a man of her own.
Someone knocked on her office door, and she ran around the back of her desk, skidding in her stocking feet on the wood floor. She caught herself on the desk and closed the screen quickly. She did not need any of her employees seeing what she’d been searching. The only person she’d told about TheLastFirstKiss.com was Chris.
“Come in!”
Veronica Torres poked her head in, her dark hair hanging in loose waves. “Hey, boss, there is a weird guy here saying you have an appointment.”
“Weird how?” Kelly knew she had an appointment with actor Hank Townsend regarding his little sister’s wedding, but Hank wasn’t what she’d consider weird. Hot. Panty-melting, definitely. He had to be to land some of the highest-paying roles in Hollywood. Women didn’t watch action flicks because they enjoyed planes blowing up and elaborate car chases. At least, she didn’t. And she had every movie he’d ever made on her shelf.
Yeah, she might have been a wee bit obsessed with him and trying hard to hold her inner fan-girl at bay.
Veronica lowered her voice to a stage whisper, her red lips twisted in disapproval. “He’s wearing one of those stupid fake glasses and nose things and he’s talking in a really bizarre accent.”
“I can hear you, you know,” a deep, Scottish brogue said dryly from out of sight.
Veronica shrugged. “I know.”
