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d the women in the room with a hard look. “But if this goes south, I’m holding you three responsible. You hear me?”
“It won’t go south. I promise,” a voice said through the door.
On a chuckle, Gage moved toward it and pulled it open.
Deva stood tall from her hunched position, where she’d clearly had her ear pressed to the door, her face flushing with embarrassment, but I had to give her props for standing her ground. “Sorry. I know listening in is wrong. However, I mean what I say. This won’t go south. I give you my word.”
I really fucking hoped I didn’t live to regret this. “Fine,” I grumbled reluctantly, holding up my index finger. “But one misstep, and you’re out. No second chances.”
She nodded so enthusiastically it was a shock she didn’t give herself whiplash. “No second chances necessary.”
I let out a heavy sigh. Damn, but I needed coffee. “All right. Then it looks like you’re hired.”
I sent up a silent prayer: Please God, don’t let this be a huge mistake.
Chapter
Five
DEVA
I got the job.
There was still a part of me that couldn’t believe it.
I felt like I was floating as I started down the hall toward the lobby. The relief I felt was nearly enough to take me to my knees. However, while I was ecstatic that I got the job, that didn’t mean the hard part was over. In fact, I was silently dreading what came next.
I pushed through to door on autopilot, stepping out onto the sidewalk as my head spun with thoughts of everything I had to do now that I was employed and finally starting the life I’d been dreaming of for as long as I could remember.
There was a huge difference between fantasizing about something and it actually becoming a reality, and now that I held my dream in my hand, I quickly realized I was ill prepared for what was to come. As a gust of wind blew past me, lifting up the ends of my hair and making them sway, I was hit with a few hard, bitter truths I hadn’t stopped to think about.
The first being that even though I’d been the one in the hot seat during that interview, I was basically going to pack up my entire life and move in with a complete stranger. Avery bigstranger with hard eyes, tattoos, and language so foul it made me blush.
The second was the fact that, despite all those negatives about my new boss, there was still something about him that pulled at me. I’d struggled to keep my eyes off him the entire meeting, and the heat from my blush still kept my cheeks warm. It was a feeling I’d never experienced before. The closest I’d ever come was when Josiah Smith smiled at me after church one Sunday nearly ten years ago. There had been a momentary flutter in my belly, but that small flutter wasn’t worth the lectures I’d received from the Oakeses for having the audacity to return his smile. Whatever I might have felt was extinguished in that moment, then long forgotten.
Until that interview.
The last truth was that the Oakes’s weren’t going to take it well when I told them I was moving out. After my father pawned me off on them when I was little, Sherman and Agnes Oakes never hesitated to tell me how much I owed them for taking me in, for putting a roof over my head and food in my belly. There wasn’t a single doubt they’d take my leaving as a betrayal.
Mathias was a whole different story. One I was dreading.
Truthfully, there wasn’t much I had back at the Oakes’s, and I would have gladly left it all behind, but the one and only thing I ever had that belonged to my mother was there, and I didn’t have the heart to leave it behind.
I turned to my bike that was propped up against the side of the building right where I left it and felt myself deflate.
I was trying to figure out how in the world I could get my mother’s prized Singer sewing machine back down the mountain in the tiny basket attached to the front when I heard a voice call out “Yoo-hoo! Hey, darlin’?” I lifted my head and spotted Myra shuffling down the sidewalk in my direction, shopping bags hanging from her arms and swaying back and forth as shewaved. “I’m so glad I caught you. I took a chance and decided to head down here to see if we’d cross paths.” She held up her arms to indicate the bags. “I admit, I got here a little early, did a bit of retail therapy.” She stopped in front of me, leaning in to press an affectionate kiss to my cheek before pulling back and giving me wide, curious eyes. “So? How’d it go?”
“I got the job,” I answered, my head still somewhat muddled.
The excitement melted from her features, replaced by concern as she took in my expression. “What’s wrong? You don’t seem excited. Isn’t this a good thing?”
I shook myself out of the haze that had grown thick and static since the interview ended and I left the office. “Yes, I’m sorry. I am, and it is. It’s a very good thing. I suppose... Well, it seems I hadn’t really thought all of this through. I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed at the moment.”
She smiled, understanding shining in her kind eyes. “I get that. And that’s just another reason why I’m happy I caught you.” She leaned in and lowered her voice, like she was sharing a secret. “I’m not sure if you know this about me, but I’m quite good at un-muddling people’s heads.”
My brow furrowed.
“You talk out what’s on your mind and I can help you through it,” she explained, then transferred all of her bags to one arm and hooked her free elbow through mine. Together, we started down the sidewalk. “Come on. Walk with me. I’ll treat you to a coffee and we’ll get this all worked out.”
