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“Just once. At the Animal Rescue Foundation fundraiser. She made it apparent she wasn’t interested.”
Kailey looped her arm through his and squeezed his biceps as she rested her head on his arm.
“Her loss. You’re a catch, Dad.”
Fucking right I am.
He needed to remember that.
Maybe it was time to get back on the horse. He’d tried a few times, only to meet up with a woman from the dating app, buy her a drink, and quietly critique all the ways she was inferior to his hippy. Then he’d go home alone and whack off as the memories of being with Dakota played in his head.
That shit needed to change. He’d wallowed long enough. The next time one of his colleagues offered to set him up, he was taking it.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Aiden
Brianna pointed at the invitation hanging on his refrigerator door for Steven and Whitney’s engagement party.
“That’s tomorrow night. Are you going?”
“Nope.”
She cocked her head. “Why not? I thought you weren’t on call this weekend.”
“I’m not. I have a date.”
His youngest squealed and bounced on her heels as she clapped her hands, while Kailey just looked up from the homework she was doing at the kitchen table with raised eyebrows.
“You do? With who?”
“Her name is Denise. She works in advertising.”
“Where did you meet her?”
“Well, technically, I haven’t met her yet. She’s the friend of Dr. Cunningham’s wife, Bridget. We’ve talked on the phone a few times though.”
“Do you like her?”
“She’s seems nice.”
Brianna snickered. “Translated: she seems borrr-rring.”
Kailey shot her little sister a look, then turned to him and said brightly, “I think that’s great, Dad.”
“Isn’t it rude not to go to your friend’s party?” Brianna asked.
He’d decided when he left the Halloween store last week that he wasn’t going to give Dakota the satisfaction of simply being polite to him at the party—he just wasn’t going to go.
Then he casually let it slip to one of the physician assistants that he wouldn’t be opposed to being set up on a blind date. And that spread like wildfire.
By the next day, he had three doctors and one nurse all approach him about fixing him up with someone “just perfect” for him. Which, again, each time someone said it, he wondered,How? Is she salty and bitter, too?
He still couldn’t understand how anyone who knew him would want to send someone they actually liked on a date with him, but they did. He had three dates scheduled over the next two weeks. The fourth politely declined his invitation after talking with him on the phone.
He’d only chuckled and thought,smart girl.
“He doesn’t have to go to every party he’s invited to, Bri,” Kailey scolded. His oldest had been there when he’d asked Dakota about seeing her at the party. She knew why he wasn’t going.
