And I don’t have dry skin.
She closed her eyes again, fully cooled down from her earlier run. Her anger was fading, too, as long as she didn’t think about Tanner. She didn’t want to think about anything, except maybe falling asleep right here...
“Anita?”
Her eyes flew open, and she turned her head.Unbelievable.She scrambled up off the floor and marched over to Tanner.
“What are you doing inmyhouse?”
Chapter19
Tanner stumbled back a step. He’d never seen her this angry before, and even though he was still furious himself, it gave him pause. Then again, he had just walked into her house. When he’d pulled into her driveway and seen her door ajar, panic had set in, and he’d hurried inside, only to find her sleeping on the floor. He also saw her skirt hiked up and showing more of her legs than he’d ever seen before. That included the white dress at Harper’s party and the pajama shorts she’d had on last week, and those were plenty short. For a quick moment he’d forgotten why he was there. Unreal. Even when he was hopping mad at her, he couldn’t stop being attracted to her.
“You left the door open,” he said, forcing himself to remain calm. When she shrugged, however, he lost the last shred of composure he had. How could she be so cavalier about her own safety? “You’re lucky it was me instead of some stranger,” he snapped.
She frowned and crossed her arms. “I know everyone in this town. No one’s a stranger.”
That was true, not that it made any difference. He’d driven halfway home before turning around and heading for her house. He was still fuming, but since tomorrow morning was the meeting at the diner with all the employees, he and Anita needed to hash this out privately. The last thing he wanted was an emotional blowup in front of everyone, and the chances of that were high if they didn’t talk tonight.
“You still haven’t answered my question.” She tapped her foot and glared at him. “What are you doing here?”
“We need to talk.”
“It’s a little late for that.” She dropped her arms. “Why didn’t you tell me you bought the diner?”
“Why didn’t you tell me about the café?”
She opened her mouth then closed it again. “Why would I?”
He gaped at her. “What?”
“We’re only coworkers—”
“I thought we were more than that.”
“Oh, right.” She was crossing her arms again. “We’resupposedto befriends. That’s why you told me about buying the diner, so I didn’t have to find out in front of a bunch of our customers.”
He shoved the stab of guilt aside. “Do all your friends know about the café?”
“Harper and Olivia do.”
“Anyone else?”
“Do all of your friends know? What about all the employees? Or am I the last on your list to tell?”
He scowled. “Stop deflecting.”
“I’m not. I’ve been working at Sunshine for ten years. Longer than you and everyone else except Mabel and Fred. Don’t you think I had the right to know you were buying it?”
“I—”
“Forget it. You didn’t think about me at all. Out of sight, out of mind. Just like always.”
He moved closer to her. “If you’d let me finish a sentence, I can explain.”
“Yeah, like you were going to explain about Heather. I’m still waiting for that.”
Ouch. But even though he understood her anger, panic over his business bypassed common sense. “Did you think for a minute about Sunshine, or your coworkers, when you bought #3?”
