“With?”
“You. This.” She waved her finger at me, sort of taking in my slouch, my messy desk, my pile of tiny ripped up pieces of paper standing like a mountain, a snowstorm, an avalanche between my Snape and Dr. Orpheusdolls.
“Nothing’s going on.” She’d buy that, right? Because it wasn’t like I was feeling the dread, the horrible something-is-going-wrong-really-soonthing.
As a matter of fact, it was sort of the lack of that feeling that was making meitchy.
Hogan and I had been dating for months.Months. I couldn’t remember the time I’d dated a boy for more than a few weeks. By Halloween, Hogan and I would have been dating for half a year. That was not like me. I was the fun one, the young one, the sister who wasn’t looking for a full-timemister.
And yet Hogan had shown up in my life (okay, I’d totally hit on him until he sent me fancy donuts to get me off his back) and he just hadn’t...left.
That’s not how things worked for me. All my past boyfriends, and yeah, that one girl I’d messed around with in middle school, had left as soon as the fun ran out, as soon as the laughs ranout.
I did not blame them. Who wanted to date adoomsayer?
Noone.
No one wanted tobea doomsayer either. But I didn’t get a choice inthat.
Delaney snapped her fingers in my face. “Testing, testing. Do you copy, RubberDuck?”
“Annoying.” I pushed her hand away, but smiled. She was funny.Sometimes.
“Talk.” Delaney rolled a chair over and sat. I watched to see if any of her injuries were bothering her today. She wasn’t favoring her side at all, which was good. It still made me furious that she’d beenshot.
This was a small town. We didn’t solve our problems with guns, no matter what the big city folk would like tobelieve.
Okay. We didn’t do it veryoften.
“I don’t want to be on gnomeduty.”
“Liar.Next.”
“There is nonext.”
“Jean.”
“Delaney.”
She just stared at me with those big sistereyes.
I blew out a breath. “Fine. It’s almost been six months since I’ve been seeingHogan.”
“And?” she asked when I didn’t say anythingelse.
“Six months is a longtime.”
She sighed. “I thought that’s what you wanted? A long-term relationship? Something more than just friends? Or are you getting bored withhim?”
My phone chimed with a message fromHogan.
SexyMuffin:All out of frosting. Rolled through a metric ton of pumpkin-spice cinnamon buns in a half hour flat. Who’s a baking god? Worship at the altar,baby.
I grinned, then texted backquick.
Hotcop: No! You didn’t save one for me? *crack goes my heart* You’re a terriblegod.
SexyMuffin: If only I’d saved some frosting, I’d patch that heart right up foryou.
