He should’ve been relieved. Wasn’t like he wanted the expectations of having a date at a wedding. Still, long after he’d walked her out to her car and seen her off, he was puzzling over how he was going to handle finding the perfect woman.
Because despite how long Momma’d been saying women were perfection, this was the first time in his life he’d ever found evidence she might be right.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The perfection he found in one woman made the imperfections in the rest all the more obvious.
—The Temptress of Pecan Lane, by Mae Daniels
Anna credited Neil’s text message Sunday night to drunken texting. Because why else would he send her a message asking how she’d been since they hadn’t talked in a while?
But when she got a second one Thursday afternoon at work, in the middle of the day, followed by an email to the same effect, she couldn’t deny he was talking toher. On purpose.
So she deleted the messages and called Beth.
“Molar extraction going on here, Anna-banana,” her sister said. “Make it quick.”
“Neil texted me.”
“You still have his number in your phone?”
“Well, yeah. How else am I supposed to avoid his phone calls?”
Beth’s sigh echoed through the lab. Jules was at a staff meeting, and Anna was supposed to be proofreading more reports.
“Who’s that friend you keep talking about? Kaci? I need her number,” Beth said.
“Why?”
“So she can steal your phone and delete Neil.”
“But the next time he texts, I won’t know it’s him, and I won’t know to not answer.”
“Good! Saywho the fuck is this?—sorry Trina, I’ll get a quarter—and let him get the hint that you’ve moved on with your life.”
A loud crash boomed behind Anna. Heart leaping, she spun in her chair. Jules was in the doorway. A stack of binders were scattered on the floor.
“I’m getting back to this extraction, and you’re deleting him,” Beth said. “Delete. Him. Understand?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“God, you need to get out of the South.” The line clicked off.
“Hey, Jules,” Anna said, her pulse thinking about settling back into a normal rhythm. “What’s up?”
Other than the guest speaker—on the topics depression and spousal abuse—at the staff meeting. Anna wasn’t invited to staff meetings, so she had no idea how it had gone over.
Her optimism only went so far, and Jules’s lip-curl didn’t look positive.
“Your new sample-tracking color-coding system was the toast of the town.” Jules nudged the binders. “Shirley wants the last two years of data synced to match. Preferably by next week. Corporate’s coming.”
Anna whimpered. Someone wanted to sink her happy boat. Not that she didn’t appreciate color-coding. Like Jackson said, it was her calling. But her first round of tests were soon, and she’d signed up to get officially certified on all the lab equipment.
The fun kept coming.
“Hope you didn’t have any weekend plans,” Jules said.
None that she was excited about. “Not really. How about you guys?”
