The first one was too casual. The second was too “I’m trying to look like I didn’t try.” The third had a coffee stain I’d forgotten about. The fourth is the same as the first, which means I’ve essentially accomplished nothing except proving to Austen that I’m a disaster.
He’s watching me from his spot on the register, tail flicking with judgment.
“Don’t glare at me like that,” I tell him. “This is a professional meeting. I need to dress my best.”
He blinks slowly, which in cat language means “You run a bookstore in a beach town and you’re worried about looking good for a man you claim to dislike.”
“I do dislike him.”
Another blink. “You’ve checked the front window three times to see if he’s coming.”
“I was looking at the...weather.”
“It’s July. In North Carolina. The weather is hot. It’s been sweltering for weeks. You’re spiraling.”
I hate that my cat is right.
“You’re talking to Austen again,” Caroline observes from where she’s pretending to dust the shelves. “Out loud. With pauses like he’s responding.”
“Heisresponding. He’s very articulate.”
“He’s a cat.”
“With opinions.”
“You need help.” But she’s grinning. “You also need to stop changing clothes. The first cardigan was fine.”
“That one says ‘I woke up like this.’”
“And that’s bad because...?”
“Because I didn’t wake up like this! I woke up like a nervous wreck who practiced saying ‘hello, Scott’ in the mirror until it stopped sounding like words!”
Caroline stares at me. “You practiced saying hello?”
“It’s a complicated word when you’re saying it to someone irritatingly attractive.”
“You just called him irritatingly attractive.”
“I said no such thing.”
“You absolutely did. I’m writing it down.” She pulls out her phone. “For posterity. And blackmail.”
“Don’t you have class?”
“Not until noon. I’m not missing this.” She grins with the gleeful malice of someone who’s about to watch a disaster unfold. “Michelle says the tension between you and Scott could be seen from space.”
“Michelle needs to stop analyzing my personal life like it’s a romance novel.”
“You literally own a romance novel bookstore. Your personal life is a romance novel. You’re just in denial about what chapter you’re in.”
Before I can respond, the bell above the door chimes, and Scott Avery walks in carrying a cardboard tray of coffee cupsand looking like a man who got dressed in the dark and still somehow landed on “casually devastating.”
He’s wearing jeans.
Jeans.
I’ve never seen Scott Avery in jeans. I didn’t know he owned clothes that weren’t professionally dry-cleaned. I half-expected his closet to be just rows of identical suits, like a cartoon character.
