“Why not?”
“Because he’s a man,” Trevor said, exasperated. “What’s next? A pink sweater?”
She shrugged sheepishly. “I think he looks cute in pink.”
The dog whimpered near the door, drawing their attention. “Alright, I’m coming,” she said, walking over to the dog and clipping the leash onto a really cheap thin collar that wouldn’t do.
“Do you know if the convenience store on Washburn sells dog food?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at him.
“He doesn’t have any food?” Trevor asked, wondering why she took the damn thing when she clearly didn’t know what the hell she was doing.
“I gave him the baggie of food they sent home, but I don’t think that was enough,” she said, frowning as she stumbled over the dog and opened the door.
She really didn’t have a clue, Trevor decided. “You don’t want to feed him any of that shit they sell at convenience stores. I’ll look and see what I can find here, but you’re going to have to run out tomorrow and get him some proper supplies.”
“Proper supplies,” Zoe repeated with a look that said she had no idea what the hell she was supposed to get.
Praying for patience, Trevor gestured for her to move her ass before the dog took a leak on his floor. “I’ll go with you to the pet store tomorrow, but after that you’re on your own,” he said.
“Thank-eek!” Zoe let out another adorable squeak as the dog yanked her to the front door. “Toby!” she cried, and Trevor shook his head in disgust, a sissy name on top of a pink collar. Poor bastard, he thought as he headed for Zoe’s kitchen.
A quick search through the mostly bare cabinets had him scowling and the search through her practically empty refrigerator had him fuming. He knew that she hadn’t forgotten to go shopping. One look at the insane price tag on the box of twigs some sick bastard had the nerve to call food let him know that money wasn’t the issue.
She had no meat, no cheese, condiments, juice, milk, or anything with flavor. Instead, one entire shelf in her refrigerator was stocked with bottles of spring water and one drawer held a large bag of salad mix and half a cucumber. The only real food in the fridge was the stuff she used to make up his lunches and that only took up half a shelf. He didn’t need to look to know that she wasn’t eating any of it.
He shut the door with more force than was necessary and leaned back against it. She was starving herself and he had absolutely no idea what the hell he should do about it. After a minute of stressing out about it, Trevor decided that it wasn’t his place to do jack shit about it. She was a grown woman with a level head on her shoulders. If she was hungry, she’d eat. Yelling at her would only cause problems that he didn’t need at the moment, so for now, he would let it go.
Chapter 11
“But that one’s pretty!” Zoe pointed out as Trevor simply sighed while he grabbed the pretty pink princess dog toy out of the carriage and returned it to the shelf.
“He’s a male, Zoe. He needs man toys,” Trevor stressed, picking up a dull brown rope and tossing it into the carriage along with a few, in her opinion at least, boring-looking chew toys.
She gestured to the pink princess chew toy. “Couldn’t we just get that and see if he likes-”
“No way in hell,” he said, giving her a quick swat on the ass to get her moving.
“Stop doing that,” Zoe hissed at him even as she started moving before he could do it again, and she knew he would. He simply shrugged as if it was no big deal and it probably wasn’t for him, but it was seriously screwing with her hormones.
It was just another reason for her to get her butt in gear and do something about it and she would. Right after she bought that really cute flowery pink bowl set for Toby.
“Don’t even think about it,” Trevor warned before she got into grabbing distance. He reached past her and grabbed two large metal bowls and placed them in the carriage with the rest of the stuff that he’d picked out since every one of her suggestions was met with an exasperated sigh and a few muttered choice words.
“Fine,” Zoe said, making a mental note to swing back this way after she finished with her other shopping. The same shopping that she was really nervous about. She’d put it off as long as possible, but if she wanted to make some changes in her life and meet a guy and hopefully have sex again before she was eighty, then she’d have to suck it up and do it.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Why?” Zoe asked, stepping past him and that gaze of his that made her feel like he knew what she was thinking. What she had planned tonight was bad enough. She didn’t need him finding out.
Jumping back into sex by having a one-night stand wasn’t exactly something she wanted to share, especially with Trevor, who would never understand. It wasn’t as if she’d ever done it before or even planned to make it a habit, but it was something that she needed to do. Not just because she really missed and needed sex again or that she was sure she would die if she didn’t have it soon, which she was, but because she didn’t think her self-esteem could take the hit if she ended up dating a guy only to have him run the other way when he saw her naked for the first time.
Her self-esteem wouldn’t be able to handle a rejection of that level. Tonight was the test. She was going to find a man that she was relatively attracted to and take a chance. If he took one look at her naked body and made a run for it, then she’d know that she had more work to do before she pursued any relationship. If, on the other hand, the man wasn’t repulsed, and they had sex then, she’d feel more confident about moving forward with her plans.
“Hey,” Trevor said, lightly tapping her on the nose.
“What?” Zoe asked, slightly startled.
“I asked if you saw the dog treats anywhere. I think we went past the aisle,” he said, craning his neck to look around.
