But no sign of a burly firefighter with kaleidoscope hazel eyes that make it so that I can never quite tell what he’s thinking, full lips that often wear an amused smile like he’s laughing at me or none at all—I can’t decide which is worse—and a massive frame that could probably lift a bus off the ground in an emergency situation.
I breeze inside to my office. It’s as silent as when I left late last night. But not for long. Soon, Mindy sits at her desk, typing furiously. Thomas—our resident data nerd with his collection of superhero figurines—waves without looking up from his spreadsheet. Pauline, the maternal presence who keeps us all fed with homemade cookies, sips gingerly from a mug of tea.
“You look tired, dear,” she says.
“I’m fine.”
“That’s what my daughter says right before she has a breakdown. Seems to happen once a month like clockwork.”
I frown. “I’m not having a breakdown.”
“Yet.” She pats my shoulder and returns to her desk.
Frowning, I get up to refill my coffee and make some photocopies. It cannot be helped, I glance through the glass wall into the office opposite mine. It’s empty, vacant. Much like Patton’s heart.
I wait while Thomas tinkers with the perpetually broken copier and Mindy slides next to me, leans against the counter, and releases a forlorn sigh like a woman in one of the Regency novels my friend Peony likes.
She says, “Austin hasn’t called or texted.”
“He’s probably been busy.”
“I’m afraid he’s not interested.”
“There are other fish in the lake.”
“Like trout?”
I shrug. “Bass, salmon, mountain whitefish.”
She gazes into the middle distance. “Let’s take a morning roll call of eligible men in this building. There’s Austin ‘James Bond’ James. Smooth with the ladies, once escaped a car fire like an action hero, and currently not flirting with me.”
I take a sip of coffee, wishing the immediate thought of Patton when the subject of men comes across my mental dashboard didn’t make my brain scramble. I did not order eggs for breakfast, thank you very much!
She continues, “Then we have Scotty ‘The Lumberjack’ Hodges. Not specifically because he’s outdoorsy, but because he looks like he spends a lot of time chopping wood. He has a one hundred percent success rate at saving the family cat during fires.”
“Legend,” Thomas whispers reverently.
“James ‘Dean’ Sutton. Brooding, mysterious, possibly navigating some rocky relationship stuff.”
“He’s off-limits.” I became good friends with his wife, Peony. While I’m not exactly sure of their status, Mindy will not be venturing into those waters.
“Then we have Reese. He’s unattached.”
“Possibly,” Thomas pipes up. “There are rumors that he had a very merry kissmas.”
I say, “Peony describes him as a real Tigger of a man.”
“Like from Winnie the Pooh?”
“Energetic, slightly chaotic. He’d need an Eeyore to balance him out and you are not a grump, Mindy, making for an incomplete pairing.”
“Let’s not forget about ‘Handsome’ Hayes Hanson. The rookie. Baby face. As cute as can be.”
Thomas adds, “Questionable decision-making skills. I heard he once tried to put out a grease fire with glitter.”
“He’s learning,” Pauline calls from her desk.
“That would make you a cougar,” I tell Mindy, since she’s a few years older than Hayes is.
