“When do I start?”
“Give me a couple of days to run things past Jade,” Toby said.
Nate’s stomach clenched. What the hell had he gotten himself into?
Chapter 4
Jade sat in the teacher staff room eating last night’s spaghetti marinara, annoyed because a drop of red sauce had splashed onto her cream-colored blouse. Rubbing it with a napkin had only made it worse, and now it looked like she’d been stabbed in the heart.
Toby entered the room, and his gaze went straight to the crime scene. “You really need to keep spare clothes at work or wear a hazmat suit.”
Crumpling her napkin, she aimed it at his head, but it didn’t have enough force to hit its mark. He chuckled.
“What are you doing here anyway?” she asked. “I thought you had a meeting with the education department.”
“They postponed it, so decided I’d have lunch with my favorite teacher.” He pulled out a seat, sat next to her, and unwrapped his sandwich.
“Don’t let Simone hear you say that. How many times today has she needed you in her classroom to help with a problem?”
Toby sighed then ran a hand through his golden-brown hair which had a tenancy to fall over his forehead. “Twice.”
“You need to tell her you’re not interested.”
Taking off his black-framed glasses, he put them on the table and rubbed his eyes. “I’ve tried, she’s not listening. I don’t want to talk about Simone, I’ve got good news for you.”
Jade sat up straight in her chair. “You do?”
“Yes. I found a teacher for your music program.”
Slapping her hands over her heart, she bounded off the chair. “That’s fantastic, Toby. How did you manage it? I really thought we’d have so much trouble finding someone who’d do it for free.”
“An old friend of mine, who’s a music genius, is staying in town for a few weeks. But don’t get too excited, once he leaves, we’re going to have to find a replacement.”
“That will give us time to work something out,” she said as she paced the small room. “I need to get the hall ready, the instruments will need tuning, I’ll send out a newsletter notifying families…” Dropping back in the seat, she placed her elbows on the table and plonked her chin in her hands. “This guy is awesome for doing this. I love him already. In fact, I’ll give him my first-born child for doing such a wonderful thing for these kids. No one wants to give their time to us for nothing. I owe him a huge kiss. When do I get to meet him?”
Toby nodded in the direction of the door behind her. “Right now. Jade, meet Nate Miller.”
A flush of heat crept up her neck and over her face. She wanted to slide under the table, but it was too late to hide and pretend the music teacher hadn’t heard her. She turned slowly in the chair.
“Hello, Freckles.” A smirk played on his lips.
Tilting her head to the side, her eyes narrowed as she took in the tall stranger with dark, sandy blond hair in Toby’s office. But why had he called her Freckles? No one except the nasty singer from the concert called her… Wait…could it be?
She looked at the sexy, crooked grin on his face then gasped. “It’s you!”
Toby eyed them both. “You know each other?”
“Yes,” Nate answered.
“No,” Jade responded.
“Hmm, that really clears things up.”
“We’ve met—kind of—but we don’t know each other,” Jade explained.
Toby put his glasses back on and slid them up his nose, looking at Nate with a raised eyebrow like he was asking him for a better explanation.
“Remember what I told you the other night about the wig incident?”
