Sugarbaby Read Online Free PDF Page A

expanding inside my chest, making me soft and giddy. The cloudy sensation spread through me, floating through my limbs, then my tummy, where it whisked and tickled.
    There was a feather-light niggle in my head, as if I had seen this guy before—and it wasn’t in any dream.
    Carley shut the door so as not to attract attention. Then she whispered below the soft Pistol Annies music Jackie had playing.
    â€œSee?” she asked with a grin that reminded me a lot of the expressions Jackie and Juanita had on. “One of those guys is your future boyfriend.”
    Giggles from in back of us. The Greek Chorus was listening in.
    â€œBe serious,” I whispered. “You know I’ve got zero energy for an actual boyfriend right now.” I was still grieving, still trying to find my footing after Rex and Micah, still testing the waters. No way did I have the confidence to strut out there in front of . . .
him
. He was the big leagues. Rex had been Big League, too, and look what’d happened there.
    â€œExcuses, excuses.” Carley lowered her voice even more so Jackie and Juanita couldn’t hear. “Weren’t you the one sexting the other night?”
    â€œAccidentally.” She’d teased me about it for days since Diana hadn’t been able to keep her pie hole closed. “Besides, I don’t like to mix work with pleasure.”
    â€œ
You
don’t seem to mix pleasure with anything.” She was at full volume now. “You’ve got the goods, babe. Use them.”
    She was serious. She thought that I, one of many pixels in Aidan Falls, had a shot with a fully formed blond god.
    Thank goodness my skin tone could hide a blush. But, come on, I’d seen handsome before. Rex and Micah were hot.
    â€œHe’s cute,” I said. “But not for me.”
    â€œHe’s intimidatingly cute. No, wait. ‘Cute’ is not even a word for this situation. And I say this as a girl who totally has a boyfriend she adores.”
    She let out a sigh, and it wasn’t just an excited sigh about seeing Bret again tonight. It was laced with anxiety.
    â€œJitters?” I asked, seeing an opportunity to change the subject.
    Carley bit. “A little jittery. I mean, I haven’t been with Bret in ages, and there were nights when he didn’t call or text and I had to wonder . . . You know.”
    She’d wondered if he’d lost interest after their spring and summer whirlwind romance, which had been interrupted every so often by his trips out of town to gig with the band he’d joined after they’d started dating, after she’d given him the confidence to share his poetry with the world. He was also working on a house refurbishment with a friend who’d hired him.
    I’d been through the same doubts with Rex. Bad direction to go.
    â€œLadies,” said Jackie from behind us, “those boys must be dying of thirst by now.”
    Carley snapped out of it and gave a chipper salute just before she pointed at me and swung out the door to the dining room. I backed away so the customers wouldn’t see that I’d been standing there gaping. As the door winged back toward me, Jackie nodded toward the dining room.
    â€œSalt and pepper shakers won’t fill up themselves,” she said.
    Juanita giggled. Maybe they
could
see me blushing.
    â€œAre y’all going to scurry over here and spy through the door crack after I leave, just to see if the magic happens?” Which it wouldn’t.
    Juanita held up a hand. “Count me in.”
    Jackie threw a hand towel my way, and I ducked.
    â€œGet,” she said.
    Rolling my eyes, I picked up the towel, went to deposit it in the hamper, then washed up. I decided to stall ever so slightly as I put on my apron, then came back to grab some salt and pepper to take to the dining area. As I backed up to push open the door with my rear, Jackie and Juanita finger waved at me, and I