Page 131 of Not That Into You

“Monica!”

My head whips up, and I spot Cameron jogging toward me.

My heart pounds as anger suffuses me with much-needed warmth.

Cameron pauses before me, looking uncertain. “Monica? What are you doing here?”

I want to smack him. I want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. “What are you doing here?”

His brows lift. “It’s my father’s event. I’m... networking.”

I snort. “With Vanessa?”

“No. I mean, I was with her, but... I’m not with her.”

My stomach plummets. He looks as guilty as he sounds. “Tell me, Cameron, is Vanessa your date tonight?”

He shakes his head. “She’s not my date.”

My nostrils flare. “Did you come together?”

He opens his mouth but then closes it as my heart drops to my stomach. His head falls with an exhale, and that’s all the confirmation I need.

I push past him and head for the door.

Chapter 36

Monica

“Hija, the bathroom is clean.”

I’m on my hands and knees, scrubbing the floor around the toilet. “One more second. I’m almost done.”

“Nica. That’s enough.”

Sighing, I sit back on my heels and regard my mother, who’s standing in the bathroom doorway. She’s about five inches shorter than me, but I’ve always felt she was larger than life.

“Did you come all the way from New York to clean my bathroom?”

“And your kitchen.”

“Because I can’t do it myself?”

I sigh. Here it comes.

“I own my own cleaning business, Nica. I clean houses for a living. I have employees. I pay those employees to clean houses. And I even train them. Do you know what I train them to do?”

It’s a rhetorical question, but she’ll only keep pushing if I don’t answer. “You train them to clean houses.”

She nods. “I train them to clean houses.”

Like I said. “I know, Ma.”

“I come home at the end of the day, and I’m tired, Nica. My feet hurt. But you think I don’t find time to clean my own home?”

“No, Mama.”

“Oh. You just think I don’t do a good enough job.”

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