Page 25 of Love in Fine Print

“Oh please, stop being so dramatic.”

“Isn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?”

Trevor grinned. “If the shoe fits, Cinderella.”

I was too tired and in too much pain to keep up with our usual banter. I closed my eyes and leaned back in the chair. I had barely slept the last few nights, which I’d love to blame on the pain I was in, but that wasn’t what was keeping me awake. That distinction was reserved for the man who had just shown up at my door. With his big green eyes, perfect lips, manly smell, arm porn biceps…

Trevor’s phone buzzed interrupting my mental list of all things Ben.

I opened my eyes and saw that he was staring down at his screen with what could only be described as an evil mastermind grin. All that was missing was a handlebar mustache for him to twist.

“What?” I asked.

“It looks like Ben knows that you’re all bark and no bite.”

“Excuse me?”

“He has a match for you.”

“A match?”

Trevor nodded and turned the phone around showing me a picture of an attractive man with brown hair and light eyes. Helooked like he belonged in a frame with a wife, two kids, and a golden retriever.

Golden retriever. Dolly.

Suddenly a picture popped up in my head of myself, Ben, Dolly, and two kids. I shook my head trying to erase the image like a mental Etch-A-Sketch, but it didn’t work. The unsettling family photo was seared into my subconscious.

Clearing my throat, I sat up straighter in my chair and did my best to conceal the direction my mind had just gone. “I told him I didn’t need his services.”

“Well, apparently, you didn’t make yourself clear.”

“I always make myself clear.”

“Then it looks like Ben is going rogue.” Trevor shivered as if a chill had run through his body. “Oh, I do love a bad boy.”

Ben wasn’t a bad boy. He was a good man. A Tim McGraw level real good man. And I had little to no self-control around him, which was why I’d kicked him out of my home. I was scared that if I didn’t, I’d do something stupid, like admit my attraction to him. Or tell him my life story. Or strip naked and ask him if he wanted to play Twister. Or all three.

Clearly, he didn’t feel the same way about me since he’d just set me up on a date.

Trevor was right, Ihadgotten every man I wanted. This would be the first rejection of my life. Not that it was a rejection. I hadn’t propositioned him in any way.

Still, I had to admit it stung that he could so easily set me up with another man. My feelings, for the first time in my life, were unrequited.

Not knowing what to say or do about my current rejected state, I stood. I needed to go to my office. I needed to be alone. I needed air. I needed someone to sage my apartment and rid it of all the Ben that lingered behind.

“Have fun on your date,” Trevor called out as I left.

I looked over my shoulder and insisted, “I’m not going on the date,”

Trevor smiled; it was his smug, smirky I-know-something-you-don’t-know smile that he donned when he was absolutely certain he had the upper hand in a situation. It had always amused me because, typically, it wasn’t directed toward me. This time, I was the target, and it wasn’t so amusing.

10

BEN

“Listen,we’re both men. I’m not gonna bullshit you. I want someone who I will be proud to walk down the street with. People who say that looks don’t matter are lying their asses off. She needs to be hot. And not clingy. I don’t want someone who freaks out if I don’t text back. She has to keep our private life, well, private. I don’t want a bunch of pictures of us on Instagram. I don’t want to do TikTok. And speaking of social media, I don’t want to be with someone who posts thirst traps.” Rex Greene leaned back in his leather chair and puffed on the cigar he was smoking. “Do you know what those are?”

I was surprised that there wasn’t blood in my mouth from biting my tongue. “Yes.”

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