Page 26 of Employing Patience

“Stop!” I hold up a hand. “This is all wildly getting out of hand. If everyone could just keep their voices …”

My words trail off as Art steps into the entrance of the aisle. The girl, who’s obviously his niece, ducks behind him as he folds his arms over his chest.

“Out of hand?” The woman raises her bag. “You were creeping on a little boy.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Then who—”

“Him!” I throw my arm toward Art, face feeling volcanic-level hot. “I was looking at him, okay?”

Art has the fucking audacity to smirk. “Who could blame him, really?”

The woman doesn’t look ready to back down, but at least she lowers her bag.

“This was totally taken out of context. If everyone could calm down.” Holy hell, my voice is coming out all panicked.

“Sounds like the only one not calm yet is you, Joey.” Art turns a sincere smile on the woman. “I appreciate you looking out for my nephew.”

“Again, nothing to look out for.” My voice still hasn’t gotten its shit together.

“Just a suggestion,” the woman spits, pulling her bag onto her shoulder, face almost as red as mine feels. “If you weren’t spying on anyone, this wouldn’t have happened.” She leaves in a huff, and all I can do is cover my face with my hands. I count to five, hoping by some miracle Art’s left me to my shame, but when I risk looking out again, he’s standing right in front of me.

I glare up at him. “Couldn’t leave me to drown in embarrassment, could you?”

“It’s more fun this way.” His eyes trail over my face. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so bright red.”

I throw my hands out to the side. “Well, there’s one for your bucket list.”

“Two, actually.”

“Two?”

Art’s smile is dangerously handsome. “You admitted to checking me out. I’m flattered.”

“I’m pretty sure I said looking.”

“Looking, checking out. All the same in my books.”

“Your ego enjoys fiction, huh?”

“Whatever keeps it alive.”

It’s tempting to roll my eyes and play it off. I’m still so flustered that the encounter, combined with the brain-cell-less-conundrum he leaves me with, gives him the upper hand. “Trust me when I say there’s no way your ego is endangered.”

“Lucky for me, then. It’ll come in handy this weekend.”

This weekend. When he goes out and hooks up, and all I can hope for is that he doesn’t bring the men back to the bar with him. A small part of me dies inside at the knowledge that no matter how much my libido goes into overdrive for him, this will never happen.

“Planning on propositioning me at work, are you?”

“You’d love that.” His infuriating smirk is back as he reaches up and tucks my loose hair behind my ear. He leans in. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell your girlfriend the whole store caught you checking me out.”

I’m too wrapped up in his proximity, too distracted by the rapid thunk thunk of my heart, to register his words. By the time my brain has made sense of them, Art is already approaching the counter.

Girlfriend.

Shit. That person I told him I have and couldn’t be less interested in having. That stupid word that slipped out in an attempt to get one over on him. My big goddamn mouth.

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