Page 102 of House of Desire

“Did she call you or something?”

I laugh at the absurdity of the entire situation. “No, because she wants to ruin my life all over again. She was waiting on my doorstep.”

“Holy shit.”

“And I was bringing Anastasia home for the first time after an amazing date.”

His jaw drops and his entire facial expression is pretty much how I’ve felt since Anya and I pulled into my driveway.

“What did Anastasia say?”

“She told me to talk to Brittany. I gave her my car keys so she could get herself home, but she left them on the ground and must have had someone pick her up.”

“Have you talked to her?” he asks, crossing his arms.

“She never answered my text from last night.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know. But I need to talk to her. Would it be insane to show up at her bakery? I think I’m still her boyfriend, but I don’t want to overstep.” Uncertainty at what to do and fear there’s nothing I can do to rectify this situation has been making my stomach hurt since I shut the door on Anya yesterday.

“I don’t think I’d show up in the middle of her workday. Maybe just text her a few more times and if she’s still not answering, I’d show up at closing in a day or two. She might need a second to breathe.”

“Okay, thanks. What do you need?”

We go over the details of a few different projects and the issues they are running into. Then we go through the list of new projects so I can add them to the map I like to keep marking of the different places around the city that our homes occupy.

“How far out are we booking?”

“Eighteen months,” he says, checking his phone.

“Still?” I ask. That was the timeline before I left for the show and we hired additional people.

“We keep getting new customers. I’ve had to turn people away.”

“Sounds like we need to expand the team again. Let’s talk to finance and see where the budget stands.” He taps on his phone and my computer pings with the notification of the meeting. “If there’s room, highest priority is quality.”

“Agreed. I can put out a call to the teams we already have and see if there’s anyone they suggest.”

“Let’s check with the managers. See if any of the apprentices are ready to be promoted and prioritize those movements and then backfill them.”

I check my phone as he makes notes. Still no message from Anastasia.

“She’ll call,” he says, catching me.

“I hope so.”

“I’m going to get out of here. There are some emails waiting for you I need responses on.”

“I’ll look at them now. I’m going to visit the Valdez site this afternoon.”

“Sounds like a plan. I’ll let you get to it.” He leaves my office and I pick up my phone again and type out a new text and send it. Considering how many times I’ve wanted to text her, I feel like I’ve shown great restraint to this point.

Parker: I found my keys. I wish you would have taken the car.

Anya: I didn’t want to inconvenience you

I stare at the screen, reading her response a hundred times. How could she ever think anything regarding her would be an inconvenience?

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