Page 18 of Finding Noah
And Noah was now alone.
I’d considered asking if he wanted to see if the family would be willing to let Fluffy go so we could bring her to California, but I figured Noah’d known that was an option. If the cat was as settled aswe’d been led to believe, then taking her back would’ve been stressful. Not to mention a car ride across the country. “Well, Leroy is in the rearview mirror. Let’s head inside.”
A slight breeze wafted across the lazy spring day, but heat still lingered, even as we neared early evening.
“Shower then grub.” He patted me on the back. “You did good.”
We walked together up to the house and then ascended the stairs.
“How do you know?”
He cocked his head. “You’re you. Truthfully, you wouldn’t give less than a hundred and ten percent. Dillon’s lucky to have you.” He opened the front door and held it so I could step through.
Stormy followed with Noah bringing up the rear.
The house was marginally cooler, but he hadn’t been running the a/c in the last bit of time, so heat again lingered.
I headed upstairs. In my room I sniffed my clothes as I stripped. Not stinky—so I could wear them one more day. I’d need to run over to the closest town that had a discount clothing store because I needed way more jeans and T-shirts. A week’s worth, at least, so I wasn’t doing laundry too often. The well was deep, but I’d heard about drought conditions persisting in California, and I didn’t want to use water if I didn’t need to.
And on that thought, I didn’t linger in the shower, even though my muscles would’ve appreciated a soak. Instead, I cleaned myself and hopped out. Then I dried off, donned a distressed T-shirt and sleep pants, and headed downstairs.
Noah would understand I didn’t want to get changed a second time. Nope. I’d eat, maybe watch half an hour of television, then crash. I was exhausted—physically and mentally.
“Sit.” Noah gestured toward the table. “Unless you want to eat in front of the television.”
“Nope, this is perfect.” Sometimes we crashed and ate in front of the boob tube. My favorite times, though, were when we sat and just chatted about our days. Whenever he was single, I ensured we spent as much time as possible together. When he was in a relationship, though, he tended to lose himself in the guy and, as often as not, forget about me.
No, that was too dramatic. Just…I’d have to fight for his attention. That hurt.
I plopped into the chair and sighed.
Noah placed a huge bowl of salad before me. “That bad?”
“Like the day we went climbing in the Ozarks.”
“Ouch.” He placed a glass of chilled lemonade by my hand. “That was something we never repeated.”
“I know, right? We’re fit, but that trek was insane. Well, today sort of felt like that. But I’ll get used to it, and I’m not complaining, okay?” I dug my fork into a slice of cold chicken as he sat next to me with his glass of ice water and his dinner.
He put the creamy peppercorn dressing by my hand.
I took it with a grateful smile and doused my salad. Then I picked up the fork with the chicken—now covered in dressing. Just the way I liked it.
We consumed the first few bites in silence.
I eyed Noah. He had something on his mind, and I was damn curious. “You find any new clients today?”
“A few people visited the website, but no calls yet. I did go over to Hartsville to put a flyer up in the pet store as well as to talk to the manager about offering lessons. He seemed open to the idea, but said he needed to talk to the owner. If it’s a go, we’d have to decide if the store would offer them and pay me or if they’d just sponsor the classes and I’d be responsible for everything.”
“That’s great news.” I speared some lettuce. “Anything else interesting happen?”
“The manager, Sam, sort of asked me out?”
“Is that a question or a statement?”
“Uh…both?”
“Are you going to go out with him?”Please say no. Please say no. Please say—
