NICE GIRL TO LOVE (THE COMPLETE THREE-BOOK COLLECTION)(5)

“Shit.” The horror returned to his voice. “Okay, that’s it, no more of the devil’s juice for me. I clearly can’t handle the stuff.”

She gasped in mock alarm. “You mean our MMA fight nights will be limited to pizza and soda?”

He paused. “Good point. I guess I’ll have to keep beer on the list of acceptable beverages. Just for you.”

“Aw, you’re so good to me,” she chuckled as she checked the time again. “Shoot, I better get going. I’m meeting with a few teachers about expanding my tutoring roster this year.”

“I thought you weren’t going to start volunteering until September,” he admonished sternly. “Abby, you can’t keep putting off your dissertation. Those kids can get by without you.”

“Just setting things up, I promise. Fear not, I’m sticking to my plan. Just me and my laptop ‘til I go back to work next month.”

“Good. I already instructed Skylar to gather her friends and chase you out of school if you show up over the next three weeks. We also blacked out every day on the calendar until ASU is back in session to remind us to leave you alone.”

“No need to go that far. I won’t be writing the entire time. And since my teaching line is straight freshman comp again this semester, I’m all set with my syllabus and lesson plans already. I’m sure I’ll have pockets of time to hang out here and there.”

“Well, then you can go get reacquainted with your colleagues and the other equally brainy candidates in your program. Go get all academic again. Skylar and I have been monopolizing your time way too much lately. If you’re not careful, you’ll find yourself in front of your doctoral defense panel dropping Skylar’s OMGs and my far more delightful f-bombs.”

Oy, her professors would think she was having a seizure and send her back to pre-dissertation comp exams for sure.

“Besides,” he continued, “we’ve already begun the detox process to do without our Abby fix for a few weeks. Sure, we’ll be strung out since you’ve gotten us all addicted to your greatness, but we’ll be fine,” he assured softly. “Really.”

A wash of tears stung her eyes. “Okay. Well you tell Skylar I’m never too busy for her. Or her dad.”

“Sure thing.” The awkward pause that followed had him quickly clearing his throat. “Alright, my prep period’s almost up so I better finish eating. Happy writing, babe.”

Abby hung up the phone with a pinch of sadness. Three whole weeks without talking to Brian on a daily basis?

Huh.

Ten-to-one odds he’ll crack first.



Abby eyed the ominous black clouds that had appeared out of nowhere sometime during her last meeting of the day. “Great,” she muttered, rubbing her bare arms. Arizona’s unpredictable monsoon season at its finest.

In a mocking curtsy, Mother Nature smoothly edged out the last tiny bit of blue in the sky and dumped a city-dousing waterfall of rain onto the ground within a six-second window.

Lovely. Not even a nice drizzle to give her a head start.

“Don’t you even think about it!”

Abby spun around to see Evelyn Ramirez, the English department head, running down the hall with a fire hydrant yellow Pi?on Pine Middle School rain cloak. “You were going to run out in that downpour, weren’t you?” she accused as she slapped the school spirit poncho into Abby’s grateful hands.

Abby smiled sheepishly. “I don’t live that far away.”

A disapproving headshake was all she got back as she donned the thin plastic, glad that it was long enough to cover the book bag at her hip. “Thanks Eve. I’ll return it tomorrow.”

“You most certainly will not. You’re not coming in, remember? That dissertation isn’t going to write itself, missy. And if you come around after school one day with your bleeding heart, these kids will pounce and suck you dry.”

At Eve’s fierce look, which was at least half serious, Abby laughed. “Okay, I’ll keep it as a reminder of just that.”

A crash of thunder made them both jump. Eve studied the courtyard through the sheets of rain coming down. “That’s a storm, alright. You better just make a break for it now.”

Abby was thinking the same thing. After a final thanks, she darted out into the pounding rain.

Exiting the school premises, she cut to the shortest route back to her house, resigned to splash through ankle-deep road puddles to save time. With just under a block left to go, however, she slowed down when she spotted a girl huddling under an anorexic sidewalk tree, trying in vain to stay dry.

“Skylar?” she called out, wiping the water out of her eyes to make sure she was seeing correctly.

The girl’s guarded stranger-danger expression dissolved into a relieved smile. “Abby, hi!”

Running over, Abby again cursed the fickle Arizona weather when she saw that Skylar was similarly not dressed for the rain. “Why aren’t you at your Uncle Connor’s?”

“I stayed back after school to sign up for some clubs. Then out of the blue, it started pouring like crazy. I’ve been trying to call my dad because I figured he and Coach Bill canceled fall football tryouts today but he isn’t answering his cell.”

“Your dad had a faculty meeting before practice today so he probably doesn’t have his phone on.” Without thinking twice, Abby immediately yanked off her new sunbright rain barrier and slipped it over Skylar’s head.