Alex (Cold Fury Hockey, #1)(102)
Helpless under the aromatic assault, the jerk-off’s eyes went briefly unfocused before dropping to the cookies.
Selecting the biggest one, Maggie lifted it to her mouth and bit, chewing with deliberate relish before cracking the lid on the milk and taking a long, slow swallow.
Satisfied when the muscles of the guy’s throat worked up and down, she re-covered the plate. “…is my suggestion you look over your rental agreement regarding noise pollution and turn your music down. Or at least close your—”
The door swung shut in her face.
Unbelievable. But at least she didn’t need to waste another breath on the jerk.
***
“He actually called you ‘Apartment Two’?” Ava Meyers, Maggie’s best friend and fellow abstainer in all things relationship, shook her head, her mahogany shag catching in the light breeze and blowing around her face. They were settled in on their favorite bench with the usual Sunday assortment of accumulated mail, magazines, electronic devices, and what remained of the cookies. “Like you didn’t merit an identity beyond the female occupying space beneath him.”
Maggie scrolled through headlines, her snit too distracting to commit to any one bit of news. “Ford says he’s in marketing. Freelance. And he’s from New York, I think, renting month to month, so maybe we’ll luck out and he’ll be gone by September.”
“Month to month? Weird. Why?”
“Your brother. You ask.”
Ava let out an indelicate snort. Ford was…distracted. That they’d even gotten this much information was a minor miracle.
Picking through the cookies, she added, “I love it that he thought you were putting a move on him, though.”
“I know. Because that’s so me,” Maggie snickered. “Scoping out the meat market twenty-four-seven.”
Talk about a headache she didn’t need. Not when at twenty-seven, her life was pretty well perfect just the way it was. Stable. Secure. On track. Built on a rock-solid foundation of priorities any guidance counselor would swoon over. Maggie had completed her education, had savings and a financial plan, a solid job managing the Shrone Gallery and her boss’s cosmic blessing to buy into the business as a partner hopefully within the next year and eventually buy her out. Add to that, the friendships that “completed” her in ways no romance could…and she was good.
The whole ever-after business? She didn’t have time for it.
Correction: She had plenty of time. It was the inclination that was lacking.
Maggie tipped her face to the sky, basking in the warmth of June’s sunshine and her contentment with the lot life had given her. Sure, there’d been dues to pay. There always were. But it was because of those rough patches that she was able to fully appreciate this tranquil little corner of Platonia she’d carved out for herself, where her circle of friends reigned supreme and the forecast always called for good times. Constancy, support, and reliability.
Chance of romantic strife or bitter betrayal raining on their parade? Zero.
Yeah, Maggie was satisfied with her life, exactly the way it was. Period.
“So, hey,” Ava drawled from beside her. “Obviously Apartment Three was a total weenie and I’m not talking about him. But do you ever look around and…you know…wonder?”
“Hmm…about what?” How to reduce her carbon footprint? Whether the new Italian place was as good as everyone was saying? If her buyer for the Stovitz oil was serious about a second piece? If she’d be able to get Hedda to sit still—and not in a meditative state—long enough to discuss her buying in? If her parents would finally relax and believe she was capable of taking care of herself?
Ava squinted, her mouth turning down in distaste. “That.”
Maggie followed her friend’s gaze to the red-checked cliché in action nestled into a shady corner of Wicker Park. And blinked. Twice.
“The couple?” she gasped. Then checking herself, she let out a laugh. Because, no way.
Ava didn’t date any more than Maggie did—which meant only under the most dire of circumstances. And unless Maggie had missed significantly more than she’d realized this morning, these were not them.
“I…yeah, I’m pretty sure…I’m serious. I think maybe it’s time I stopped shutting down every guy who asks me out and start—I don’t know—opening myself up to the possibilities.”
Eyes cranking around a beat before her head, Maggie gasped. “Wha—?”
This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be. Except that sour look of disgusted resignation on Ava’s face as she frowned across at the picnic set for two told Maggie…it was happening. Her friend was serious.
“What’s going on? I mean, where’s this coming from?”
Picking at the crumbs from a half-eaten cookie, Ava slumped deeper into the park bench, looking in that moment more like a sullen teen than the coolly confident, ball-busting lawyer she played in real life. She shook her head. “Everything’s so perfect now, you know?”
Yeah, Maggie did know. Hence the confusion.
“But what’s it going to be like in ten or fifteen years?” She let out another heavy sigh. “The guys, Sam and Ford—they’re idiots.”
“Of course.” The best kind. Ford was Ava’s older brother, their landlord and the odd nut behind the number one phone and tablet app on the market, Hibachi Catapult. And Sam Farrow, general man-whore and go-to guy for all things fix-it, was their oldest friend. Maggie loved them like family. Together Sam, Ford and Ava were her core group of go-to friends. All romantically impaired with their own individual brand of relationship dysfunction.