Читать книгу Working Romance - Susan Kohler - Страница 9

Chapter Four

Later that evening Kate waited for her doorbell to ring. She was hopeful that Bob would arrive at any moment, so she used the nervous energy to get some things done. The minute she got home from work, she’d thrown on her old grubby clothes, then played with the kids and dogs for a while before fixing dinner. Then, she put the kids to bed and the dogs out, and quickly picked up the living room, dusting and rearranging the small colorful throw pillows on her plain brown sofa. She cleaned the kitchen and put a bottle of California Chablis in the refrigerator. Then she cleaned the downstairs bathroom.

Finally she’d taken a quick shower and changed again. She dressed carefully, although with a somewhat casual deception, in her best emerald green blouse and crisp white shorts. She let her long, auburn hair out of the severe bun she’d worn it in at work and brushed it until it fell in soft waves down her back.

She stood back and surveyed the living room objectively. It looked cozy and inviting. She had made up for her plain, worn furniture by filling the room with personal touches. The walls were painted a very light earth tone, and most of the furniture was in shades of brown, ranging from tan to chocolate. It could have been too dark, but she had thrown in lots of colorful accents, brightly colored throw pillows and a hand knitted afghan draped on the back of the sofa. The walls had several pictures of her kids and a group of antique mirrors. She also had several hanging plants and knickknacks on every end table. .

By 9:30 she was ready. It was the most excited she’d been since her husband died. Finally, there was a knock at the door. Her heart seemed to be racing as she went to open it. It wasn’t Bob. She felt the excitement drain out of her as she opened the door and found the rude, obnoxious jerk who lived next door standing on her porch.

“Hi Tim.” She managed to get out the greeting without showing too much disappointment. “What do you want?”

“From you doll? Everything I can get!” He smirked, eyeballing her tight shorts. “But for now, can I use your car to give mine a jump-start? I need to go to the store and I’ve got a dead battery.”

“Sure, Tim, no problem. Let me get my keys.” She reached for her purse and rummaged for her car keys.

She was relieved, for once, it didn’t sound like he was going to try to stay and make a pest out of himself. She handed him her car keys.

“You wouldn’t happen to have any beer, would ya, doll?” he asked, as his eyes made their way up to her chest, looking her at breasts with a leer. “If you did I could stay here with you instead of going out. You look good enough to-”

Just then Bob walked up behind them. He took one look at Kate’s face with the frozen smile and knew that the other man wasn’t welcome.

“Hi Kate. Am I interrupting anything?” Bob asked casually as he reached out to pull her into a warm hug. He had replaced his office attire with jeans and a soft, clean white T-shirt.