Junior Year Box Set полностью

I pulled her to my chest and kissed her forehead.

“Eva said you’ve been working too hard and needed a good night’s sleep. She and Annabella debated whether to wake you, but she decided to let you get your rest.”

“She must think I’m a terrible role model. I mean, I barely know you, and here I am in your bed. God, I’m stupid,” she moaned.

“I thought it was ‘¡Ay, Dios mio!’ last night.”

“You’re pretty pleased with yourself. You plied me with alcohol and then lured me into your bed with a massage. Finally, you did something sneaky with my feet and got me aroused.”

“¡Ay, Dios mio!” I said sotto voce to mimic her.

She hit me with her pillow.

“You’re a sexy, intelligent, gorgeous woman. I’ve seen you perform, and you have every guy eating out of your hand. You can’t tell me you haven’t heard every possible come-on line. If you didn’t want to be here this morning, you could have shut me down at any point,” I said, and then she nodded. “But I am kind of cute.”

“The male ego! Next, you’ll be wanting me to rate my experience,” she huffed.

“¡Ay, Dios mio!” I reminded her as I batted my eyes.

“Okay, Big Boy. Let’s see if you can duplicate what you did last night,” she challenged.

I clapped my hands, rubbed them together, and did my best evil scientist laugh. I do love a challenge.

◊◊◊

Even though today was supposed to be a day off, Caryn thought it was important to keep up our weekly meetings. She had me call the office where Dad and Megan were in the conference room. Dad kicked the teleconference off with some bad news.

“The Quickie Mart was robbed last night. The owner was hurt, and it’s currently closed. He was beaten when he wouldn’t open the safe. The police told me they only had $75 in change in the safe, and it would have been better for him just to give it up.

“I talked to his wife, and he’ll be okay, but she’s talking about retiring and moving to Florida,” Dad shared.

“Did the video cameras Fritz installed capture who did it?” I asked.

“Yes, and I think you know him. It was Tommy Cox.”

Of all the people I knew, he was in the top three for the biggest ass-hat award. The other two were Bill Rogers, who had tried to kill Tracy, and then there was Mike Herndon. Tommy had first come to my attention when he cyberstalked my family and me. Then he was involved in the steroids scandal that almost cost us the season my sophomore year of football.

“Please tell me they caught him.”

“Not yet, but they’re looking for him. Megan just sent the police the video an hour ago. Let Fritz know that the police were impressed with the quality. There’s no doubt who did it.”

“Any other bad news?” I asked.

“Duke cornered a skunk and was banished to the garage for a night,” Dad shared.

“I have a feeling it’s a good thing I’m in Cuba.”

“You owe me big time,” Dad assured me.

“Is he okay?”

“He wasn’t happy about it. You know how he is. He has the whole house on a schedule. Being stuck in the garage turned his world upside down, and he barked for most of the night. There was talk of sending him to the farm, but your mom finally calmed down.”

“Mom loves him too much. She only sends me to the farm when I’ve been bad,” I said, which made Dad chuckle.

It was good I could joke about it now.

“How is everything going there?” Dad asked.

“I hate the director, but everything else is going well. I’ve found a baseball team to work out with and have taken time to do some exploring. All in all, it’s been good,” I said.

“Do you think you could send Caryn home?” Dad asked.

I looked at Caryn, and it was apparent that she and Dad had already discussed this. I was a little irritated that she hadn’t talked to me before now to give me a heads-up.

“Why, what do you need?” I asked.

“The restaurant has taken off. Granny and Mary are being run to the bone, and they need to hire an additional manager. They also need more staff.”

“And Caryn has helped with all that,” I finished Dad’s thought.

“Plus, it sounds like we need to deal with the Quickie Mart,” Dad added.

Megan updated us on the financials, and then Dad had one last item.

“Your grandmother has a new roommate.”

“Did she find herself a man?” I asked.

I could imagine how Dad and Uncle John would take that.

“No, a woman.”

Caryn laughed; I must have made a face.