Chapter 12
Luke
What Kook, I mean Cook, I mean Carlton, had said burrowed its way under my skin. Not about the hobbies. The other thing. Dating. So, I’d sent her flowers after a few days of stewing about it and trying to find a hobby.
Flowers were a start, right? Then I’d gone for french fries in the café. They were surprisingly delicious. I’d eaten both clamshells of them from Sheridan the other day, and then I was craving them again.
More than anything, I’d appreciated that she brought fries, and not—I don’t know—organic okra chips, like Lola always deposited on my counter until I could deposit them in the trash.
Speaking of organic meals, out in The Citadel’s lobby, I ran into Lola, her arms full of groceries. Healthy groceries.
Which would go bad in my fridge.
“Hey, Lola.” She kissed my cheek. “Let me take those.” I took a couple of the bags. I wasn’t supposed to lift anything over ten pounds, though. “Everyone’s telling me to get a hobby.” We rode up the elevator together to my floor.
“You should. What do you like to do?” She waited while I unlocked my apartment door. “Besides stalking that Sheridan Chandler woman, of course.”
“Stalking!”
Once inside the apartment, we set the bags of groceries on the counter.
She looked around at the mess. “It’s all over town that you showed up at her parents’ anniversary party, Luke. And then, I heard you sent her a huge bouquet of flowers.” She removed a take-out box from one of the bags, pushed it toward me, and then opened another for herself. Sandwiches. With lots of vegetables. And salad. And cups of minestrone. So healthy.
“Why on earth would that become town news?” It’d happened less than an hour ago.
“You’re not denying it.” Lola shook her half-sandwich at me. A tuft of alfalfa sprouts fell onto the table.
“I’m asking how you know.” I stared at the sprouts, but my brain was jumping from conclusion to conclusion.
“Well, for one, the anniversary party wasn’t exactly a secret, and it became less of one after some local lawyer went on and on about it on one of his social media channels—about how he went to meet Sheridan Chandler there, and instead he ran into you, and then he heard you left with the Chandler woman, and how the whole night was pretty much his brush with fame.”
“Fame?” I knew I had a measure of notoriety, but—“Why is Sheridan Chandler famous?”
She rolled her eyes. “Not her, silly. You. He thinks you’re famous.”
“Apparently his grandmother was a patient of mine.”
“Anyway, what’s with you and Sheridan Chandler? Is there a little something-something going on? What about dinner and an activity together with us? Keith and I have been planning karaoke. Wanna double?”
Sheridan had better not sing, not with her off-key warbling.
Sexy, off-key warbling, that was. Which echoed nicely in the shower.
Only I should be allowed to hear that.
I’m losing it. I should tell a professional about my … experience.
For the past several days, apparently all I’d done was obsess about her and the dream—and turn myself into a laughingstock for all of Torrey Junction.
But I wasn’t committing to karaoke. “I’ll think about it.”
Lola slapped my arm with glee, as though she’d just won a major battle.
“Be straight with me. How did you hear about the flowers, Lola?”
“Uh, hello. Unless you pay Marty the Flower Guy hush-money, he tells everyone who is sending flowers to whom. You should have gone with a grocery store florist instead.”
“That’s ridiculous.”