No Vacancy (The Aveline Series Book 2)

Chapter 28

PENN

I arrivedat Darcy’s house at exactly four o’clock and looked from side to side, hoping none of her neighbors saw me. I felt like a criminal, hovering over her door, looking for the butt rock, and glancing over my shoulders. When I spotted it, I laughed to myself—it really did look like a butt. I put the key in the lock and ran inside quickly.

I peered around. Even though I had been to Darcy’s house before, it felt awkward standing in her living room without her there. Her house was small, but cozy. It was full of pastel colors and plants, a little brighter than what I would have expected Darcy to live in, what with her angry and sarcastic personality, but it was nice.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, and I pulled it out.

DARCY: Did you make it? Did anyone see you?

I sat on the couch and heard something crinkle. I reached over, pulled out a package, and held it up. Milano cookies. I took a picture and sent it to Darcy.

DARCY: Do not eat those. They are mine.

I took one out of the package and sent her a picture of me putting one toward my mouth.

DARCY: DON’T YOU DARE.

I took one last picture with the entire cookie in my mouth and sent it.

DARCY: I was just starting to tolerate you.

Forty-five minutes later, Darcy walked through the front door waving her hand and hollering.

“Absolutely, Ms. Winslow! I will tell Lettie that Yasmin has all the signs and symptoms of diabetes. We will get her in and check her out. Yes. Yes. It’s nice to see you, too. Okay...Goodbye.” She shut the door and leaned against it. “Where are my Milanos? I know there were six left, so if you ate more than one, I will know.”

I chuckled to myself, holding up her bag of cookies. “I swear, I only had one.”

“Good,” she replied, taking the bag. “Let me get cleaned up, and then we will figure out what to do about”—she waved her hand toward the door—“all of them.”

She walked into her bedroom and left the door open enough that I could see into it. It was messy, very unlike the rest of her house. There were clothes strewn all over the floor, and her bed was unmade. My eyes flicked to the corner where I saw her taking off her scrub top, and I sat back, averting my eyes and hoping she didn’t see me peeking in.

“So,” I cleared my throat. “Do you really think it’s going to cause that much of an uproar just because some little old lady saw me getting out of your car?”

Darcy appeared in the doorway, pulling a sweatshirt over her head and taking her ponytail out of the back of it. “Yes, because it wasn’t just some old lady. It was Rosie. And then it was Ruby. Or was it Ruby then Rosie? Either way, then it was Lenora. And now they’ll be expecting us to announce ourselves as a couple before we’ve even had our first actual date.” She walked from her room to the kitchen and filled up a giant cup with ice water.

I narrowed my eyes. “Are you saying there’s a chance I could get a date with you?”

She took a long sip from the straw and came into the living room, sitting across from me on the love seat. “We just have to break it to them gently. Tell them I was just helping you out since you don’t have a car.”

She either ignored me or didn’t hear me. “But about the date. Do I have a shot?”

She raised both of her thick eyebrows. “What?”

I repositioned, scooting back on the couch, feeling uncomfortable at her lack of answer. “A date. You and me. A real one.”

“Why would you want to go on a date? Aren’t you leaving soon? I mean, wasn’t that the plan before your car broke down?” A half smirk formed across her face, and she crossed her legs, placing her ginormous cup between them. It made me think she never believed I was going anywhere.

“I did tell you that, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, and one time I told my parents that I was staying at a friend’s house, but I was actually at the bar two towns over with a fake ID.”

I looked at her, one eyebrow raised in confusion.

“The point is,” she continued, “I can smell a lie from a mile away.”

“Oh, really?” I asked with intrigue.

“Yes, and you are a really terrible liar.” She sat back and took a sip.

While Darcy may have caught on to that small lie, the big one I was harboring was still nowhere on her radar, and for that, I had to think I wasn’t that bad of a liar.

“But I guess I could go on a date with you,” she said.

I sat forward, my forearms resting on my thighs. Now, she had piqued my interest. “You don’t say? And why would you do that?”

She tilted her head, and I couldn’t read her expression. Women had never been difficult for me to read, but that was mostly because the ones I had been meeting were very blunt about what they wanted from me. Not Darcy, though. She was complex and infuriating, and I both loved and hated the way I couldn’t figure out what she was going to do or say next.

“You really want to know why?” she asked.

I shouldn’t have wanted to know. I shouldn’t want to go on a date with her or keep hanging out at her house. I should run the other way and remember everything from those cheesy Hallmark movies and the way the city boy always ends up leaving everything behind for one girl from one town who just so happened to pique his interest in the way Darcy had piqued mine. But this wasn’t a movie. This was reality, and the reality was I was going to control every emotion I had, and therefore, I didn’t need to worry about falling for anyone, let alone Darcy Miller.

I nodded.

She sighed. “Because I’m bored.”