Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Dad nodded. “The ending is important.”
The ending, in that case, was the difference between ordering pizza topped with pepperoni or ordering pizza topped with “doggie-style.” “The lady taking our order had not found it amusing at all, although Vance had.”
Dad cracked open his cola. “Your face sure lights up when you mention this boy…” He lifted a knowing brow as he took a sip. “Am I going to need to meet him?”
“It’s not super serious.” Because there were things far more serious than falling in love… “But he’s coming to Kate’s engagement party in a few weeks.”
His expression went blank. “You’re going?”
“Yeah.”
He patted my knee. “That’s noble of you. I wouldn’t go if she weren’t my daughter.” Dad had made it known to everyone in the family that he did not approve of Kate and Jimbo getting married. Just like he’d made his disappointment with Kate abundantly clear.
I stuffed the last bite of the sandwich into my mouth, directing my attention away from the sympathetic eyes of my dad to the industrial skyscrapers rising above the tree line. What if Kate hadn’t slept with Jimbo? Where would that put me?
“Honestly, Dad, I should be thankful for the whole situation. Otherwise, I’d be married to Jimbo.” And I couldn’t think of anything worse.
“It’s good to always find the silver lining, peanut.”
And if there was one art I’d almost perfected over my twenty-four-year run of bad luck, it was that.
“Oh, I almost forgot.” I rummaged through my purse, pulling out the paper sack I’d tucked inside before I’d left Margot’s. “I got you something.”
Smiling, he took it. “I can only hope one is a baguette.”
A baguette because buying souvenir food magnets was a tradition we’d started after he and mom had divorced.
The first trip we’d taken was to Prince Edward Island to see the house that had inspired Anne of Green Gables. It was on that same trip that we’d visited the Canadian Potato Museum, where he’d bought us both potato magnets, thus starting our tradition.
He dumped the souvenirs into his palm, then held them up to the sunlight to admire them.
One was fashioned after a bag of baguettes with “I Love Paris” written across it in blue, white, and red letters. The other was a miniature pasta container with a shiny badge across it that read “Roma.”
“These will look great with the rest of my collection,” he said, then pressed a kiss to my forehead. “I can’t wait for you to make it over to Australia and bring back a Vegemite magnet.” Ever since I’d started at Wanderlust, Dad had hoped for me to land an assignment in Australia just for no other reason than him wanting that magnet.
I brushed a blade of grass from my leg. “What if they don’t have Vegemite magnets?”
“Then bring me back one shaped like a kangaroo.”
“Dad,” I laughed. “That’s not food.”
“Huh.” His brow furrowed in thought as he stretched out his legs on the blanket. “I could have sworn I watched some documentary about kangaroo meat being sold in supermarkets there.”
Before I could respond, a familiar voice called my name, followed by a “Yoo-hoo.”
Dad jutted his chin to the other side of the park to a woman sporting a short blond bob and bright-orange workout clothes. Amanda waved on her way across the lawn, two yapping poodles following behind her.
I grabbed my can of soda from the grass. “This will not be good.”
“Why?”
“She’s my boss.”
A few seconds later, she stopped at the edge of our picnic blanket. “What a cute little set-up you two have.” She waved her hand over our spread of half-eaten food, then slid her sunglasses down the bridge of her nose. “Is this your boyfriend, Blake?”
I took a quick look at my sixty-year-old father and his engrained smile lines from a life well lived. “He’s my dad.”
“Oh.” She gave him a slow once over, her red lips curling. “Isn’t he handsome?”
Dad tipped an imaginary hat. I needed to stop whatever this was right away.
I faked a smile before taking a sip of my drink. “Are you out enjoying the nice weather, Amanda?”
“Yes. Probably not as nice as the weather you had in Italy, but…” She twirled a short tendril of hair around her finger, glancing back at my dad.
“It rained the whole time in Italy.”
“Oh, what a disappointment.”
Maybe if I hadn’t been having marathon sex with the hottest guy I’d ever laid eyes on, it would have been a disappointment. “It was still enjoyable. I saw a lot of art.” Because art was hands-down a great word for it.
One of Amanda’s dogs sniffed its way toward my leg, wagging its cute little puffball tail.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt your picnic,” she said.
Why was she being nice? Amanda was never nice. Then she winked at my dad. Okay, so that was why. Her attention drifted back to me. “What was I saying? Oh, that I just got off the phone with Lloyd.”