“I hate to hear that… I mean, for Dr. Weston, not her.”
“Girl, he’s a complete jerk-face. Don’t feel sorry for him,” she huffed. “He’s always got his adult diapers in a twist.”
Laughing, I said, “Then I guess he got what was coming to him.”
“You got that right.” She paused for a minute then asked, “You like Italian? I’m in the mood for Italian. We should go grab some lunch together.”
“Yeah, I’d like that.”
“Cool beans. I know this great place I’ll take you. They have killer pasta,” she replied as she went to her desk to get her keys. Then she called out to the secretary out front, “I’m taking Cassidy to lunch. We’ll be back in forty-five.”
Sydney spent the entire lunch giving me the ins and outs of all the doctors and how things worked. When we got back, I didn’t have much time to think about anything, much less Cotton. I spent the rest of the day sorting through the stacks of paperwork that had to be filed by the end of the day. When I finally managed to finish and headed home, I found Clutch waiting for me outside.
“Hey there, beautiful,” he smiled. His back was propped against the brick wall of my complex, and he was wearing one of his baseball caps and a big smile. I‘d noticed a few days ago he’d stopped wearing his sling and seemed to be fully recovered, and since he didn’t need Smokey to drive him around, I’d seen a lot more of him. Especially after I’d left the club. He’d been by every day, so I wasn’t surprised to see him standing at the front door of my apartment building.
“Don’t you have anything better to do than harass me every day?” I teased.
“Nope,” he replied as he followed me up to my apartment. As soon as I opened the door, he walked over and plopped down on my sofa. In a matter of seconds, he had the remote in his hand, surfing through all the sports channels.
“Well, make yourself comfortable,” I laughed as I tossed my purse down on the table. “You know… you don’t have to keep coming over here to check on me. I’m fine.”
“Maybe so, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop checkin’. I’m following orders after all,” he smiled.
“Pfft. I doubt your prez even cares whether you check or not. Just stop wasting your time.”
“Cass,” he started. “I’d come, orders or not.”
I walked back to my room and started changing my clothes. Through the closed door, Clutch shouted, “I just don’t get it. So just because things didn’t work out with you and the Prez, that doesn’t mean you have to leave the damn club, Cass.”
“I already told you. I needed some time to myself, knucklehead. Even you ought to be able to understand that.”
“Well, I don’t. There’s no reason for you to give up everything just because …” he started, but stopped when I walked back into the room.
“Just leave it. This is the right thing for me right now. I’m not saying it will be forever,” I lied. I honestly had no intention of going back. Being around Cotton would just be too hard.
“You got anything to eat?” he asked as he got up and started walking toward the kitchen. “You haven’t been around to cook, and I’m starving.”
“So the truth comes out,” I laughed. “You just miss me for my cooking.”
“Now, you know that isn’t true. I miss everything about you,” he smiled, and I watched with surprise as a light blush covered his face. He quickly tried to recover by saying, “Well, not everything. You have that bad habit of bellowing out those weird songs. No one listens to that stuff, Cass. What’s wrong with Adele or Demi Lovato?”
I gave him a light shove and said, “I can’t believe you said that. I don’t bellow… and it’s not like I even know I’m doing it half the time, but I’ll be sure not to sing around you anymore.”
“Whoa… what’s wrong with you?” he asked as he crossed his arms.
“What? Nothing’s wrong.”
“Oh, there is definitely something wrong, Cass. I’ve never known you to pout… ever.”
I sighed and said, “And I’m not pouting now.”
“Yeah, you are. You’re pouting. No doubt about it.”
“No… I’m not!” I snapped.
“Shit, Cass. What’s going on? You’re all on edge and moody… Ohhh, shit. I get it,” he smiled.
“You get what, numb-nut?”
“It’s that time of the month, huh? Feeling crabby and mad at the world? You want me to go get you some tampons or something?”
“Clutch!” I shouted. He took a step back and raised his hands up in defeat as I stepped toward him and said, “You are such an asshole.”
“Yeah, I can’t help myself,” he smirked. “But hey, let me make it up to you. What do you want for dinner? I’ll go get whatever you want and one of those chick flicks you like so much.”
I almost told him no, but I was lonesome and having him around helped take my mind off of things. “Yeah… I think that sounds good. Thanks.”