“Where do you want to meet?” If Cyn still felt as if she needed a safety net, he was happy to provide it. But whether she admitted it to herself or not, Cyn had nothing to be afraid of when it came to him. Yes, Parker meant to have her, but at the same time, he wasn’t planning on letting her go.
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Chapter Four
“You have to open the store for me today.”
“I don’t have to do anything but stay black and die.” Cyn continued loading the dishwasher, not bothering to looking up. Drew Truman, the eldest sister of the gruesome twosome, wasn’t worthy of the respect or the time and energy it would have taken to glance up.
“Fine.” Drew’s long suffering sigh was as dramatic as the want to be thespian could utter. It was a noise Cyn was unfortunately well acquainted with since Drew and her equally annoying sister, Staci, moved into her townhouse. “You don’t have to, but I need you to open the store for me today.”
“Sorry, I can’t. I have other plans.”
“Liar.”
“You’re right. I am lying.” Cyn closed the dishwasher’s door and straightened. “I’m not sorry at all. In fact, this is this least sorry I felt all day.”
Of course that wasn’t saying a lot. The Elder Saturday family breakfast, a tradition begun long before Cyn had even began to eat solids, had lost its thrill for her. Thanks in large part to her father Walt’s live-in girlfriend, Franny, and her twin daughters.
“What is that suppose to mean?”
“You’re a smart girl,” she lied. “You figure out.”
“I can’t believe you’re acting like this. What’s so important you can’t open the store?”
“I could ask you the same thing, but you know what, I’m not. Because I don’t care.
You don’t want to work today. Fine. Take it up with my dad, but don’t expect me to cover for you this time.” Or ever again.
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Lena Matthews
Cyn was done working shifts she hadn’t been scheduled to work. She was tired of putting up with the three ungrateful women who made her life miserable for the sheer fun of it. For the last two years she’d bitten her tongue and held back, just because she wanted to please her father, but she could no longer do that.
She didn’t have a life. Last Saturday was an eye opening experience. This thing with Parker might very well go nowhere, but it wouldn’t be because she didn’t try. She’d been ten types of fools to let him slip away. It wasn’t everyday a girl went out with a Prince and even if tonight was the only time she saw him again, she was going to enjoy herself.
She deserved it.
“You’re just being selfish.” Drew’s face turned up in anger as she spoke. The sad thing was, she and Staci both would have been very pretty girls if it weren’t for their very ugly attitudes. They both had shoulder-length ebony hair, coffee-tinged skin, and slender yet feminine bodies, but their bitchy personalities made all those features pale in comparison. It really was a waste. “Mean spirited even.”
“You would know.” Cyn turned around and began to wipe down the counters. As soon as she was done cleaning her father’s kitchen she was leaving. The longer she stood around arguing, the longer it would take for her to finish.
“I’m going to tell your father.”
“Okay.” Cyn loved her father, truly she did, but she wasn’t going to work on her day off just to prove it.
“Fine.” Drew huffed out of the room, leaving Cyn alone in the peaceful silence. With Drew and her sister for roommates, it wasn’t a state she had the liberty of enjoying much any more, so she tried her best to relish the brief moments when they came.
“What’s this I hear about the store not opening today?” Walt’s booming voice startled Cyn out of her silent reverie. Damn, talk about brief. She didn’t even get to fully zone out yet.
Turning around, she eyed her father who was standing in the kitchen doorway with Franny, Staci and a grinning Drew at his heels. Despite the deep pitch of his voice, the robust sixty-three-year-old man was the least intimidating man in the world. Even though 38
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Head over Heels
he stood over six feet tall and possessed a voice that could shake the leaves from the trees, he was as kind as they came, a fact Franny used to her advantage for the last two years.
Smiling, as she usually did when her father was in her presences, Cyn leaned back and rested against the sink. “Sorry, Daddy, you’ll have to ask Drew about that. It’s her turn to open the store.”
“Is it now?” Walt turned his level stare to Drew, who scrambled into the middle of the room to quickly answer him.
“Yes, but I have an audition today at twelve,” she whined, much to Cyn’s annoyance.
Cyn didn’t believe her for a moment, but then again, she didn’t care. Audition or no audition, she wasn’t going to open the store. “The schedule has been posted on the board for over two weeks. She could have switched with any of us at any time. Did she really have to wait until an hour before the shop opened to do so?”
“But I just found out about it.”
“Just now? Five minutes ago?” Cyn questioned, one eyebrow raised.
“Well, no.”
“Exactly. I’m not switching. I covered for you the last two weekends in a row. I’m not going to do it again.”
“You worked the last two weekends for her?” The surprise in her father’s voice made Cyn almost reluctant to continue, but she knew if she didn’t speak up now she’d spend the rest of her life being their lap dog.
“Yes.” Cyn nodded her head to emphasize her words. “And I have plans tonight that I’m not going to break.”
“Well, I don’t blame you,” Walt sympathized.
“But, darling.” Franny stepped up and leaned against Walt’s arm, resting her head on his shoulder. The twins had
