Wanda was right. Mom and Dad’s was a busy place for active, healthy seniors. Her words brought George’s thoughts back to the present and kept her from dwelling on anything but the task at hand. Getting to work.
People hustled in and out, grabbing their morning coffee on their way to start their days, waving to her as they went. Along with the coffee shop, there was a small sundry shop where one could grab little items like aspirin or a bottled drink, and right next door was a barber shop/beauty salon.
“Hey, guys. How are you this morning?” Dex asked with a smile, brushing his fingers over hers, making her stomach jiggle with butterflies.
He’d left Marty’s early this morning to go to his place to shower and change into his work clothes, and probably to have some alone time to curse her very existence while he screamed into the void.
Because she was a crappy, crappy student.
“We’re fucking great, Dex,” Nina groused. “I’m up with the roosters and rarin’ to go. So what’s my job today? Sponge baths and IVs?”
George nudged her and frowned. “It’s not like that here, Nina. I told you, this is a senior living center for people sixty-five and over who are probably healthier than me. All the people here have homes of their own right out there.” She pointed to the far wall with floor-to-ceiling glass windows. “They have their own apartments just like any other apartment complex. They can cook for themselves if they want, they can do all the normal things people who live everywhere can do. They just choose to do it with other seniors. So lay off the idea of sponge baths and IVs, Vampire Lady.”
Dex grabbed a towel from the white Formica countertop and smiled at Nina. “I have good news, Nina. No baths at all. You’re going to work in the kitchen, and Marty and Wanda are going to work in the beauty salon answering the phone and washing hair.”
Nina brushed her hands together and nodded, clearly resigned to her undercover duties. “Okey-doke. Where to?”
Someone wolf-whistled from behind them, making them all turn around.
George squinted through the sunlight that had suddenly begun to pour through the atrium and saw Barnabas Duckworth, seventy-two, spry as the day is long, probably as horny, too, moderately wealthy, tan, and a total letch.
He was what some of the ladies called the pretend George Hamilton of Mom and Dad’s.
“Would ya look at this passel of fillies, Georgie Porgie Puddin’ Pie?” he said as he sidled up to Nina and eyeballed her with a leer. He leaned into her and winked. “Who are you, hot pants?”
Nina lifted her sunglasses and glared down at him. “People call me Young Enough to be Your Granddaughter, but you can call me Nina. Who are you, Pop-Pop?” she asked, tacking on a laugh to soften the blow of her teasing.
But Barnabas laughed with her. “Barnabas Duckworth. Rich, single, ready to mingle, and did I mention rich?”
As he said those words, as he smoldered a gaze at Nina before running a hand over his slicked-back full head of white hair, Effie Sampson scurried in.
If Barnabas was a dirty old man, Effie was a crusty old bird. In her early seventies, unsurprisingly single all her life, in great shape for her age, she was one of the tougher customers George had run into during her time as events coordinator.
Thankfully, Effie didn’t want much to do with anyone. She was happy to stay alone in her one-bedroom apartment and play armchair critic. She wanted nothing to do with the events George put together at Mom and Dad’s. She wanted to be left alone, and most were happy to do exactly that due to her sharp bark.
When she stalked toward the group of women, her small eyes darting from face to face, she frowned and pointed at George. “You,” she said, glaring at her. “Why can’t I ever find you when I need you? Don’t you ever work?”
But George couldn’t answer her because all sound in the room evaporated when a disembodied voice, like the whisper of the wind, caressing her skin said, “Effie is the one.”
And she knew, without a shadow of a doubt, Effie Sampson was her first case as a guardian angel.
Aw. Come. On.
Chapter 8
“Everything okay so far today?” Dex asked.
She shivered, even though she wasn’t at all cold, looking out the windshield of her Prius where she and Dex had met for their lunch break.
George wouldn’t be surprised if the devil himself showed up at this point, pitchfork in hand, but she’d plowed through her day anyway, trying to ignore the fact that her wings were a hot item in Hell—pardon the pun.
She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the idea that someone had tried to steal her wings.
Though seriously, good luck getting their hands on wings even George couldn’t get her hands on without Dex’s help. Whoever this demon was, he’d be SOL trying to steal them from her. And who was this demon? Did all demons have names like Darnell?
After she’d heard the story of how Darnell had become a demon, her perspective broadened. All through that amazing dinner with everyone last night, she couldn’t help but wish this had happened to her sooner.
Mostly because she and Gladys had somewhere to be, and it wasn’t at a bar, or some party where everyone was drunk, or at a singles retreat where she had to do stupid exercises meant to prepare you for the dating world. That might sound crazy to some people. These folks were, after all, technically frowned upon in religions far and wide, but they didn’t seem to care.
They had each other. That appeared to be all that mattered.
It was something she’d always wanted. To be included. To trust. To be accepted…
Dex nudged her, bringing
