Seeking Single Male. Stephanie Bond

the man who’d called himself Greg Healey. All last evening she’d been restless, fidgety and irritated. Even a formidable amount of cake icing eaten straight from the carton hadn’t helped.

      Annette sighed dramatically. “I’ll never get to wear my wedding gown.”

      Lana bit her tongue. Everyone who knew Annette had seen the wedding gown she’d been working on for going on ten years, because she carried it around in the back of her van on a mannequin.

      “Mr. Right is out there somewhere, Lana, I just know it,” Annette continued. “And he’s looking for me, too.”

      “Well, if he’s looking for you, I hope he likes coffee.”

      “From your mouth to God’s ear. Hey, speaking of looking, have you found a roommate?”

      Lana’s laugh was as dry as yesterday’s biscotti. “No, but I found a certified weirdo.”

      The pastry chef’s eyes lit up curiously. “What happened?”

      “A guy came in yesterday and said he was here about the ad. I asked him if he met all the requirements, meaning was he gay, and he said yes. He seemed all right, maybe a little stuffy, but definitely good-looking. But when I took him to see the apartment, he made a pass at me, right in the bedroom!”

      Annette’s face had gone totally white.

      Lana laughed. “Oh, don’t worry—I shot his eyes full of hair spray. But it was all very bizarre.”

      “Was his name Greg something-or-other?”

      A tiny alarm went off in Lana’s brain. “Do you know him?”

      Annette touched a hand to her forehead. “Lana…oh my goodness, I completely forgot. A guy called about the singles ad I put in the paper, and I told him to meet me here yesterday at eleven a.m.”

      Lana’s throat tightened—the timing was right. “You’re running singles ads now?”

      Annette nodded, her face red.

      She gripped the counter. “What did your ad say, exactly?”

      While Annette scrambled to find the magazine, Lana’s mind swirled with the implication of a missed connection.

      “Here it is,” Annette said, smoothing the page on the counter. “‘Lexington, Kentucky: Single female in mid-twenties seeking single male for good times. Horse lover a plus. I’m a good cook. Coffee Girl.’”

      “Coffee Girl?” Lana murmured, remembering the man’s puzzling enquiry.

      “I thought it fit,” Annette said with a sheepish shrug. “And I thought meeting in a public place was a good idea.”

      She had to sit down to sort through it all—while ignoring the tiny thrill that he’d mistaken her for someone in her mid-twenties. “You mean this guy I thought was answering my roommate ad was actually answering your singles ad?”

      “I’m sorry, Lana. With going to the doctor and all, I forgot that I asked him to meet me here.” She leaned in close. “But you said he was cute?”

      Lana barely heard Annette as snatches of her conversation with Greg Healy came back to her and she realized how incriminating her words had been. She closed her eyes and managed a small hysterical laugh. He must have thought she was propositioning him. And being a red-blooded male, he’d accepted.

      Then Lana froze as his other comments floated back to her. She swallowed a lump of mortification that lodged in her throat. Holy hooker! The man thought she was propositioning him, all right—for money.

      “Lana,” Annette said loudly, yanking her back to the present.

      “Huh?”

      The redhead’s eyes glowed with hope. “You said he was cute?”

      “I…guess so. But he made a pass at me, remember?”

      “Well, you took him back to your apartment!”

      “Yeah, but…if he were a decent guy, he wouldn’t have gone!”

      Annette’s mouth was grim. “You’re absolutely right. Any guy who would be that forward wouldn’t be willing to wait until the wedding night, would he?”

      Another one of Annette’s romantic fantasies—that her gentleman prince would be willing to wait until their wedding night before consummating their relationship. Lana remembered Greg Healey’s hot kiss, the split-second hardness of his sex against her thigh. “Er, no, he didn’t strike me as the waiting type.”

      “Oh well, I’m just relieved that nothing bad happened. Thanks, Lana, for weeding out another loser.”

      Lana smirked. “That’s me, the jerk strainer.”

      Annette grinned. “I’ll bet he got more than he bargained for when he made that pass.”

      Lana returned a weak smile.

      “Well, I’d better unload the rest of the doughnuts before the doors open.”

      When Annette exited to the back room, Lana rubbed her breastbone. Her internal organs had begun behaving strangely at the news that Greg Healey might not be the pervert she had originally thought. She swallowed hard, realizing that maybe Mr. Healey wasn’t the only one who’d gotten more than he bargained for when he’d made that pass.

      The alien sensation stayed with her throughout the day. Business was good due to a college sports conference going on downtown, and she found herself watching the door for the appearance of Greg Healey’s tall, broad figure. It was silly, she knew, because the only reason the guy would come back would be to sue her for blinding him.

      Her neighbor Jack’s comments came back to her, and she idly wondered if this Greg Healey was the same rich SOB bachelor Jack used to know, after all. But if what Jack said was true, the Greg Healey he knew would be even less prone to answer a singles ad than an ad for a roommate.

      She frowned. Unless the man simply shopped the singles ads for sex.

      Her opinion of him continued to flip-flop. Lana even debated whether she should try to contact him and explain the misunderstanding. But she suspected he wouldn’t find the situation quite so humorous.

      No, better to let sleeping dogs lie. She’d lived in Lexington most of her adult life and had crossed paths with Greg Healey once. The chances of it happening again were astronomical.

      Of course, when she arrived home that night, it occurred to her that he knew where she lived. She would certainly feel better if she’d found a roommate, but she’d had no luck.

      “You’re too picky,” Alex chided her when she came over that night to bring a velvet footstool she said she didn’t want to haul to the new house. “And you should be careful about who you let in your apartment.”

      Lana sighed. “I suppose Jack told you what happened yesterday?”

      “We have no secrets.”

      “Are you interested in hearing the rest of the story?”

      Alex sat down on the yellow couch. “Absolutely.”

      Lana dropped onto the blue beanbag chair and watched as little foam balls went flying out of the tired seams. “The guy actually thought he was meeting someone who placed a singles ad.”

      Alex squinted. “Hmm?”

      “My pastry chef, Annette, placed a singles ad and asked the guy to meet her at the coffee shop.”

      Her friend’s eyes widened. “And he thought you were—”

      “—looking for more than a roommate when I invited him up to see the apartment.”

      “Oh, that’s hysterical.”

      “Oh, yeah, I’m still laughing about it,” she said, rolling her eyes.

      Alex