Page 75 of How To Plot a Payback

I don’t blink. The light has turned, but I remain on the sidewalk. The thought is just so impossible. “I’m sorry, but I believe you’re lying. There’s just no way that you were a dog walker.”

A little crease forms between her brows. “And why is that so impossible to believe?”

“You are literally carrying that dog. Right now.”

She glances down and, looking quite like my sister, who tends to scour the house looking for her fourth baby while actually carrying said fourth baby on her hip, cracks a smile.

“At best you were a dog carrier,” I say. Then repeat, “At best.”

The light turns again and another group of pedestrians surrounds us.

“There was one unruly terrier I did tend to carry around quite a bit. But other than that—”

What am I doing?! Pull yourself together, man!

“Sure,” I cut in, focusing on the light ahead. No distractions. No chitchat with this woman. “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I have a date—”

I am headed to a (practically) blind date, if anyone must know. With a caterer friend of Paula’s I met at work and have known for a sum of thirty seconds. Hardly enough time to catch her name, but long enough for Paula to squeeze herself into the conversation and set up a brunch date between her two “favorite eligible single friends.”

“With Maggie?” she says, looking intrigued. “That’s actually what I chased you down the street to ask about. So you hit it off then?”

“No,” I reply forcefully. “Specifically not with . . .” I pause. It doesn’t even feel safe to speak her name. “The young lady, for the record, is Goodwin’s niece.”

Lavender waits for me to continue.

I don’t.

“And?” she says.

“And I’m an old bachelor.”

“You said yourself you’re about to go on a date.”

“An old bachelor compared to women who are as young as your boss’s niece.”

She laughs. “You’re joking. I was on a date with a forty-year-old last week.”

“And you’re twenty-nine. That’s different.”

She looks amused. “And how do you know this?”

“We were at school together,” I remind her, frowning. “It’s hardly rocket science to count down one year.”

The light turns again, and traffic begins to flow. I step off the sidewalk and onto the road. “Good-bye, Lavender,” I say, training my voice to keep things professional. The goal here is to keep my distance while remaining polite. The last thing I need, after all, is for her to officially turn against me. And while I’m not peppy (I will never be “peppy”), I do the job.

But in true leech fashion, she sticks to me.

“Why are you following me?” I say, side-eyeing her.

She shrugs. “I live in the same direction. So who are you going on a date with then?”

“You do not live in the same direction,” I reply. The area isn’t bad per se, but if you recall, both glitter and glue reside in this town, and this area isn’t remotely like the famed location where so many of those shiny types reside. Here, we glue people do things like leave our cars on the street. Here we use regular-sized welcome mats for our regular-sized doors.

“It’ll take you hours to walk back to your Hollywood Hills mansion from here.”

“I don’t live in Hollywood Hills,” she says.

And I have to admit, she surprises me here.