Page 90 of Hottie on Her Shelf
“Please.” Randall dismissed the notion with a flick of his wrist that set the hat flipping back onto his head. “Handsome, rich, charming, thoughtful, ab-tastic men are everywhere. We’ll get you a rebound hottie. Might not tick all the same boxes, but two out of five will still deliver a good time.”
“I don’t want a rebound. I definitely don’t want rich. I want Fitz.”
Randall cocked his head to the side and then tapped a finger against the soul patch she tried every week to talk him into shaving off. “I’m confused. Megan told me you dumped him. Did she get it wrong?”
“No.” Petting the dog helped her tamp down—pretend to ignore—her feelings. Maybe she’d get a dog. Definitely not a cat. The spinster librarian-with-cat cliché was too depressing. “But I just got a jump on the inevitable. Fitz would’ve realized soon enough that we couldn’t make it work. Or his parents would’ve forced him to do it.”
He cocked his head to the otherside. “I’m more confused. You fell for a man who still does whatever his parents order him to do?”
“No. I wasn’t being precise in the description. Fitz wants, above all else, to live up to the duty, the responsibility, to take care of the town that his forebears have passed down to him as a sacred legacy.”
“That’s a heck of a lot.”
“Yes. Yes, it is. Too much for a person to carry, in my opinion.” It genuinely made Hallie sad to watch Fitz be jailed by the constraints of his family legacy. He so very much didn’t want to be mayor—but also didn’t want to abandon his family’s post and all the citizens. It was a damned-both-ways scenario. The fact that he continued to choose the selfless-but-miserable option—well, it couldn’t last forever. Hopefully, he’d break free before the next election. “Anyway, his parents would eventually remind him of this crushing duty, and he’d dump me. Or would have. That’s why I jumped the gun. Not because I didn’t…well…enjoy his company.”
Randall pivoted, craning his neck left and right as if checking to be certain they were still alone. “Hallie? Were you—are you—in love with the mayor?”
“I don’t know.” She scrunched up her face, thinking, wondering if it even mattered putting a label on it now that they were over. “There was always this concrete wall in my head, with a flashing sign that said this can’t work out. But the wall was crumbling, and I’d fallen hard for him. Very hard. Check out the bruises on my heart hard.”
“I take it all back. No rebound sexcapades for you.” He waved his arms in a big X, like a lifeguard signaling a swimmer to come in with semaphores. “That’s the wrong prescription.”
“Is there a right one? I’ll pay whatever it costs.” She stood, lifting a Boston terrier up with her. It was even softer. Could it be available? Because crying into her pillow every night was only setting herself up for a mold issue down the line.
“Yes. You need to throw yourself into a project.”
Hallie’s projects consisted of reading…and researching what books she wanted to read next. Or reading about the fascinating hobbies dabbled in by the characters in her books. In real life, a project sounded daunting. “Like that macramé planter you and Ana worked on after her long-distance fling with Werner fell apart?”
“No. That wasn’t therapy, either. We were testing YouTube tutorials to see if they’re actually useful or just staged.”
All she really remembered was the hideousness of it lying in a knotted lump in Ana’s living room for months on end. “And?”
“And have you ever seen that planter hanging in either of our houses?”
“No, thank goodness. I figured someone from the future hopped in a time machine and sent it back to the seventies where it belonged.”
Randall clapped his hands twice, snapping her out of the macramé musing. “Your project—an all-consuming one—should be running for mayor.”
What? Randall had been the one who used the fancy app to design her campaign poster. Did he think that was just another fun project with no real-life application? “Uh, that’s what I’ve been doing. Have you not listened to any of my stump speeches?”
“Yes. Blah blah new blood blah blah blah new ideas. I mean that you have to win.”
“Please refer to my previous comment.”
“Hallie, you’re trying. I’ll give you that, but until a few days ago, you were also sleeping with the opposition. That’s not exactly cutthroat politics.”
Dammit, he was right.
She’d dropped her guard. Still argued the issues, of course. Vociferously. But it had been more of a drawing back the curtain to show an alternate view than trying to take Fitz down. It’d morphed into a clash of ideals rather than a cage match from which only a single victor could emerge.
“So what do you suggest?”
“You need help from someone who knowsthings. Me? I’ve got enthusiasm and the random knowledge that can fill in topical jokes in a dull speech about parking meters. Patent granted in 1938, BTW.”
“Hilarious,” she drawled.
“Megan and Ana don’t know anything either—aside from how much we wish we could do a better job of helping you.”
“I don’t need help. I’ve got facts and—” It was beginning to sound like the same rant she’d made to Fitz when she’d so snottily turned down his offer of help, which she’d ended up regretting.
