Free Waking Up by Amanda Carpenter Page A

attend. All the employees were invited, and would show up either before or after their shift if they had to work that day, and Marilyn’s large family and circle of friends would also come. The blonde, a cheerful, unflagging extrovert, turned thirty on Saturday and was determined that the world should know it. She had confessed to Robbie that she was expecting close to a hundred guests when estimating the escorts and children of the people invited.
    Marilyn and her husband John bad done quite well for themselves, with a spacious house and lawn, and a private swimming pool at the back. Marilyn’s waitressing job was more of a hobby to keep her busy rather than any real need for the money. Her main interests in life were her husband, two children, and home, which she loved to redecorate every year at great cost of both time and money. Robbie had been advised to bring her swimsuit and a change of clothes, for the party would last from three in the afternoon to well into the night, with food being served the entire time.
    Normally she would have enjoyed the prospect of going to a party, but for some reason, she was ultra-sensitive to the fact that she would be attending alone.
    But she was just good old Rob. She wished in an explosion of fervency that she could show up with an incredibly handsome, charismatic man in tow who was obviously besotted with her and no one else. She longed rather forlornly for a whirlwind romance.
    She had breakfasted lightly and late, and lounged dispiritedly in her chair at the table, dawdling over a third cup of coffee. She mopped, her slim chin tucked into the heel of one propped up hand, her lower lip thrust out in a dissatisfied pout. Maybe she should really cut loose and splurge on that vacation in the Bahamas about which she secretly dreamed. Maybe she should buy a new wardrobe. Maybe she should move.
    A dark shadow fell over the table, and she turned her head to stare broodingly at Jason as he rapped on the glass door with the backs of his first two fingers. “It’s unlocked!” she called out, loudly enough for him to hear.
    He came inside, thrust the door shut behind him, and eyed her up and down as he commented, “Sunny mood we’re in today, I see. Got any more coffee?”
    “Help yourself.” She ducked her nose into her cup and finished hers. As he sat down beside her, he quickly searched her face with his vivid eyes, and though she was well aware of the perusal, she didn’t care enough to change her countenance.
    “I’m not sure I want to sit that close to you,” he told her, with a delicate shudder. “The way you look, you might start frothing at the mouth and biting any moment now.”
    After a moment, she asked, subdued, “Do I look that bad?”
    His brows shot up as he realized the depth of her dejection, and he said, quickly reassuring, “No, of course not. I was just teasing. But I must say, you don’t look very happy with your lot in life.” He raised his cup to his lips.
    “Jason, I need a man,” said Robbie plaintively, and he spat coffee across the table. That made her laugh, and he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand while regarding her sourly, wheezing.
    “That’s right, laugh it up. You shouldn’t say such things when I’ve just taken a drink,” he complained, as he rose to get a paper towel. After wiping up the spilt coffee, he sat down again while sending her an understandably wary look.
    “I’m being serious,” she said, once again morose and watched him from under her brows as he gingerly gave his coffee a second try.
    “Whatever do you need a man for?” he asked and then quickly added, with an irrepressible grin, “I mean, aside from what obviously comes to mind.”
    “I’m going to a party tonight, and I don’t want to go on my own,” she replied and heaved a great sigh.
    “No problem. I can take you.”
    “You?” she responded with astonishment. He was clad in his usual disreputable cut-off jean shorts, barefoot and bare-chested,