Free Carried Away: A Small Town Romance (The Moore Brothers Book 2) by Abby Brooks

she’d give him arm candy. She was gonna look damn good when he picked her up.
    She turned on some music and danced through getting dressed and then headed into work for the longest day ever. James had been right. No one showed. A few people trickled in for their morning coffees, but after that? Nada. She cleaned the tables. She stocked the counters. She did her best to avoid Ben, but he was just as bored as she was so that was no easy feat. Finally, she gave in and let him yammer away at her while she watched the hour hand drag its lazy ass around the clock.
    At half past one, she’d had all she could take. “Hey, Ben?” she asked, interrupting whatever he had been droning on about for the last twenty minutes. “I need to get ready for a date. Would you man the counter for me?”
    Ben clamped down on the first bit of personal information Ellie had given him in days and didn’t like the taste of it. “A date, huh?” He sniffed and looked away. “Where you going?”
    He looked like he had just caught her cheating and it would have been comical if it hadn’t been so annoying. “Shrimp Fest,” she said, heading back to the office to grab her bag of clothes and makeup. “With James Moore.”
    Ben whistled. “No wonder I never had a chance with you. You like ‘em tall, dark, and rich as hell.”
    The disdain in his voice was almost more than Ellie could bare and if he wasn’t an employee, she would have told him just exactly all the other reasons he didn’t have a chance with her. But he was an employee, so Ellie disappeared into the restroom before her mouth had a different idea about what Ben needed to hear. She emerged just before two and found that Ben had already left. The place was devoid of customers, so at least he hadn’t left her in a lurch, but damn. Here she was worrying about treating an employee with proper respect only for that employee to turn around and walk out on the job.
    What if a customer had come in? Oh hell! Just because no one was here now, didn't mean they hadn’t been here earlier and who knew when Ben and actually left. Ellie checked the cash in the register and sighed in relief when it looked untouched, then scurried back to the office to make sure everything was okay in there, too. Which it was. The kitchen though? That was another story. Ben had left a mess. A huge mess. Stacks of dishes tilted maddenly near the sinks and food needed put away and she was pretty damn certain she was going to need another weekend cook because Ben’s ass was fired.
    Creepy bastard.
    Ellie went to work, doing her best not to spill anything on her shirt, and was just coming out of the walk-in when she heard the front door open. “I’ll be right there,” she called out. She just needed to get a few more of these perishable items in the walk-in and the rest would just have to wait until later. She gathered several bins of condiments in her arms, each one stacked precariously on the next.
    She turned just as James came around the corner and scared her half to death. She jumped, and then in an effort to keep from spilling a big pan of mayo down her chest, she stumbled. The pans in her hands clattered to the floor and Ellie lost all control of her body, lurching backwards to avoid stepping in the mess. There was a split second of oh shit I’m gonna fall followed by strong arms wrapped tightly around her and one powerful set of chest muscles squeezing against her shoulders.
    “Whoa,” said James as he stood her back up. “I didn’t see that coming. Are you okay?” He released her but kept his hands on her shoulders, laughter crinkling the corners of his eyes.
    Ellie looked down at her shirt and didn’t see one drop of anything anywhere. “Yeah,” she said, beaming and trying to ignore the fact that she was wishing he hadn’t let her go just yet. “I’m fine. Double fine since I didn’t spill anything on myself.”
    James stepped back and gave her a serious once over, a smile playing on his