Free Unexpected by Lilly Avalon

me.
Unfortunately, he walks out of the kitchen about ten seconds later
and immediately spots me. Damn.
    He saunters over, a
smug look on his face. “Here to ask for your job back, Alina?
Because I already hired a replacement.”
    I give him a fake
smile. “No, I'm not. And even if you hadn't hired a replacement, I
wouldn't be interested. I'm just here for my paycheck.”
    “ I don't have
the paychecks yet. There's been a delay.”
    As if on cue, Willa
comes out from the back room and waves an envelope at me. “That's
funny, because Willa seems to have it in her hands right now.” She
hands it to me and I pretend to look it over carefully. “Yep, this
is my paycheck. Maybe you forgot, or maybe you're just a jerk.
Either way, I don't even care anymore. I have better things ahead
of me.”
    Geoffrey flares his
nostrils, then spins around to go back into the kitchen. Willa
smirks and says, “Good luck. Although I doubt you'll need it.” Her
eyes brighten and she reaches for my arm. “We should hang out
sometime.”
    Willa and I have
only known each other for a couple months and worked together only
a handful of times, which didn't give us much of a chance to talk,
but I always liked being around her. So when she says this, it hits
me how much I could use another friend in my life. “We should.” I
get out my phone and she recites her number as I plug it in.
    “ Awesome.
Text me so I have your number.” She glances over at the
people in the booth near the corner. “Looks like they need me over there. I'll talk to you later,
okay?”
    I nod and say,
“Okay.” She flashes me a beaming smile and heads off.
    When I get to my
car, I send her a quick text message so I don't forget to send it
later. I pull out of the parking lot and wonder where to go after I
deposit the check. I don't have any more places to check out or any
interviews yet, and I really don't want to sit around Ryan's for
the rest of the day until he gets home.
    Since I haven't had
much of a chance to talk to my mom since Tuesday, I head over to
her house. She's in the middle of a massive baking project for her
church's bake sale. I offer my help and end up stirring a large
bowl full of brownie mix. “How much more of this do you have to
go?” I ask.
    “ Once we take
care of that batch of brownies, I'm going to get started on a
couple pies. I have the pie crusts ready so all we have to do is
add the filling.”
    “ Cool.”
    After a minute of
silence, Mom says, “So, how has it been since, well, everything
happened?”
    I shrug. “I guess
it's been okay. Drew called me when he found out about me not
working at the diner, but I told him off. Pretending to worry about
me now isn't going to make me come crawling back.”
    She shakes
her head. “I thought he had potential.”
    “ Potential to
break hearts,” I mutter.
    “ You can't
know these things.” She takes the bowl from me and pours it into
the pan, then hands it back.
    I run a
finger over the edge of the bowl and lick the brownie batter off my
finger before she can stop me. “Considering Drew isn't the
first guy to cheat on me, something has got to
give.”
    “ Like I said,
you can't know these things. My high school sweetheart, Paul, used
to be my everything. He was so nice, kind, and loving. When
we graduated, however, everything changed. I don't know exactly what sparked it, but he wasn't
my Paul anymore.” She places the pan in the oven, then turns back
to me. “People change, Alina. Sometimes for the better and
sometimes for the worse. You have to learn to have faith and hope
for the best. Drew may have seemed nice at first, but that's
because he was trying to win you over. His true colors have come
out. It's too bad it took six months, but at least you found this
out now. You're still young and there is someone out
there.”
    “ What if I
can't trust him?”
    “ Honey,
there's nothing wrong with being cautious, but you gotta have
faith.”
    “ Like the
George Michael