Free Georgia On My Mind by Marie Force Page A

minute they sat down at the table, Tess sent her a pointed look. “Anything you want to tell me?”
    “Anything you don’t already know?”
    “It’s always so much better coming from the horse’s mouth,” Tess said with a wicked grin.
    Taking a long sip of her wine, Georgie glanced at her friend over the top of the glass. “The short story is—he chewed me out about not recycling at the center, apologized later with the flowers, asked me to dinner, I went, we had fun, he asked me to come to his house so he could show me the work he’s done to it, we had sex—a lot of sex, really, really good sex—which I have never, ever done before on a first date, and I felt like a total slut all day today. That’s it.”
    Tess’s mouth hung open, her eyes agog.
    “What?”
    “All Cat said was you went out with Jogger Guy.”
    Georgie groaned. “ Shit .”
    “Well,” Tess said, giggling. “This is an interesting development.”
    “Don’t get too excited. It was a one-night thing.”
    “Why?”
    “I’ll tell you the same thing I told Cat—in light of everything else that’s going on, I don’t need the complication.”
    “Why does it have to be complicated?”
    How could she explain that this had complicated written all over it from the moment she first saw him running by and wanted to lick the sweat from his back?
    “Why can’t you just have some fun with him while you’re in town?”
    “Come on, Tess. You know it never works out that way. People get their feelings involved, and it gets messy when it ends. I don’t need that, and I’m sure he doesn’t, either. Besides, I’ve already done, well, everything there is to do with him. How do we go back to just ‘having fun’ after that?”
    Tess raised an eyebrow. “ Everything? ”
    “No stone was left unturned.”
    “Wow.” Tess took a big gulp of her wine. “I need a cigarette.”
    Georgie cracked up.
    The doorbell rang.
    “I’ll get it,” Tess said.
    She left the room, and Georgie dove into the spicy barbecue chicken.
    Tess returned a minute later. “Georgie, you have a visitor.”
    With barbecue sauce smeared on her face, she looked up to find Nathan Caldwell watching her, his bright blue eyes dancing with amusement.
    “Hello, Georgie.”
    Looking away from him as her face burned with embarrassment, she grabbed a napkin. “What are . . . I mean . . . why are you here?” She hated the stammer that infected her voice as she tried to spit out the sentence. How did he manage to turn her into a stammering fool just by walking into the room? It was so unfair!
    “I was wondering if I could borrow some dental floss.”

Chapter 7
     
    Tess looked from one of them to the other. “Dental floss? I don’t get it.”
    Georgie burned with mortification.
    Nathan turned to Tess. “You must be Tess.” He extended his hand. “Nathan Caldwell. Nice to meet you.”
    Flustered, Tess shook his hand. “Oh, well.”
    Georgie rolled her eyes. Apparently, he had that effect on all women, not just her, which was yet another reason to keep her distance.
    “Georgie and I were just having dinner,” Tess said. “Why don’t you join us?”
    “I’d love to.”
    “But—” Georgie said.
    “Georgie, serve the salad.” With another pointed look, Tess handed her three bowls.
    Flashing Georgie a satisfied grin that told her he knew exactly how uncomfortable he was making her, Nathan plopped down in the chair next to hers. “Oh, is that corn on the cob? I’ll really need floss after that.”
    “Okay,” Tess said as she brought another plate and silverware to the table, “what’s with the floss? Or do I not want to know?”
    “Nothing kinky,” Nathan said with a chuckle that earned him a glare from Georgie. “I have this temperamental toilet in my house, and apparently it gave Georgie some trouble this morning, because when I got home, I discovered she’d used half a box of floss to tie the ball cock to the light.”
    Georgie, who had been attempting to