Free Georgie on His Mind by Jennifer Shirk

overestimated his guilt
for mowing down her old Barbie. Why would Walt want her
hanging around a boys' night out? That didn't sound like such
a hot idea. Having his younger sister around wouldn't be conducive to Brad relaxing and meeting a woman.
    "Go out with the two of you?" she asked. "Oh. I don't
know. I ..." Think, brain! Think!
    Walt leaned in, looking vaguely amused at her uneasiness.
"What's the matter?" he asked. "We haven't seen each other
in years. It'll be a great opportunity for us to catch up and
get better acquainted with each another."
    Better acquainted with Walt? She didn't think that was
such a hot idea either.
    She dropped her gaze away so she could think better, but
her mind stalled when she ended up with an eyeful of his
chest hair. Not only was she not sure she liked this new personality of Walt's, but she wasn't sure she liked this new dress
code of his. Handsome, kind, and shirtless was not a combination that was going to resolve this sudden infatuation she
was feeling toward him anytime soon.
    She drew a shaky breath and looked up. "Well, uh ... as a
matter of-"

    "Great" He beamed, and the corners of his eyes crinkled
in a way-too-appealing manner. "It's a date then"
    "Oh. Yeah, that sounds ... great" A date. With Walt.
    And her brother.
    No, not great. And not exactly the kind of date she was
looking for. But maybe this was what she needed to get a
guy like Walt out of her system. Ever since she'd seen him,
her body responded to him in ways she wasn't used to. It
worried her.
    Whenever she'd gone on dates or hung around attractive
men in the past, she'd always been able to have a great time
and keep her emotions in check. But when she looked at
Walt, it was an entirely different matter. The last thing she
wanted was to be drawn to someone like him. He was just
like her brother-overprotective, domineering, someone
who saw her as a person unable to make intelligent decisions. Yikes. No, she didn't want that. She had met and even
dated a few of those Neanderthal type know-it-alls in college. That was enough for her. She wanted a man who saw
she had a good head on her shoulders and saw her for what
she really was-not just a little sister who needed protecting.
    She was sure that once Walt and Brad were together,
they'd go back to their old ways of treating her, and she'd be
reminded of all the reasons why she should ignore her physical reaction to Walt. Then she could go back to concentrating
on a more important matter-finding her brother a woman.

     

After four days at the store, Walt was still finding things
he could improve upon. He hadn't anticipated putting this
much work into it so soon, but once he had a chance to oversee the pharmacy without his uncle in the way, Walt's business instincts automatically took over.
    Expired drugs had already been pulled from the shelves,
but prescriptions from four years ago still needed to be boxed
and filed away. The antiquated way of keeping their books
had to be updated to a better computer system. The good
news was the video surveillance camera he had ordered
would be in next week. He hoped they'd at least be able to
figure out how the condom thefts had happened and prevent
any other shoplifting. Now if he could just come up with
a way to keep their sales from slipping further, he and his
uncle might actually be able to hold on to their business for
the foreseeable future.
    Walt decided to give his eyes a break from all the paperwork he'd been perusing and checked his watch. Eleven fifty-five. The next technician was scheduled to arrive any
minute, and it happened to be one Georgiana Louise Mayer.

    He sighed.
    Maybe it was his imagination but it seemed as though
Georgie had been avoiding him these last few days. Fortunately for her, he'd been pretty busy doing paperwork in the
stock room. Randall had been understanding enough to do
pharmacist duty all week so that Walt could look over the
business aspects of