Free No Easy Choices (A New Adult Romance) by Trista Cade Page B

response sounded so rehearsed that I couldn’t even get mad. Someone had shoved that crap down his throat one too many times.
                  “Well, there’s graphic art, digital art, stuff like that. Those things pay big bucks, too, since it’s not something that just anybody can do. And you have to be really smart.” I looked at him hopefully as the light flickered in his eyes, only to be extinguished just as quickly.
                  “Well, yeah, but it’s nothing like the income potential of accounting. And my dad should know. I intern at his firm in the summers, well, until practices start.”
                  “I don’t know. I just couldn’t sit behind a desk all day doing stuff I don’t love.” The idea made me want to physically convulse.
                  “Oh, you don’t have to sit behind a desk all day. There are lots of conferences and tax law trainings and stuff to go to.”
                  “You just described hell to me,” I said, cringing and hoping I hadn’t hurt his feeling. I reached for a breadstick to stuff in my mouth to keep me from saying something else that was stupid or hurtful.
                  “Yeah, I know what you mean,” he answered, only he wasn’t laughing this time. I prayed for the waitress to hurry up and bring our food so I couldn’t keep this conversation going.
                  On paper, he was perfection. He was dutiful to his parents, even if it was taking things too far by ignoring what he wanted to do and becoming an accountant. He was outgoing and athletic, but had the good sense to apologize for throwing up on me. This was someone my parents would be thrilled to see me walk through the door with at Christmas break.
                  So why didn’t I feel anything?
                  This was a first date, and it was with someone who probably wouldn’t have had three words to say to me if we’d gone to high school together. I’d officially come into my own, me, Andie McMichaels. I was in college studying something I loved, I was a member of a really active campus sorority, and I was on a first date with a genuine specimen of a guy. I should have felt something. Anything. Instead, I nibbled a breadstick and tried not to hurt his feelings any more than I already had.
                  After we finished eating and had watched a fun, non-offensive, non-overly-sex-filled movie, we headed back to my house, thankfully without any more talk of ruining our lives by becoming drones who worked for a corporate overlord or by being “free spirits” who got to sit around and draw all day. We talked a little bit about sports—I’m not a moron, I went to public school, I know what football is—and how the college was supposed to do this year around the region. Mindless, fun, no-hurt-feelings stuff like that.
                  “I think I’m supposed to say something about how I had a really great time tonight, and how I’d like to do this again, and how I’ll call you if that’s okay,” Jackson said, a hint of his former smile coloring his face.
                  “And I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to thank you for a lovely evening and agree that we should definitely do it again,” I said, relieved that he didn’t seem to hurt by my lack of enthusiasm for his dad’s career path for him. He stepped closer to me and kissed me very gently on the lips, lingering there for only a second, kissing me a second time, and then a third. He smiled and stepped back, then gave me a small wave and walked away up the street, much like he had the night of my pity party.
                  And I had felt nothing. Zilch. Not so much as a lingering temperature change on my face to show that someone else had been there in the last few seconds.
                  I felt exactly what I expected to feel after kissing a soon-to-be tax