Free Love Found Me (A City Love Novel, Book 1) by Nina Amari Page A

walk skirting past vented grates and foot traffic. But with every step, she'd found her muscles steadily loosening.
    Maybe it was the cold whipping a quiver up the long pleat in her wool overcoat that simmered her nerves into a reposed blend of calm and humiliation. But the air felt good, like heavy burdens lifted off her shoulders. By the time she'd gotten far enough, she wasn't shaking anymore, as pure golden sunlight melted the hazy gloom of morning into baby blue sky. The city was a stirred calm. 
    Danielle spent the afternoon in unemployment bliss. Sashaying down to Fifth Avenue's Museum Mile and to the Upper East Side corner ice cream parlor. It was a haven for sweet-a-holics. The guy behind the counter remembered her from months ago. It wasn't often she'd taken the time to enjoy her favorite scooped a concoction of butterscotch, peanut butter and strawberry maple walnut oozing decadent hot fudge.
    This was when she'd realized she hadn't simply taken the pleasure of doing what she wanted, when she wanted. Despite her fury at Finch, she didn't want to wrestle her mind about it. He'd given her reason to finally sever the hold--the reason she'd come to New York City. But now she'd had to revisit that conversation with herself.
    Danielle, there is more to life than your career. Love is what you've been denying yourself for far too long. Love can find you, if you keep an open mind to find it. 
    It had taken her firing to convince herself that actually there was more to life that she'd been missing behind a desk and mountains of paperwork. Danielle stared at the guy squirting another smooth creamy layer of whipped cream. Her eyes were in a trance following his hand as he'd circled her huge sundae until it domed a tower with a sweet cherry on top.
    She shook her head, and her eyes lit as she murmured, God, that looks so delicious.
    Suddenly, she was starting to shatter the temptation to drudge up the memory, as her expression had changed from a heated upset to absolute purely sated pleasure. Amazingly, she was rallying a zest for "Freeeedom!" She shouted a silent scream at the top of her lungs that tore anxiety and worry for blissful moments. After all, Freedom , she thought, was something career never allowed time for.
    She savored every sumptuous meltdown and silent moment of brain freeze. With every luscious taste, Omigod, this is so delicious --she closed her eyes to evoke memories of calm, sand and breeze. As sweet icy foam trickled her tongue to quiver once it kissed mountains of whipped cream, she was in heaven.
    But there wasn't any room for one of those tantalizing and crisply sautéed almond butter prosciutto and melted brie sandwiches. Danielle was still in the habit of insidious consumption.
    Food filled the void, and shopping filled the desire for reward. After all the hell and back pitfalls of corporate life, heck--employment as a whole had been just that--a means to supply what never seemed to end--bills, payments, taxes.
    She'd beat down the pavement at Finch. She'd made sacrifices. Heck, she'd had absolutely no love life, in exchange for a career that was sucking her bone dry. Starting at seven or eight most mornings, hustling twelve or even fourteen-hour days. Often weekends if need be.
    Her demanding, tightly organized schedule allowed no time for a social life.
    It wasn't natural. For a woman in her prime, it just wasn't natural to spend more than half of her life chained to her office. When would she have awakened from the mirage and stood in front of the mirror and faced her naked self. She was born with a desire to love and be loved. But, love couldn't electrify a woman caught in a ceaseless maze of bureaucracy.
    Afterwards, Danielle zigzagged the maze of traffic when suddenly her heart flip-flopped in her chest. Without warning, the pulsing evened out and she began to pick up speed. Lots of speed, when she'd noticed the old neighborhood. Not just any neighborhood--Her ex fiancé's