Selling Grace: A Light Romance Novel (Art of Grace Book 1) by Samantha Westlake
Authors: Samantha Westlake
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James, sexy smiling real estate agent, thinking about my naked body.
The quesadilla sitting in my stomach shifted a little, and I winced. Maybe I could manage to do a couple thousand sit-ups between now and dinner, to try and make the naked body in Carter's fantasies a little less... blobby.
Carter pulled out his phone, and I gave him my address. "Perfect," he told me before we parted ways outside of Taqueria El Burrito. "I'll swing by and pick you up around seven."
"Can't wait," I lied brightly, as my stomach did another little nervous flip.
Chapter Thirteen
*
The rest of the afternoon, my brain kept on bouncing up and down, from highs to lows, like it was strapped onto a roller coaster. One moment, I found myself unable to keep a silly grin off of my face as I remembered Carter's enthusiastic flirting with me. The next moment, my grin turned upside down and plunged into a frown as I remembered how I still needed to come up with thousands of dollars of disposable income, how my stupid divorce still threatened, months later, to drag me all the way down to bankruptcy.
What would happen if, heaven forbid, the worst possible outcome happened, and I couldn't manage to get the money for Barry? I'd been trying not to reflect on this bleak possibility, but I figured that I should at least consider some sort of last-ditch plan.
I didn't know the details of declaring bankruptcy, but it seemed like the sort of thing that was worth trying to avoid at all costs. But then again, from whom could I borrow that kind of money? I knew that Portia didn't have an extra ten thousand dollars just lying around. I could maybe think about approaching my parents, but I even knew how much it would hurt them. My mom and dad were happily retired, but they'd worked hard for many years to save up their nest egg. That egg wouldn't take kindly to getting raided for ten thousand dollars in order to bail out their daughter for her marriage mistake.
Okay, mind off of this, onto something else. Something happier. Think about this date with Carter tonight. What would he want to do? Where would he take me?
My god, I realized, sitting up a little straighter behind the front desk at the art gallery, what was I going to wear?
I did my best to mentally flick through the contents of my closet at home as I waited for the clock to finally creep towards five o'clock, closing time. What sort of style should I be aiming to hit? Did I want to come off as a good girl, as wholesome, or should I embrace Portia's idea of just throwing myself into the sack and go with something slutty?
Even after I arrived back home, I remained half-paralyzed as I stared into my open closet. "What do you think?" I asked Salem, now sitting nearby on my bed with all four of his feet tucked under his furry body. He looked like a large black potato with a head.
Salem just yawned back at me, rolling onto his back and twisting around on top of my comforter, looking like he was in ecstasy. "Fat lot of help you are," I told him, and returned back to the closet.
I did have some little black dresses in the back, which would typically be suitable for a date like this - but, I realized with a little twinge of embarrassment, it had been quite a while since I'd tried one of them on. I was fairly certain that I'd put on at least a couple of pounds since I last bought one of those cute dresses. They likely wouldn't look quite so cute on me now.
Still, with a lack of other options, I dug them out and forced myself into one of them. Turning back and forth in front of the mirror, self-consciously sliding my hands down over the sides and my hips to smooth out imaginary wrinkles, I admitted that maybe I could pull one of these off still. They certainly didn't leave much to the imagination, especially up around the bust, but maybe that would be enough to distract Carter from how my rather plump butt stretched out the fabric down around my hips. I definitely belonged in a dress slightly larger, but
The quesadilla sitting in my stomach shifted a little, and I winced. Maybe I could manage to do a couple thousand sit-ups between now and dinner, to try and make the naked body in Carter's fantasies a little less... blobby.
Carter pulled out his phone, and I gave him my address. "Perfect," he told me before we parted ways outside of Taqueria El Burrito. "I'll swing by and pick you up around seven."
"Can't wait," I lied brightly, as my stomach did another little nervous flip.
Chapter Thirteen
*
The rest of the afternoon, my brain kept on bouncing up and down, from highs to lows, like it was strapped onto a roller coaster. One moment, I found myself unable to keep a silly grin off of my face as I remembered Carter's enthusiastic flirting with me. The next moment, my grin turned upside down and plunged into a frown as I remembered how I still needed to come up with thousands of dollars of disposable income, how my stupid divorce still threatened, months later, to drag me all the way down to bankruptcy.
What would happen if, heaven forbid, the worst possible outcome happened, and I couldn't manage to get the money for Barry? I'd been trying not to reflect on this bleak possibility, but I figured that I should at least consider some sort of last-ditch plan.
I didn't know the details of declaring bankruptcy, but it seemed like the sort of thing that was worth trying to avoid at all costs. But then again, from whom could I borrow that kind of money? I knew that Portia didn't have an extra ten thousand dollars just lying around. I could maybe think about approaching my parents, but I even knew how much it would hurt them. My mom and dad were happily retired, but they'd worked hard for many years to save up their nest egg. That egg wouldn't take kindly to getting raided for ten thousand dollars in order to bail out their daughter for her marriage mistake.
Okay, mind off of this, onto something else. Something happier. Think about this date with Carter tonight. What would he want to do? Where would he take me?
My god, I realized, sitting up a little straighter behind the front desk at the art gallery, what was I going to wear?
I did my best to mentally flick through the contents of my closet at home as I waited for the clock to finally creep towards five o'clock, closing time. What sort of style should I be aiming to hit? Did I want to come off as a good girl, as wholesome, or should I embrace Portia's idea of just throwing myself into the sack and go with something slutty?
Even after I arrived back home, I remained half-paralyzed as I stared into my open closet. "What do you think?" I asked Salem, now sitting nearby on my bed with all four of his feet tucked under his furry body. He looked like a large black potato with a head.
Salem just yawned back at me, rolling onto his back and twisting around on top of my comforter, looking like he was in ecstasy. "Fat lot of help you are," I told him, and returned back to the closet.
I did have some little black dresses in the back, which would typically be suitable for a date like this - but, I realized with a little twinge of embarrassment, it had been quite a while since I'd tried one of them on. I was fairly certain that I'd put on at least a couple of pounds since I last bought one of those cute dresses. They likely wouldn't look quite so cute on me now.
Still, with a lack of other options, I dug them out and forced myself into one of them. Turning back and forth in front of the mirror, self-consciously sliding my hands down over the sides and my hips to smooth out imaginary wrinkles, I admitted that maybe I could pull one of these off still. They certainly didn't leave much to the imagination, especially up around the bust, but maybe that would be enough to distract Carter from how my rather plump butt stretched out the fabric down around my hips. I definitely belonged in a dress slightly larger, but
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