She put her head on her desk and banged it softly.
Maybe this whole WorkAround thing had been a terrible idea. Maybe Mary Leigh was wrong and had given her shitty advice. Maybe the whole online therapy business was a sham, and she was being life-coached by some nineteen-year-old operating out of her parents’ basement.
Her computer dinged with an email notification, and she took a breath before lifting her head and clicking. The numbers were in for last week’s Miz Poppy posts and two new freelance assignments had hit her inbox. Work. The sight of it unwound some of the tension and put an end to her pity party of one.
Calm. The hell. Down.
Don’t catastrophize. That was what Mary Leigh would say.
Okay, so she’d had a minor freak-out. Fine. She couldn’t expect perfection. She couldn’t let one embarrassing incident shake her confidence in this plan. She’d worked too hard to get to this point. This didn’t have to be a thing. Jasper didn’t have to be a thing.
Look, Mary Leigh, coping mechanisms in action! Mark that in your chart and stamp it with a smiley face.
* * *
By the time lunchtime rolled around, Hollyn had tucked away the stressful morning into the let’s-pretend-this-never-happened file and was in the zone, crafting her next post. She was feeling pretty good, resolved even, until she went downstairs for decaf number two and froze a few feet away from the coffee bar. Jasper was behind the counter, pouring a cup for someone else, a blue apron tied around his waist.
Her stomach sank.
He wasn’t just another person renting a hot desk—someone easily avoided. He was the new Jackee. He was the new keeper of the coffee.
Jasper smiled her way and lifted a hand in greeting. So freaking friendly. So damn nerd-hot. “Hola, Ms. Busy.”
Smile back! Smile back! Smile back, she silently screamed at herself. Be a functioning human!
Instead, a grimace pulled at her face, a yank of muscles she couldn’t control. His smile fell, a startled look flashing in his eyes. Then annoyance. A little part of Hollyn died inside. She turned on her heel and walked right back the way she came.
In the stairwell, she leaned against the brick wall and closed her eyes, mortification bleeding through her and making her limbs tingle. No no no. She could feel the telltale signs, but it was too late to stop it. All systems had already been engaged.
Hello, panic, my old friend.
She mentally reset the calendar she kept in her journal where she tracked how many panic-free days she’d had in a row with the title Don’t break the chain. The chain had been broken. Again.
If her mother were here, she would be shaking her head at her with that knowing look on her face. See, honey, I told you moving to the city was a bad idea. You’re not ready for this. You may never be. That’s okay. Just come home.
As Hollyn’s heartbeat raced and sweat glazed her skin, all the things she’d pictured in that imaginary movie of herself melted into the ugly reality. There was no four-leaf clover for her. There was no meet-cute. Her awkwardness was not adorkable like a movie heroine. She was a goddamned disaster. This monster that clamped its hand around her throat and took control of her muscles was real and it was bigger, meaner, and more determined than ever.
Maybe her mother was right.
She slapped the wall with the palm of her hand and let out a sound of frustration, the noise echoing through the empty stairwell.
No.
She. Would. Not. Run. She loved working in her cozy office. She loved that she was finally earning her own money—even though there wasn’t much of it. She loved having the freedom to go out in the city at night instead of having to watch life go by through a TV screen in her small hometown. She was Miz freaking Poppy, goddammit. She was famous. You know, regionally. Microregionally. Like very micro. On the internet.
She groaned at her lame pep talk, but it at least distracted her from replaying the awkward encounter with Jasper over and over in her head. This didn’t have to be a big deal. She would not let her attraction to some cute barista derail her plan. She could deal with this.
He was just a guy. In a world full of them.
So what if this particular one thought she was rude? It’s not like she was trying to date him. She wasn’t capable of dating anyone. In fact, she never had to speak to Jasper again.
She had nothing to worry about.
Everything was cool.
Totally cool.
Ugh. Maybe she needed to find a new office.
Chapter Two
Be cool. Jasper’s caseworkers had always told him to think before he acted. They said impulsive like it was a dirty word. Like it was some disease he had contracted. Jasper can’t control himself. Jasper can’t keep his mouth shut. Jasper is just too much. He could hear them in his head now, telling him to just let things lie and pour the damn coffee. But when he smiled at the mystery woman from the second floor, and her pretty face twisted into a look full of disgust before she hurried back in the other direction, he wanted to shout out, “Hey, what’s your problem?”
What did he ever do to her besides bring her coffee this morning and not embarrass her about her porn perusing? Jasper set down the carafe he’d been holding and opened his mouth to call out to her, but she’d slipped into the stairwell before he could get the words out. He frowned and shook his head. “What the hell, man?”
“What’s that?” the dark-haired woman in front of him asked, looking up from her phone. Emily Vu. Vlogger-blogger. Intense vibe. He’d made his mental notes, determined to learn as many names and personalities as he could.
“Sorry,” he said, putting a lid on her coffee and setting it on the counter. “I just… I think I must’ve done something to annoy the woman who works at the end of the hall upstairs.” He cocked his head toward the stairwell. “She was heading this way and then bailed when she saw me working the counter. Maybe she doesn’t trust me with her coffee or something.”
Emily’s brows lifted, and she looked toward the stairwell. “Last office…the woman with the curly blond hair?”
“Yeah, you know her?”
Emily tucked her phone into the pocket of her suit jacket before taking her coffee. “Not really. I mean, I’ve passed her in the hall, but she keeps to herself. I think she’s a writer, maybe. Something that doesn’t require the video or podcasting rooms.”
“I wish I knew what I did to offend her or whatever.” He poured a cup of coffee for himself, replaying their earlier interaction in his head, trying to figure out where things had gone wrong. “Maybe she really loved the person who had this job before me, and now she’s mad that she’s gone.”
Emily choked a little on her coffee and then smirked at him. “I promise that’s definitely not it. No one loved Jackee.” She grabbed a napkin to dab her lips. “Jackee made sure of it. Maybe she’s just having a bad day and you were in the line of fire.”