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Becca scoffed.

“If you’re having sex with a zombie, you’re beyond saving!” she exclaimed. “Do you think the zombie is going to wait until you both have an orgasm before zombifying you?”

“Maybe! They didn’t exactly cover this topic in The Walking Dead.”

They reached La Vida Mocha a couple of minutes later. Usually, the thrill of walking into this coffeeshop was seeing the owner, Vanessa, working behind the counter. Vanessa was unbelievably gorgeous, and Becca and Krissy—along with every other gay woman in town—just enjoyed admiring her. However, this time, Vanessa was nowhere to be seen. Instead, it was Amber behind the counter taking orders while the brand-new barista, a cute young thing with brown hair whose name Becca didn’t know yet, made the coffee.

While she and Krissy were on the line waiting, a woman approached Becca. She was in her thirties, pretty and had impressive curves.

“You’re the firefighter,” she said. “The one from that burning building.”

Becca sighed.

“Yep,” she said, hoping her tone in that one-word answer would indicate that she really didn’t want to be bothered.

But this woman wasn’t going to be dissuaded so easily. She was an alpha, and she was giving off that predator vibe. Apparently, Becca was her current prey.

She looked Becca up and down, appraisingly, her bottom lip between her teeth, as if she was ogling a mouth-watering dessert, trying to decide exactly where she wanted to make her first bite.

“Listen,” she began, “I’d like to buy you some coffee and maybe we can sit and chat for a while…?”

Becca, placing her arm around Krissy’s shoulders, said, “Sorry. Girlfriend.”

The woman gave a surprised gasp.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” she said, her eyes going back and forth between Becca and Krissy. “I didn’t know…” And she made an unhurried exit.

Becca dropped her arm from around Krissy.

“Thanks,” she said.

“Of course,” Krissy replied.

This was something they did often. If they were together and one of them needed “rescuing” from the unwanted attentions of a man or woman, the other was suddenly her “girlfriend.” Becca had to admit, though, that she had kind of liked her arm where it had been just a few moments ago.

“I’m sorry to bother you,” another woman said. She was much younger than the first, barely out of her teens, Becca guessed. “But you’re the one on YouTube, right?”

Becca forced a smile. Why couldn’t La Vida Mocha have a drive-thru window?

“I am.”

“That video was so amazing!” the young woman gushed. “My idiot cousin was telling me last week that he thinks women should stay out of the police force and the fire department.”

Becca’s eyes flashed.

“Did he now?” she said, with an edge to her voice. “Well, I bet your idiot cousin would have wet his pants if he had been up on that roof with me.”

The young woman laughed, holding Becca’s eyes with her own. And was it Becca’s imagination or did her new friend push out her chest a little more?

Despite herself, Becca felt a flush of excitement.

Nope! Too young…too young!

Fast approaching her thirty-fifth birthday, the last thing Becca wanted was to get involved with someone who might be twenty. No, if she was ever going to do the age-gap thing it would be with a woman whose birth year at least started with 19.

The young lady brandished her cellphone.

“Do you mind if I get a picture with you?”