Page 117 of Kiss Marry Kill

“Er… sure. It would be nice to already have rooms though.”

She grimaced. “I know it’s not exactly what you’re looking for.”

I grunted.

“I do have another property on the other side of town. It’s a little newer than this building, and the tenant just moved out last month. Unfortunately, it’s a little smaller than this place.”

I somehow stifled my groan. “I see.”

She sighed. “As I said, the problem is finding landanda building zoned for medical use.”

“I know. It’s not your fault.”

“If you just want to lease a vanilla shell space, I have plenty of those I can show you. They’re all basically the same as the spot we looked at in the Bandito Business Park. I know it wasn’t exactly what you were hoping for, but something tells me it’s closer than this is.” She shivered.

It was a sad state of things that apparently my only choices were a space in a soulless strip mall or a derelict building in the middle of nowhere. But I couldn’t rent a room from River any longer, and there was no way I’d rebuild on land that he owned. I was in a crappy situation, but I needed to buck up.

I forced myself to say, “Why don’t you show me the other smaller building? I really don’t think this one will do for me.”

“No, this one…” She shook her head, pinching her nose. “Let’s go,” she said in a nasally voice.

She made a point of locking the door behind us, which seemed unnecessary. The only creatures who wanted to go inside weren’t using a door. I avoided thick cobwebs as I stepped off the porch, shuddering.

“Follow me, Dr. Thornton,” she called out cheerfully, climbing into her car.

I got in my vehicle and started the engine. I waited for her to drive down the road, but she stayed where she was, brake lights illuminated. I noticed she was on her phone. But then, Mrs. Numi wasalwayson her phone. Sighing, I stared out at the flat desert landscape as I waited for her to lead the way to the next location.

Maybe times seemed grim, but at least I still had Girdy to help me navigate things. She’d generously offered to alert all of my patients that I wouldn’t be seeing them at River’s clinic any longer. She’d also volunteered to pack up the examination room items with the help of Todd. She understood completely why I didn’t want to go back to River’s clinic. Running into River right now could be a volatile situation.

When Mrs. Numi started flashing her lights and honking her horn, I scowled, wondering what she was up to. I got out of my car, worried she might be having a stroke. As I reached her vehicle, she flung open her door and climbed out.

“Are you okay?” I asked, peering closely at her.

“We got it!” she crowed. “Dr. Thornton, we got it!”

I blinked at her, completely confused. “What do we… got?”

She clutched my arm. “Reginald has come to his senses!”

“What?” Shock rattled through me.

“Reginald accepted your offer. He rejected River’s offer and accepted yours instead!”

I couldn’t believe my ears. I had to be dreaming. There was no way in hell Dr. Johnson had passed on padding his pockets with an extra hundred thousand dollars. Right? People just didn’t do things like that. People were greedy. People only cared about the almighty dollar.

Mrs. Numi started laughing. “You don’t believe me. I can see on your face that you don’t believe me. It’s true, Dr. Thornton. Your offer has been accepted.”

I braced myself on her car, feeling light-headed. “Are you sure this isn’t a mistake?”

“Absolutely. My assistant sent me the contract.” She held up her phone. “See?”

I could see that there was some sort of document on her screen, but I couldn’t have told you for sure what it was. “I don’t understand,” I mumbled. “I thought sure he’d take River’s offer.”

“I know! Isn’t it wonderful?” She laughed again, holding her arms up to the sky. “My faith in humanity has been restored!”

“Could you look at the contract again, just to be double, extra, really, really sure?”

She gave an exasperated sound, but she did pull up the contract on her phone again. Peering at it, she nodded. “It’s legit, Dr. Thornton. Reginald accepted your offer. His signature is on the document.”