Page 25 of September (New Orleans #9)

A fter two long days, the long drive back would’ve normally taken its toll on Juliet, but instead, she was surprisingly chipper.

Well, it wasn’t much of a surprise. She was chipper because she had talked to Gwen every day for at least a few hours.

They’d chatted the night she arrived over FaceTime, and Juliet hadn’t gotten to sleep until well after one in the morning.

She hadn’t laughed that much in a very long time, though.

They had talked again on her second night, but this time, the call was a little shorter since she needed to get some real sleep before her drive home.

They’d said goodnight to one another both nights, and Juliet had liked having someone to say goodnight to again.

She’d also been sad immediately after hanging up because she hadn’t been falling asleep next to Gwen, or anyone else, for that matter.

She hadn’t even had Carly to sleep next to her. She’d been alone and on a work trip.

The retraining had gone well. The staff had been having issues with waste, tossing out espresso drinks because they’d make them wrong, and customers would return them or ask for the drink to be made correctly.

Juliet had discovered one employee who wasn’t the best listener in the world, one who wasn’t great at the register and wasn’t charging properly for extra syrups and extra shots of espresso, and another who was always coming up short on their cash register.

The policy was clear, though: three short drawers in a month meant a write-up, and another one after that the following month meant termination, so she’d talked to the manager about letting go of that roaster.

Training wasn’t always teaching people how to make drinks and serve sandwiches with a smile.

It was part detective work, too, and then problem solving once she had diagnosed the issue or multiple issues.

She liked that part of the job enough, but it was often exhausting.

After all that, she was more than ready to be at home, in a hot bath, and hanging out with her dog, so she’d hit the road early that morning and had only stopped for gas.

She was also really excited to see Gwen again and no longer felt like trying to hide that fact.

After talking to the woman every night, flirting with her during their conversations, and having to spend time away from her, she was ready to at least figure out her next step where Gwen was concerned.

“Hey, want to grab a drink later?” Molly asked.

“Maybe. Can I get back to you on that, though?”

“Sure. Have other plans with a certain dog walker, perhaps?” Molly asked.

Juliet laughed and replied, “I don’t know yet. Maybe. I think I might go for it, Molls,” she said while in the car, which was connected to her phone via Bluetooth. “I like her a lot. We’ve talked every day.”

“Every day? It’s been two days.”

“I know. But we talked for, like, five hours one night.”

“Five hours?! After you worked a whole day? We don’t even talk that much. Then again, you don’t want to sleep with me.”

“No offense, but no, I don’t.”

“None taken. I don’t want to sleep with you, either,” Molly said. “So, five hours?”

“Yeah. Crazy, huh? Her favorite color is green. She told me that while looking into my eyes, which also happen to be green. I’m trying not to make anything out of that, but she was smiling when she said it.”

“She was staring–” Molly stopped. “You were on FaceTime? You didn’t just talk on the phone?”

“No. We get on FaceTime so that I can see Carly, too.”

“Sure, blame the dog,” Molly joked.

“I’m serious. I get to see Carly and Gwen. It’s win-win.”

“I guess so. Are you going to ask her out?”

“I think so. She said something the other day, before I left, about how we talk about Carly a lot, and she wanted to get to know me better. That’s not something a friend usually says.”

“They also don’t usually say that their favorite color just happens to be the color of your eyes.”

“No, they don’t, I guess,” Juliet said with a smile. “But what if she says no?”

“Why would she say no?”

“Because I don’t even know when we would go out.”

“Well, you’re on your way back now,” Molly said. “I’m guessing that’s why you’re a maybe on drinks tonight: you’re hoping you can go out with her. Am I right?”

“Yeah. And I meant after that. I will be gone so much, Molls.”

“Do you even like these increased responsibilities they gave you with this so-called promotion, Jules?”

“Not really, no. I’m just trying to think about my future. If I can do this for a few months, maybe I’ll get his job.”

“Sweetie, he’s not getting promoted. If he does, it’ll be a big surprise.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m in meetings with all of HR. They’ve been talking about the executive team promotions and searches this week while you were out, and they did not indicate that there was a new role opening up for him.

The VP role doesn’t exist, so they’d have to create it just for him.

I’m not sure they see the reason to do that right now. ”

“Really?” she asked. “I was kind of counting on that.”

“I guess it could still happen, but if it does, it would be during next year’s reviews, not this one, and that would mean over a year of this travel for you.

Besides, you know how they don’t like promoting someone twice within a year.

They want people to be in their roles for at least twelve months before they move you up again. ”

“But that’s just a rule with exceptions.”

“True,” Molly replied.

“I just figured with him moving up, especially now, with Andrew being gone, they’d put me in his place and backfill me.”

“They could still do that. I just don’t think it’ll be this December.”

“Well, fuck,” Juliet said as she pulled off the highway. “I don’t know if I can do this for over a year, Molls.”

“Because of Gwen?”

“No, because of all the travel. I miss Carly, but it’s not even that.

I’m just not made for driving all over the place and eating fast food or terrible room-service rubber chicken.

I’m a homebody. I like to be sitting in front of my TV, eating a somewhat healthy dinner while I watch something I’ve seen a hundred times already, and being in my own bathtub with my almond oil bubble bath. ”

“Oh, that sounds nice. Where do you get that? I should pick some up.”

“I’ll send you a link when I get home,” she said, turning the corner.

“Can I help at all?” Molly offered. “I feel like he might have embellished about his promotion thing, which led you to sign an offer letter without knowing exactly what you’d be signing up for, and then Andrew was let go, too. I know it’s a lot.”

“It is,” she said. “I don’t know. I’ll figure it out, I guess. I’m about to turn onto my street. Can I call you later about drinks?”

“Sure. I’m kind of hoping you turn me down, though, because that means you’ll be out with Gwen.”

Juliet laughed as they disconnected and she turned onto her street and into the parking lot for her building. Just as she parked, though, she got a text message, so she went to check her phone, expecting it to be from Molly, a reminder to send her that link for the bubble bath.

Gwen Benedetti : Want to meet us at the dog park? I’ve got all her stuff in the car, but she wanted to go for a walk, so I thought I’d let her run off some energy for a bit.

Juliet replied and hurried to drop off her suitcase at the apartment before she quickly changed into comfortable jeans, a T-shirt, and a light sweater, and got back into her car.

◆◆◆

“Wiggly Park?” she said.

“Hey,” Gwen replied, standing up from the park bench when Juliet approached. “And, yeah. Cool name, huh?”

“I didn’t even know this was here.”

Juliet looked around at the rectangular patch of grass with a short fence around it that was surrounded by a street and houses.

“It’s just a fun place where they can be off the leash and run,” Gwen said. “How was the drive?”

“Good. Long, but good. I got you a cookie.”

She held up the brown bag to Gwen.

“A cookie?”

“Yeah. We sell them. I got it yesterday before I left the store, but they’d made it fresh, so it should still be good.”

“They make cookies fresh there, too?”

“Well, they come in frozen, but we bake them. Does that count?” Juliet asked as Gwen took the bag.

“Depends on what kind of cookie you got me.”

“It’s chocolate chip,” she replied.

“Really? Those are my favorite,” Gwen said and peered inside the bag. “Cool. Thanks, Jules.”

“No problem.” She shrugged a shoulder. “So, where’s my girl?”

“She’s over there, playing with Buster,” Gwen replied as she turned and stood next to Juliet, nodding to where Carly was running alongside Buster, who was trying to take whatever she had in her mouth.

“And what are they playing with, exactly?”

“One of his rope toys. I brought it from Elisa’s. They’d been running back and forth like that for twenty minutes, so she should be very ready to fall asleep next to you tonight.”

Juliet laughed and noted, “She hasn’t even noticed I’m here.”

“She’s busy. That rope toy is important,” Gwen teased. “Plus, I think she’s a little in love.”

“With Buster?”

“Yes. And he loves her back; don’t worry. I think they’ll treat each other well.”

“Oh, you do, do you?”

“When I drove them over here, they both sat in the back seat and kind of curled up into each other. It was really cute, Jules. They didn’t even try to sit up and look out the windows. They just wanted to snuggle.”

“Really? That’s adorable,” she replied. “And he’s fixed, right? I mean, she is, so she’s not going to get pregnant, but he’s not going to like–”

“Hump her brains out?” Gwen asked, causing Juliet to laugh again. “He’s fixed, yeah. Hey, can you watch them for a minute? I really need to pee. I made the mistake of having that coffee before I came here, so I’ve been holding it in.”

“Sure. But coffee?”

“Yes. And I went to Southern; I didn’t make it myself. I got the drink you recommended last night.”

“And?”