Single, Available, and Completely Attached by Michelle Brewer

on and left through the doors she had entered nearly forty-five minutes ago, heading directly for the parking lot.
    Her phone began to ring a few minutes into the drive back to the community center, but Anna refused to answer it.
    He’d had his chance—it wasn’t her fault that he’d blown it.
    She was sure to smile at Crystal as she passed through the front entrance, hurrying along the way to her office.   All she wanted to do was get back to work and put this afternoon behind her.
    Deep down, Anna knew she should have expected this from him.   But she hadn’t prepared herself for the rejection, and it hurt much worse than it should.  
    Her phone continued to ring and, finally, she placed it on silent and threw it in the drawer of her desk.  
    That was much, much better, she thought to herself as she shifted her focus to the spreadsheet in front of her.   The end of the month was always stressful, what with maintaining various budgets and finalizing activity calendars.
    It couldn’t have been ten minutes later when a knock sounded on her door and she rose, expecting to find Crystal waiting—but, as usual, Drew Whitman caught her off guard.
    He held up a plain white bag.
    “I brought dessert.”
    “Unfortunately, I haven’t had lunch yet.”   She told him, her face a mask.   She braced herself against the door, set on not letting him pass.
    “I’m guessing some jerk must have stood you up.”
    “Oh, he’s a jerk, all right.”   Drew tilted his head to the side, his blue eyes finding hers.  
    “I’m sorry, Annabelle.   I got held up at work—”
    “And you didn’t think to pick up the phone?”
    “I was called into a meeting.   I honestly didn’t expect it to take nearly as long as it did.”   He held up the bag again, giving it a little shake.   “I promise , this is the best cherry pie you’ll ever taste.”
    “Drew, maybe we should just…”
    “Just give me one more chance, Annabelle.   I swear—I won’t let this kind of thing happen again.”  
    She weighed her options, the tantalizing scent of the pie filling the room.
    “I’m only doing this for the pie, just so you know.”   She held open the door, allowing him in.   A child-like grin flashed across his lips and she couldn’t help the smile that touched her own as she ducked her head, refusing to let him see it.  
    “Well, you won’t regret it.”   He waited for her to take a seat before he sat in the chair in front of her desk, taking two containers from the bag.   “The pie, or my company.”
    “We’ll see about that.”   She was already regretting them both.  
    “Scout’s honor.”
    “For some reason, I highly doubt you were ever a boy scout.”   She took the fork he offered her.  
    “Okay, so Jeff was the scout.   I just sort of…watched.”   She smiled again, despite herself.   “But I was very supportive.”
    “I doubt that, too.”   He looked up just in time to catch her taking her first bite of the pie.   She covered her mouth with her hand, doing her very best not to close her eyes.
    The pie was pure bliss.
    “It would seem that you know me much better than I had thought.”   He told her, taking a bite of his own piece.   Anna swallowed before she met his eyes.
    “I know your kind well, Mr. Whitman.”  
    Before Jeff, Anna had wasted quite a lot of time on boys very similar to Drew.  
    “I like to think I’m not quite what you would expect.”   He told her.
    She had a feeling she was going to find out.
    “We’ll see about that, won’t we?”   she predicted.
    “I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised, Annabelle.”   She was struck once again by the urge to ask him why he called her that—and, for the first time in a very, very long time, she actually thought about the first time she’d met Drew.  
    He’d been both charming and vile that night, and in spite of herself, she had been drawn to him—drawn to that devilish glimmer in his eyes, to the brief