interrupted the old woman’s barrage of complaints.
The elderly woman glared at her and spat out, “It’s afternoon already, girl. If you didn’t stay up half the night, you would have seen the morning.”
Ignoring the woman, she turned to Daniel and offered her most sincere smile. “Good mor—afternoon, Daniel.”
She was relieved when he smiled in return. That was one thing she liked about Daniel, he never stayed angry for long.
“. . .god-forsaken music.” Mrs. Sterling was still going on. “Let me tell you girl, if you have another one of your blasted parties I’m calling the police. Do you understand?”
“Perfectly, Mrs. Sterling.” Sonya gave her a synthetic frown. “And I’m terribly sorry to hear about Fufu. Has he finally kicked the bucket?”
The woman straightened her back and glared at Sonya then turned away in a huff, leaving the two standing alone in the mail center. Grinning, Sonya turned back to Daniel as he dropped some change into the newspaper stand and pulled out a paper. Her smile vanished immediately.
“Listen, Daniel,” she began, “I was a jackass last night. You know that. But what I said was unforgivable.”
He briefly glanced up from his paper but didn’t say anything.
She leaned forward and said, “I’m sorry.”
His head shot up to look into her pleading eyes.
“Really.” She added for reassurance.
Sighing, he folded his paper and began to leave the room. Sonya followed.
“I suppose you’ve already gone for your morning jog?”
He offered a vague nod and headed toward the elevators without uttering a single word to her.
Sonya heaved a weary sigh. Lord, he was really mad at her. She must have hurt his feelings more than she figured. Wanting to mend things quickly, she offered, “Audrey took a liking to you.”
He paused in mid stride to stop and look down at her.
Pleased she finally got his attention, she smiled up at him. Then nearly choking on the words added, “I-I could give you her number if you like.”
His eyes searched her face before turning away to press the button for the elevator. “Not interested.”
Surprised at her own relief, she nevertheless felt curious. “Why not?”
“Not my type.”
“Not your type?” Which was exactly what she already concluded, however, hearing it from Daniel’s lips made her feel incensed. “You mean the waitress type?”
“I didn’t say that.” His grey eyes shot in her direction. “I have nothing against waitresses.”
She sighed, taking his hidden meaning for what it was. “I already apologized. Do you expect me to beg for your forgiveness?”
There was a pregnant pause where she thought he wouldn’t answer until at last he produced a grin, and Sonya felt a wave of relief. “I’d be waiting a long time.”
“Yes, you would.” She agreed and returned his smile. “Do you have time to join me for a muffin or donut at the coffee shop?”
He shook his head. “No, I’ve got to get back to the Institute. Our deadline was bumped up.”
She nodded, vaguely wondering who our was, then brushed the thought aside. No sense getting him started in some lengthy conversation about his latest project. “I was going to tell you about my good news.”
“What’s that?” he queried as he began to surf through his mail.
“Tristan finally got around to asking me out.”
His hand paused for a moment before continuing. Then finding something of interest, he pulled it out of his stack of envelopes. “Congratulations.”
“I know.” She beamed. “Next Wednesday night.”
“You got what you wanted,” he said quietly as he opened the envelope.
“Not yet.” She gave her seductive laugh and was a little peeved when he ignored it. “I’m going to have to get my hair done and I think I’ll treat myself to a new outfit. Or I could wear the little red dress again. He seemed to especially like it.”
“Sounds