Single Ladies by Blake Karrington Read Free Book Online Page A

floor, balled up by the door. She covered her face with both of her hands, damn near ready to cry. She didn’t know how she was going to explain this to Ralphy. The thought of her entire marriage ending because of something like this brought tears to her eyes. She knew Ralphy, and there was no way in hell he would ever forgive her if he found out that she was cheating on him. That was a guarantee beyond a shadow of a doubt.
    â€œThink, Lisa. Think!” she said to herself, wiping the tears away from her eyes.
    She had to try to find a way out of this situation, and the way things looked, it wasn’t going to happen. It was already eight-thirty in the morning, her clothes were ripped, the sun was up, her hair was sweated out something crazy; and who knew how long Ralphy had been awake and waiting for her to come back in?
    â€œThink, Lisa! Think!” Lisa mumbled to herself as she looked around the cabin.
    She jumped at the first idea that popped into her head, and stormed back into the bedroom where Dre was snoring away. She walked over, grabbed his pants, and dug into the pockets, finding a wad of money, which was needed. There had to have been a couple grand there, but she only needed a hundred dollars, which she peeled off quietly before putting the money back in his pocket.
    On her way into the Forrest Tree campsite, she remembered passing by a surplus mini market that sold just about everything. It’s sad, but the only idea she could come up with was to bring Ralphy some breakfast, hoping that he wasn’t awake by the time she got back to the cabin; or, if he was awake, he hadn’t been for that long.
    Lisa ran to the store in record time, covering the half-mile walk within a couple of minutes. By the time she got there she had begun to sweat both from the walk and out of fear she was about to get caught.
    The store was actually bigger on the inside when she entered. She looked around and went straight to the food section, grabbing a small basket to put her items in.
    It wasn’t until she grabbed one of the hot breakfast sandwiches from the food counter that she realized the entire breakfast excuse wasn’t going to work. Ralphy wasn’t the least bit slow. Plus, he already had the whole weekend planned out, including breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
    â€œMa’am, can I help you?” a store worker asked as he walked over to Lisa and saw the obvious stress written all over her face.
    Lisa didn’t hear him at first. She just stood there in a daze, thinking about Ralphy and Dre killing one another once they found out what was going on.
    â€œYou know, we have a beautiful trail that runs about four miles alongside a creek,” the man said, trying to be polite. “Sometimes I run that trail when I’m feeling down,” he said, finally getting her attention.
    In situations like this, a woman’s brain thinks faster and more deviously than a man’s does. Before the clerk could even finish telling her about the trail, she had a plan B brewing in her head. She looked around the store, but she didn’t know if they carried what she was looking for. “Do y’all sell running shoes and jogging pants?” she asked the young clerk, who was more than happy to direct her to the small clothing section of the store.
    Lisa only had a hundred dollars, so she had to make it work. She grabbed the cheapest running shoes she could find, along with a pair of sweatpants. They didn’t have sports bras so she bought two tank tops and a S AVE THE W ILDLIFE T-shirt.
    â€œHow long does it take you to run that trail?” she asked the clerk as she placed her items on the counter.
    â€œWell, I’m not a fast runner so it takes me about an hour. If I’m walking, it’ll take me about two hours, only because I like to take in nature’s beauty,” the man answered in a chipper tone.
    Lisa dug into her pocket and pulled out the money she took from Dre, and