Fantasyland: Midnight Soul Part 71

"I like to find my clients exactly what they want, but I will say that's likely," she muttered.

"And lastly, proximity to Mr. Hawthorne, which I should have said first," I finished.

At this, Noc slid an arm around me and pulled me close to his side. Therefore, I returned the gesture.

"I can work with this," the agent said.

I should hope she could, she was being paid to do just that.

"I'll sort some listings. Do you have a direct email or would you like me to continue sending them to Ms. Rousseau's a.s.sistant?" she asked.

"Send them to me," Noc answered. "It'll all go faster that way. I'll get your number from Franka and text you my email."

"Excellent," she replied.

"Not to hurry us along or anything," Josette began. "But are we done here? Just because, you see, Noc said we're going to the mall after this and there was that blouse I decided against that I haven't been able to get out of my mind since, and I was hoping it'd still be there."

"We're done here," Noc decreed, looked to the agent and lifted his chin. "Thanks for your time, and you send us some listings, we'll be in touch."

"My pleasure. I hope to see you again soon."

Josette and I also gave our farewells and Noc guided us out.

We were in his SUV when he shared, "Babe, you don't have to live in the city. You want nature around you, I'm sure they have places that might not be close but they're not far."

"Yes, but you're in the city," was my reply.

"Yeah, but I'm also not getting to you by sled, sweetheart," he returned with humor. "It won't take half a day to make an hour's drive."

I turned from viewing the road before us to look at Noc and only then did I repeat, but more definitively this time, "Yes, but you are in the city."

He glanced at me and back to the road, but even with only having his profile, I watched his expression warm before he said, "Gotcha."

I nodded smartly, looked behind me to smile at Josette, who smiled back, and then I looked back to the road.

I was engrossed in my perusal of a very attractive dress hanging on a rack in the mall when I heard Noc make a noise.

I looked up to him to see that his expression was no longer vacant (this being because I knew he was bored out of his mind, for we did not simply pick up some baby gifts and Josette's blouse, we became distracted by other things so our quick trip to the mall was nothing of the like).

Now he looked alert and I turned to see what he was regarding.

It was Josette, skipping toward us, waving her telephone and looking joyous.

I couldn't help it, her demeanor made me smile.

My lovely Josette, she so enjoyed the mall.

She stopped on a sway and cried, "I have a dinner date tomorrow!"

My smile died.

"I beg your pardon?" I queried.

"Say again?" Noc asked.

"Glover," she stated, rolling up to her toes, and back, and again, grinning like a lunatic. "That man we met on Bourbon Street. You know. The large, tall, handsome Maroovian-non-Maroovian one with the lovely smile?"

I knew no such man.

"No, I do not know," I stated.

"That guy, baby, the one Jo was talkin' to for, like, two hours," Noc explained.

I turned to him, vaguely remembering, and back to Josette when she started talking.

"He gave me his number. I texted. He texted back. We've been exchanging them, like, bunches. He's been being very sweet. I was looking at the jeans over there," she tossed an arm behind her but didn't turn that direction, she kept grinning at Noc and me, "and he called and asked if I wanted to go out to dinner tomorrow night. And I said yes!" She nearly shouted her last. "Isn't that divine? He's coming to pick me up at seven at Valentine's."

"He's doing nothing of the sort," I spat.

Josette blinked and her smile faltered.

I felt Noc move closer to me.

"I'm sorry?" Josette whispered.

"Am I to understand he's arriving at Valentine's home to put you in a car and take you for a meal?" I inquired.

"Yes," Josette kept whispering.

"That's unacceptable," I declared.

Josette blinked again and her shoulders fell.

"Frannie-" Noc started.

I jerked my head his way. "It's unacceptable."

"You were drunk and unnecessarily flirting with me so I think you missed she's into the guy and he was way into her," Noc replied.

"I do not care," I retorted and again turned my attention to Josette. "I forbid this to happen."

"Franka," Noc clipped as Josette's entire expression fell.

I again looked to Noc.

"Josette was not a common servant with no one to look after her even when she was a servant," I bit out. "She's a young woman of means with family who cares for her. Thus, he will behave like she is as such, which means he will behave appropriately. In other words, he'll arrive at Valentine's home at seven tomorrow to sit with us for drinks and dinner. Through this time spent with him, I'll understand what he does to make his living. I'll ask questions to ascertain his moral character. I'll observe his behavior toward Josette. And only then will I allow the possibility of a future dinner date. This being after he's proved himself a gentleman in his intentions toward Josette once we've spent some time with him and he has our approval."

Noc stared down at me.

I looked to Josette.

"Telephone him back and share this," I ordered.

Josette stared at me.

"Sweetheart, that's not how it's done in this world," Noc told me.

I returned my gaze to him. "This matters not to me."

"The dude is gonna think you're crazy, worse, he's gonna think Jo's crazy and he's totally gonna beg off."

My brows snapped together. "Why on earth would he do that?"

"Because, Frannie, this is not how it's done in this world," he answered. "A guy likes a girl, he texts her, calls her, asks her out, takes her to dinner, gets to know her better. They like each other, that keeps happening. Beyond that," his eyes slid to Josette and back to me, "we won't go there right now."

I considered this information.

Then I turned to Josette and decreed, "Fine. Then telephone him back and share that Noc and I will be attending this dinner with you."

Josette's mouth dropped open.

"Frannie..." My name from Noc's lips was shaking with mirth.

I scowled at Noc finding nothing amusing.

"What?" I clipped.

"You can't invite yourself on a double date if the guy didn't ask us along, especially on a first date."

My voice was rising. "Why not?"

He shook his head, his amus.e.m.e.nt plain. "You just can't."

"Then who's going to look after her?" I demanded to know.

Noc's amus.e.m.e.nt didn't leave but the warmth in his expression heightened.

"We'll make sure she texts us, tells us where she is, how she's getting on, when he brings her safe home." He looked to Josette. "That cool with you?"

"Definitely!" she chirped.

"It's not cool with me," I put in and Noc looked to me.

"He's not asking you out," he noted.

I continued scowling at him before I made a decision. "All right, then we shall go to this same restaurant and sit at another table so we'll be close in case anything untoward happens or I observe something that displeases me in his behavior, or Josette needs me."

Noc started chuckling as he got close and curved an arm around me.

Tipping his head down, he said quietly, "Right, Momma Bear, the gig is, you're gonna have to let your little cub explore on her own eventually. I met the guy. We talked for a while. He seemed good to me. If he wasn't, if I got a bad vibe from him, anything, I'd be the one throwing a wrench in on his action. But what I got from him, I liked. And what Jo got from him, she liked. So you're just gonna have to stand down."

I did not wish to stand down.

I stared into Noc's eyes.

I turned my head toward Josette and saw the hope and excitement s.h.i.+ning in hers.

Blast!

"Tell him he has you home by ten," I demanded.

Noc burst into laughter.

Josette's face became wreathed in smiles.

With the side of his fist under my chin, Noc turned my face to his and tipped it up so he could drop a short kiss on my lips.

When he finished doing that, he looked to Josette.

"I'll talk her into letting you have until midnight," he said.

Well!

"Now I gotta teach you two something else women do in this world," Noc continued, no longer sounding entertained, now sounding beleaguered. "That being the fact that a woman has a first date with a guy, she uses it as an excuse to buy a new outfit. You both got more new outfits than you can get through in a month. But I'm thinking none of them at this point are the right one for dinner with Glover."

"You're correct, Noc, I've been going through all of them in my head since I said yes, and Frannie, we must find something he will most like to see me in," Josette declared.

G.o.ds, now Josette was calling me Frannie.

I sighed.

But she was quite right.

Nothing we'd bought previously would do.

Thus it was time to get to work.

"Have you lost your mind?"

Much later, after Josette had insisted Noc and I have an evening alone together, we left her at Valentine's and returned to Noc's where I now sat on the sofa staring up at him standing in front of me holding one gla.s.s of wine (mine, which he had halted in delivering to me after I'd said what I'd just said) and one bottle of ale (his).

"No, I have not," I pointed out the obvious.

"You are not gonna do that," he declared, still standing several feet away from me and not offering me my gla.s.s. "More, I'm not gonna do that, but you definitely aren't gonna do that so to make myself perfectly clear, we are not gonna do that."