by Emma Hart
Table of Contents
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
THE ACCIDENTAL GIRLFRIEND
CHAPTER ONE – LAUREN
CHAPTER TWO – LAUREN
CHAPTER THREE – MASON
CHAPTER FOUR – LAUREN
CHAPTER FIVE – MASON
CHAPTER SIX – LAUREN
CHAPTER SEVEN – MASON
CHAPTER EIGHT – LAUREN
CHAPTER NINE – LAUREN
CHAPTER TEN – MASON
CHAPTER ELEVEN – LAUREN
CHAPTER TWELVE – LAUREN
CHAPTER THIRTEEN – MASON
CHAPTER FOURTEEN – LAUREN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN – LAUREN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN – MASON
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN – LAUREN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN – LAUREN
CHAPTER NINETEEN – LAUREN
CHAPTER TWENTY – MASON
EPILOGUE – LAUREN
KISS ME NOT
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
BOOKS BY EMMA HART
THE ACCIDENTAL GIRLFRIEND
Emma Hart
Copyright © by Emma Hart 2019
First Edition
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Cover Design by Emma Hart
THE
ACCIDENTAL
GIRLFRIEND
CHAPTER ONE – LAUREN
“I can’t remember a time I didn’t have hemorrhoids.”
I jerked my head up from my phone and looked at my sister. “I’m sorry, what?”
She sighed, adjusting her shirt so that she wasn’t suffocating the six-week-old baby currently at her boob. “I miss pooping without worrying one of them is going to pop. I mean, is it not enough I pushed a human through my vagina? Now I have to live with little growths coming out of my anus?”
I blinked at her. “That is way more information than I ever needed to know about your anal region.”
“Well, nobody else will listen to me.”
“There’s a reason for that, Isobel. It’s because nobody cares about your hemorrhoids except your doctor.” I put my phone screen-down on my knees. “Nobody forced you to procreate. It was entirely your own choice.”
She sighed. “I blame Jared.”
“Your husband can’t take all the blame. You were the one who stopped your birth control.”
“You’re my little sister. Why aren’t you on my side?”
“Because your side is ridiculous.” I put my phone on the coffee table and headed for the door of my apartment when the doorbell rang. “I’m not going to sit here and eat pizza while you discuss the state of your asshole, so find something else to talk about!” I yelled back as I pulled the door open.
The poor pizza guy froze. He couldn’t have been older than seventeen, and the red ballcap that was pulled over his forehead wasn’t quite enough to hide both his horror and the spots that dotted his chin.
I looked down at the three boxes he had stacked on his hand and offered him a bright smile. “How much do I owe you?”
“I, uh, um…”
“I got it!” The voice of one of my best friends, Madi, echoed through the hall. “Is fifty enough?” she trilled, bouncing up behind him, her scarlet-colored curls flouncing around her shoulders.
“It’s three pizzas. I should hope it does, or we’re being ripped off,” Tina grumbled, walking up behind her.
“Forty-one-ninety-eight,” the pizza guy mumbled.
Madi waved two twenties and a ten at him. “Here you go, sweetie. Keep the change.”
Someone got paid today.
“And there’s my monthly girls’ night paid for,” she said happily, taking the boxes and dancing into my apartment. “What up, Iz? How’s the asshole?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and sighed.
Tina slipped her hand into her scarlet-red purse that matched her lips to a tee and pulled out a wallet. I hid a smile as she extracted ten dollars from it and handed it to the pizza guy, whispering, “For your mental trauma.”
Mental trauma was about right.
I didn’t see him delivering our pizza anytime soon.
Or ever.
I didn’t blame him. If I could get out of conversations about my sister’s bodily parts, I would.
I’d lead the freakin’ march.
I detoured into the kitchen to grab a bottle of wine and three glasses before joining everyone back in the living room. Madi had taken the seat next to my sister on the sofa and she’d tied her hair up into a messy topknot that matched her ‘people hater’ t-shirt and yoga pants perfectly.
Tina was on the armchair with her socked feet tucked beneath her butt, her dark hair hanging in a thick braid over one shoulder. That left me the oversized bean bag, but that was fine with me.
The bean bag was closer to the pizza.
I dropped onto the huge, fluffy seat with the glasses clinking in my hand.
“Uh, excuse me?” Isobel looked at the glasses as I set them down one-by-one on the coffee table. She’d put her boob away while I’d answered the door and Cara was sleeping in her pram.
Which I looked at before I replied to her. “You’re breastfeeding.”
“And? I can have a small glass of wine. Besides, these things are like a cattle farm.” She cupped her boobs. “There’s milk everywhere, including in your freezer.”
I paused. “I’m not sure how I feel about having your breastmilk in my freezer.”
“It’s for when you babysit.”
“I don’t remember agreeing to that. Not that I don’t love Cara, but I love sleep more.”
She snorted as she leaned forward and unscrewed the wine, pouring a half-glass for herself. “Don’t talk to me about sleep.”
Madi looked between us. “I’ll get another glass then, shall I?”
I nodded with a grim smile. If Iz wanted a glass of wine, she was going to have one. She’d been deprived for months—if you asked her, and as her younger sister, I never did.
“So,” Tina said, leaning forward to lay out the pizza boxes. “What’s new since last week?”
The rich scent of melted cheese filled the air, and Madi arrived with both paper plates and a wine glass with a flourish.
Excellent. No dishes.
I was winning at adulting this week.
Sure, my sister was keeping a tiny human alive, but I was minimizing my dishes one by one. Who was really nailing it?
“Well, my date last night sucked,” Madi said, sliding a slice of ham and pineapple pizza onto her paper plate. “He totally catfished me. He was easily pushing fifty and did not have the body his Tinder profile said he did.”
“I told you to ditch that app,” I muttered around a mouthful of pepperoni and cheese. “It’s the worst.”
Tina nodded in solidarity. “I’ve never been happier since I deleted it from my phone.”
“Yeah, well, I like it.” Madi paused. “Most of the time.”
“It’s fifty-fifty,” Iz said. “Jared’s sister has been using it since her breakup. I helped her look through some guys and hoooooey, some are a treat, but the rest of them…”
“They should be euthanized,” Tina finished. “They’re either married, catfishing, or their looks are prettier than their personalities.”
“I’ll drink to that!” I raised my wine glass, and we all clinked. “All right, so Madi’s date was a bust, Iz visited her doctor to com
plain about things she decided to put her body through—Tina?”
She chewed, looking up thoughtfully. “I think I’m going to adopt a cat.”
“Really? You do know they’re assholes, don’t you?” As if he’d been called, my gray-and-white cat, Henry, strolled into the room. He studied us all with dark brown eyes before pausing by Cara’s pram and sniffing it for a moment. Seemingly unimpressed, as was his default mood, he trotted over to us and looked at all of us.
Then he bounded up onto the sofa and plopped on top of Iz’s head.
I bit the inside of my cheek. I swear I wasn’t laughing. Okay, maybe I was a little bit. She was sitting there with a slice of pizza hanging out of her mouth and my cat on her head. She looked utterly ridiculous, especially when Henry flicked his tail around to stroke her cheek.
“Lauren,” she said slowly. “Your cat is sitting on my head.”
Honestly, there was no way to reply to that, was there? Except there should have been because Henry had issues.
Henry liked sitting on people’s heads. He always had done, ever since I’d brought him home from the shelter when he was nine months old. It’d been cute to start with, but now he, well. He wasn’t exactly a small, cute kitten anymore. In fact, he probably needed to go on a diet.
It wasn’t comfortable when a fat cat sat on your head.
With a sigh, I got up and walked over to her. Henry meowed his displeasure as I extracted him from my sister’s head and deposited him in the hallway next to his scratching tower.
“We’ve talked about this,” I said to him. “If you have to sit on people’s heads, at least have enough manners to wait until they’re done eating.”
He mewled, turning around and showing me his butt.
Such a polite boy.
Rolling my eyes, I left him to sulk and probably pee in one of my shoes. “There. He’ll leave us alone now.”
“Until he wants one of our heads later,” Madi pointed out. “Back to catching up. Recap: Iz went to the doctor, I got catfished, and Tina wants to adopt a cat who doesn’t sit on people’s heads. What’s up with you, Lauren? Please have something juicy. The older we get, the less crazy these girls’ nights are getting.”
“The last time we went out, you were the one who got tired at nine-thirty and wanted to go to bed,” I reminded her.
She groaned, reaching for her wine. “The shoes, man. They’re so high, and there’s only so many times I can be perved at by kids.”
“Those kids are only four years younger than you, and it’s easily solved by either wearing a fake engagement ring, pretending to be a lesbian, or simply wearing a shirt that covers your tits,” Iz pointed out.
“She has a point,” Tina said around a mouthful of food. “Just wear a sweater and sneakers. Problem solved.”
“When did this become a shame Madi party?” She sniffed and leaned back with two slices of pizza on her plate. “And Lauren still hasn’t told us what’s new with her.”
Three pairs of eyes turned to me, but only my sister was smirking.
Because she knew.
Nothing.
There was a big fat nothing new with me.
“Um…” I grabbed another slice of pizza before setting my plate on the floor in front of me. “I looked for new curtains for my bedroom?”
“Lauren,” Tina groaned. “How is that exciting?”
“How is thinking about adopting a cat exciting? I’ve done it. Look at where it got me.”
Iz pulled a hair from her mouth. “She’s not wrong.”
Madi leaned forward, pushing a loose curl behind her ear. “Curtains, Grandma? Really? You work in a bar. Are you telling me that nobody asked for your number? Did nobody eye you up? Nobody wanted to bend you over and—”
Cara cut her off with a snuffle.
We all froze. I don’t think any of us breathed for a good ninety seconds until my niece filled the room with sucking sounds as she made good work of her pacifier.
“Do you dirty?” Madi finished on a whisper.
I stared flatly at her and drained my wine. “The only person who hit on me this week was Mr. Hennington, and that’s because he’s trying to get a free beer out of me.”
“Did it work?” Iz asked brightly.
“No! He’s eighty-five!”
“And proof that drinking every day is good for you. Cheers!” Tina raised her glass and quickly finished it.
I topped up both our glasses and headed to the kitchen for the second bottle. “Look,” I said as I resumed my position on the beanbag, uncapping the bottle to finish pouring my glass. “Kelsey left last week, and I’m picking up her shifts. The only hot dates I’m getting are with Kenny the delivery driver, and he’s as attractive as a pig in shit.”
“Hey, some people like pigs,” Iz said. With pizza sauce smeared all over her chin. Presumably proving her own point.
Madi passed her a napkin and tapped her own jaw.
“Besides, I don’t need to date. I’m happy with my life as it is,” I continued, leaning back in the beanbag. “I don’t have time to date. It’s bad enough with a cat needing my attention, never mind a man wanting me to love him.”
Tina lifted her glass. “I hear that.”
“Speak for yourselves,” Iz added. “I have two humans who need me. I’d love to be single.”
Madi side-eyed her as she poured her second glass. “No, you wouldn’t. If you were single, you’d have to run to the store and buy your own Twinkies.”
Iz sighed. “Do you know how long it takes me to get out the door these days? Going to Target requires packing for a mini vacay twice over, and I’m still going to forget something.”
“Ah,” I said. “But you decided to birth a crotch goblin. You don’t get to complain about needing a suitcase to spend two hundred dollars when you meant to spend twenty.”
“Okay, literally everyone gets to complain about that,” Tina said, dangling her glass between her fingers. “Target is a cesspit of temptation.”
“Like Tinder!” Madi snapped her fingers. “A cesspit of temptation and lies.”
I blinked at my best friends. That had escalated rather quickly. I mean, she wasn’t wrong.
Tinder told me the hot twenty-eight-year-old had muscles on his muscles and a great job, but he was actually fifty-two with a beer belly and was a trash guy.
Target told me I only needed Post-It notes and Cheetos, but I left with Post-It notes, Cheetos, socks, three tank tops, two bags of Hershey’s kisses, hand soap, dishcloths, and toilet cleaner. Plus a twenty-eight pack of toilet tissue and eighty-nine sanitary towels.
Iz snapped her fingers. “I know. We should get Lauren a date.”
“Yes!” Madi punched the air. “Let’s get Lauren a date!”
“Let’s not,” I said quickly. “Lauren’s fine. Lauren doesn’t need a date. Lauren has a vibrator.”
Tina grinned. “When you use a vibrator as an excuse, you need a date.”
“On the contrary,” I replied. “A vibrator is the perfect excuse not to date. It doesn’t argue with me. It doesn’t expect anything from me. It doesn’t have dirty clothes. It doesn’t talk to me during my favorite TV shows. And, when I’m done with it, I can put it in a drawer until I need it again. Do you know what happens if you stuff a man in a drawer? You get put in prison. So until a time that the vibrators rise up and start marching for rights for sex toys while wearing slogan t-shirts, I’m all good.”
“Why would vibrators start marching for sex toy rights?” Madi asked. “They don’t have legs. They can’t march.”
“Turn them on and they can move.” Tina nodded. “They can buzz along.”
“Still preferable to men,” Iz said. “They won’t argue, even when they’re marching. Not to mention that it’d take them a while to get to where they needed to go. Men? Nope. They come like Usain Bolt looking at a world record.”
This was going downhill. Fast.
“Look, the point is, nobody needs to stage a protest for sex toys
to have rights.” I raised my hands. “I’m good with Jerry. Jerry’s good with me. We’re both satisfied. I do not need any of you guys to find me a date.”
CHAPTER TWO – LAUREN
You know how people say, ‘famous last words?’
Yeah. I was now the lucky duck on the receiving end of what, exactly, that phrase meant.
Apparently, nobody cared if I wanted a date or not. The wine had put a hive of bees in their bonnets, and now, my two best friends and my too-sober-for-this-shit sister were trawling dating websites.
It was the stupidest thing I’d ever been privy to. They’d been through at least twenty-five profiles and discarded every single one of them. It was a waste of time because I didn’t even need to look at the profiles to tell them that they were all not my type.
Not even close.
“I know.” Tina waved the full bottle of wine. The third bottle. “None of these are working! I have an idea!”
Oh, God.
“Why don’t we bring the hot guys to Lauren?”
“Like a farm show? Or an auction?” Iz asked, ignoring Madi’s snort-laughing. “Are we going to put Lauren on a pedestal and line guys up in front of her?”
“We could send her on The Bachelor or The Bachelorette,” Madi offered. “The Bachelorette is probably better. The guys really will come to her, and have you seen the men they rustle up for that thing? It’s like a supermarket full of snacks over there.”
I had no idea what that meant.
“No, no reality shows,” I said quickly. “You guys, really, I’m good. I’m fine. You don’t need to—”
I was interrupted by a gasp from Tina. She filled up all four empty wine glasses on the table, giving Iz her second, tiny glass. Literally. It was all of two mouthfuls. I guess she wanted her to be included in whatever cockamamie plan she’d thought up now.
“We put out an ad online!”
“No.” I vehemently shook my head. “No. Absolutely not.”
“Like on Craigslist?” Madi sat upright. “That’s not a bad idea.”
“It’s a terrible idea!”
Iz leaned forward. “Actually, that’s not so bad. The chance of catfishing would be seriously reduced. Statistically, there’s a better chance of you actually meeting someone online outside of a dating website. There are no computer algorithms getting in the way and bumping page views. It’ll be actual people seeing your ad.”
