by Alison Mello
Learning to Love 3
Found My Love
Theresa is a single mom afraid to love. She was never married her ex but he does pick up their daughter once in a while.
When Chase first spots her at an engagement party he feels instantly pulled to her, despite his trust issues. They hit it off that night and exchange numbers, but shy Theresa wants to take it slow. He is willing to go at her pace as long as she is committed to him.
Will Chase be able to stick it out when the dreaded ex stops showing up to take Katie making it hard for them to have alone time? He says he wants to take care of them but when life gets in the way will he step up to the plate or run out the door?
Note: This book is written in one point of view.
Note: This book is written in first-person point of view.
Genre: Contemporary
Length: 73,368 words
FOUND MY LOVE
Learning to Love 3
Alison Mello
EROTIC ROMANCE
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK
IMPRINT: Erotic Romance
FOUND MY LOVE
Copyright © 2015 by Alison Mello
E-book ISBN: 978-1-63259-984-1
First E-book Publication: December 2015
Cover design by Harris Channing
All art and logo copyright © 2015 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
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Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
About the Author
FOUND MY LOVE
Learning to Love 3
ALISON MELLO
Copyright © 2015
Chapter 1
“Good morning, Mrs. Coleman. How was your honeymoon?” I say as I walk towards Abbey’s cubicle.
She smiles at me excitedly. “Good morning, Theresa. It was the most amazing two weeks of my life! How’s little miss Katie doing?” Abbey asks.
“Katie is great. I signed her up for camp this week to give my mom a break. I can’t wait to hear all about your trip over lunch, but for now, I need to get you caught up on some vendor stuff. Can you come into my office so we can have a brief meeting?”
“Sure. I’ll help you carry your stuff. What can I take?”
“Thanks, Abbey.” I hand her my briefcase, and we walk into my office. “Shana quit, but I have already placed an ad to replace her. I would like for you to be a part of the interview process. We also had an issue with last week’s check run. I need you to go through the checks that were printed and sent out as soon as possible. Confirm that everything that needed to be paid got paid, and if something didn’t please call the vendor to let them know what happened.” I roll my eyes, frustrated that we couldn’t function for two weeks without her.
“You got it. When are you hoping to do the first round of interviews?” she asks as she takes notes.
“I’m thinking late next week or early the week after. I want to get someone in here as soon as possible, though.”
“Have you started to receive resumes yet?”
“Are you kidding me? Look at this pile of resumes. Since it is an entry-level position, anybody and everybody is applying for the job.” I sigh.
“Great. Why don’t you give me half the pile, and I’ll sort through them from home tonight. We can meet about who we each like, then we can schedule the interviews on Thursday.”
“Thanks, Abbey. That’s a great plan! Are you sure you don’t mind going over some of them? I tried to skim through them, so I didn’t print them if I feel they are not even a potential fit, but it got time-consuming, so I just printed them all.”
“I don’t mind at all. Since I have to work closely with this person, I would like to help and ensure they are a good fit,” she says happily.
“Okay, great.” I hand her half the pile before she heads back to her desk to catch up on her work. As she leaves, I take a deep breath and sink into my own work. I need to try to keep my mind off Chase, which is why I called this meeting first thing this morning. I figured if I could jump right into my work, I would focus on that instead of him. No such luck. The second Abbey is out of my office, I start thinking about him.
I smile, thinking about the amazing weekend Katie and I had with him. We had gone to dinner and then a movie on Friday. Katie spent Saturday night at her friend’s house, so Chase and I went out alone for drinks. When he dropped me off at my house, it was awkward. We’ve yet to stay at one another’s house. We both have trust issues thanks to our past, and I think we need to have a d
iscussion to figure out how to get past them. If we don’t figure this out, we’re never going to have any kind of lasting relationship, never mind one together. If we can’t work it out, we’ll have to stop seeing each other. To be honest, with my history I’m probably destined to be alone. I really would like to find myself a good man, though. Maybe I should talk to Abbey about it over lunch. Then again, I don’t want to take away from her sharing about her honeymoon. I’ll just have to save that issue for another day.
I shake myself out of my daydreaming and get ready for my ten o’clock meeting with my boss. We’re going to go over this week’s projected income from certain clients and determine how much funds can be earmarked for Abbey to pay bills. I’m hoping she doesn’t find too many mistakes in the check run. I don’t have a ton of money left to cover any discrepancies. If I find out we’re getting a good chunk of money in, maybe she can convince them to wait until next week for payment.
As I’m wrapping up answering e-mails and checking messages I hear my notification alert on my phone. I check it quickly to make sure that it isn’t Katie, and I hope nothing major happened at camp. Of course, it isn’t camp. It is Kyle.
Do I have to take Katie this weekend? I’m broke from giving you all my money and don’t know what I’ll do with her.
Are you serious? She’s your daughter. Play a board game with her or watch a movie at home?
Yes, I’m serious! She comes over here and tells me about all the shit you do with her, and I look like an ass because we stay in my apartment and play games together.
Well stop wasting money on drinking and you will have some to spend on her. I know you still go out drinking during the week and on the weekends you don’t have her.
Fuck you! I shouldn’t have to live like a hermit because I have a daughter.
I’m not saying you should, but you need to budget better and save some money so you can do things with your daughter, if that is what you want. I have to go, I have a meeting in a few minutes. Please pick her up, she’s looking forward to it.
Whatever!
Still shaking my head at my conversation with Kyle, I walk out of my office with my notebook, report, and phone in hand. Lucky for me, Jack understands that I’m a single mom and that I get really nervous while Katie is at camp for the week and need to carry my phone everywhere. I need to text my mom to see if she can still watch Katie Wednesday night for me so I can meet the girls for Krav Maga. I put a reminder in my phone to do it after my meeting.
“Good morning, Jack. Are you ready for me?” I say with a smile as I stand in the door to his office.
“Absolutely, Theresa, come on in,” Jack says in his usual cheery voice. Then again, Jack is almost always in a good mood. The only time he’s in a bad mood is if we don’t have a good income for the week. Then he stresses out.
Jack is quite a bit older than me, but we have a lot in common, so we get along well. We both enjoy working out and often hit the gym together at lunch. We both love football and basketball so we talk about sports all the time. He has been happily married to his wife, Carol, for about thirty years. I’ve met his wife at several work functions over the years. They’re really cute together.
“So,” Jack says, “how was your weekend?”
“It was good,” I say flatly.
“How is Katie doing?” he asks with a hint of concern.
“She’s fine, but she may end up having a crappy weekend. Kyle just texted me that he may not pick her up because he has no money to do anything with her,” I say, totally frustrated.
“That really sucks! It’s too bad he can’t pull his crap together. You have an amazing little girl, and if he just spent some time with her, he would see she just wants to spend time with him.”
“I know that’s what I said! He’s jealous that I do things with her and then she runs and tells him about it. Of course, it’s my fault because he gives me all his money.”
Jack just shakes his head, and I tell him not to stress about it. Katie and I will be fine. I take a deep breath and say, “On that note, let’s dig in so I can find out from Abbey how bad we screwed up the check run last week.”
“Absolutely,” Jack says as he pulls out his report.
We go through the report making note of everyone who’s more than thirty days past due on paying us. I’ll bring this list to the head of account receivables so he can make some calls and find out when we’re getting paid. As we wrap up, we realize that we really don’t have too many accounts that are more than forty-five days past due and we have a good amount of money coming in this week, so I can promise Abbey some extra money this week to fix any errors. Jack and I wrap up by discussing the resumes for the data-entry job. I let him know that Abbey and I have created a plan and that we are hoping to make calls for interviews on Thursday. He’s happy with our plan, so I leave Jack’s office and I head to see Rob in AR to have him make his calls and request an update by Wednesday. He gives me his flirtatious smile and tells me that it’s no problem. Rob is an attractive guy. I often have to remind him to watch himself because he flirts with me and has made it clear he would love to date me. Of course, I have a very strict rule about not dating those I work with, never mind the fact that I’m his immediate supervisor. I can sense his flirting coming, so I walk away before he can start up his usual small talk.
As I go see how Abbey is making out with the check run, my phone vibrates in my pocket and I see it is Chase.
Hey, pretty lady! Will I see you Wednesday after Krav Maga?
Hoping to make it. Just need to confirm my mom can take Katie.
Okay, cool, have a good day!
You, too!
“Hey, Abbey, how are you making out with the check run?” I say as I approach her cubicle.
“It’s not too bad actually. You guys didn’t screw up as bad as you thought you did. There were definitely some missing, but nothing from the major groups of vendors. I’ve already called them to let them know I’ll get them caught up as soon as I can.”
“Good. How did they take it?” I say with concern.
“They were fine. We’re not usually late, so they just said they understood and to let them know if we weren’t mailing money this week,” she said casually, and I know she was trying to make me feel better.
“Great, because we are due in a good amount of money this week, so I should be able to give you some extra to get them caught up. When we meet on Wednesday to go over the resumes, we’ll go over the AP report as well. Be sure to include whoever was missing from this week that was supposed to be paid, and I’ll see what I can do for funds.”
“No problem, and once we have confirmed we can pay them, I’ll call them and let them know. What time do you want to do lunch? I’m starving since I got in early this morning.”
“Give me fifteen minutes and I’ll meet you in the kitchen to eat and talk about this amazing honeymoon you went on.”
“Cool, see you in fifteen,” Abbey says, with a huge smile.
I head to my office to get my reports organized and to check my e-mails. I send a quick e-mail to Jack, letting him know that we didn’t mess up the check run as bad as I thought. My alarm goes off, and it is my reminder to text my mom, so I do it right then and there so I don’t forget!
Hey, Mom! I just want to confirm that you can take Katie Wednesday night so I can go to my self-defense class with the girls…xoxo
She instantly responds as usual.
Of course I can. I miss her since she’s at camp so I can’t wait to see her.
Wish Kyle felt the same way. He’s trying to back out of taking her again this week. I’m so disappointed and Katie will be, too, if he doesn’t show.
I’m sorry, sweetie. I know how much you wish he was around for her more, but you can’t make him.
I know. Got to run. Abbey is waiting to have lunch with me so she can tell me about her honeymoon!
Okay. Do you and Katie want to have dinner with us at the house tonight?
Sure, see yo
u after work!
My mom is the best. She has been so supportive of me and of my decision to leave Kyle. She told me that I’d have no problem raising Katie on my own because I was basically doing it on my own while we were together anyway. I love her dearly for all her support and assistance.
I grab my phone and head into the kitchen to grab my lunch from the fridge. When I walk in, Abbey is already pulling her lunch out of her bag. She always has a sandwich with either veggies and dip or an apple and yogurt. She eats so healthily, and I know I need to start following in her footsteps. Working out just isn’t enough anymore.
“So tell me about this amazing honeymoon of yours! I don’t even know where the cruise went,” I say, excited for her. Seth took Abbey and her son Brian on a cruise for their honeymoon. It was the perfect getaway for them because they have been through so much.
“It was amazing. We flew down to Miami on Saturday morning and spent the day at our hotel by the pool just relaxing because our cruise didn’t take off until Sunday. Seth arranged for a limo to pick us up at the hotel and take us to the port. Brian thought it was so cool. He couldn’t stop taking pictures of us in it with him.”
“I bet he did think it was cool. I mean who doesn’t enjoy a nice limo ride.” We are both giddy.
“We got on board Sunday late morning, got settled, and had lunch. We spent Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday at sea. The guys went on the waterslides while I was lying in the sun just relaxing. Seth had booked me a massage on Monday, and it was the most amazing hot stone massage I have ever had,” she says with the biggest smile.
