It's A Wonderful Midlife Crisis (Good To The Last Death #1) - Robyn Peterman Page 0,3

to ignore all of the floating entities that had popped up to see the show. Stan had no idea six semi-corporeal strangers were standing behind him watching my mortifying life play out in full color. Far be it from me to clue him in. I knew I was going crazy. No one else needed that info.

“I’d be happy to, you know…” Stan said as he made the peace sign with two fingers and then shoved his tongue between them.

“Good God, no!” I shouted on a gag and then slapped my hand over my mouth as the slightly decaying old man hovering over Stan’s left shoulder laughed like a loon. “I’m good—really. I have to go visit my gram at the nursing home in a bit and then get to work.”

“Can I see you again?” Stan asked as he made sure his meticulously gelled hair was still in place.

It was.

“I think maybe we should just be friends,” I said diplomatically, considering all I wanted him to do was leave.

“Is it because I could only go for ten minutes?” he asked with a slightly perplexed frown on his ridiculously pretty face.

“Actually, it was two minutes,” I corrected him. “But it’s not that at all. It was a very energetic two minutes.”

“Thank you,” he replied with a satisfied smirk.

It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. The laughing dead dude rolled his buggy eyes for me and I almost giggled.

“Welcome. However, I’m not in the right place for a relationship right now. It’s not you. It’s me. You’re just too… umm… perfect for someone else. You deserve someone who likes to shop at preppy stores. I, you know, don’t want to hold you back, and I’m not good at math, so… ahh,” I stuttered, searching for more inane crap to spew. He wasn’t an asshole. He just wasn’t for me.

And I wasn’t ready for any of this. It wasn’t Stan’s fault. I had my own intimacy issues. However, it was all kinds of stupid to have gotten drunk and tried to work them out with someone who was less appealing than eating a full bag of plain rice cakes.

“I see what you mean,” Stan said as he nodded seriously then glanced over at me with pity. “While the sex was outstanding, I’m far smarter than you.”

“I’m sorry… what?”

Correction. He was a complete asshole.

The hanging specters didn’t like that one either. They flew around Stan like a freaking tornado. It was difficult to focus on the boring man on my porch with all the hoopla going on.

“Well, I do have two Masters and my CPA license. And you’re just an attractive widowed paralegal with a great rack,” he said in a socially acceptable, pleasant tone, clearly unaware he was an asshole.

There were several ways to handle the situation. One was to kill him, but I had too much going on to spend any time in prison for murder. Plus, I’d never killed anyone. My fortieth birthday wasn’t a good day to start a life of crime. This was a small town and I didn’t need that kind of reputation. The second was to escort him right out of my life.

I knew exactly how to do that.

“Stan, I’m going to suggest you leave before I tell you that you have a tiny penis and I wasn’t exactly sure we were having sex at all. You wear too much aftershave and if you’re going to manscape, you might want to have a go at your back. So, unless you want to hear all that, you’d better sprint your preppy, pencil-pushing ass off my porch.”

“Can I call you?” he asked through the closed door as I slammed it shut.

I didn’t grace the request with an answer. It was embarrassing and unbelievable that I’d spent even two minutes of time I couldn’t get back on a jackass with a mini man tool who thought he was smarter than me.

God, I missed Steve. I mean, we had our problems, but he wasn’t hairy.

I was done dating. Forever. Forty, widowed and single was starting to sound very good.

Now I just needed to deal with the visible to only me weirdos hanging out in my house. However, I had to give it to them. They were very supportive when Stan was talking smack.

After a full two and a half minutes of contemplative thought—which was thirty seconds longer than Stan’s performance last night—I decided to ignore my uninvited houseguests. I was completely out of coffee and the lack of