You Dropped a Blonde on Me Read Free

longing I can’t quite describe, but one that I absolutely have to pursue in order to find total fulfillment.”
    The look he gave her was blank. Astonished, too, but mostly blank. “I’ll see if Mr. Herrera’s in.”
    “Thanks,” she looked at his name tag, “Carlo. I’ll wait over by the condiments.”
    Ducking out of the short line, Maxine backed away from the counter to give herself a good view of the private offices through the kitchen. Mr. Herrera wasn’t getting away today. Not if she had to tie him down with the strings of his gingham apron and make him hire her.
    By all that was minimum wage, come the time when she left this fast food joint of batter-dipped sin and fried iniquity, she’d have a job, and she’d wear the ridiculous uniform, hat and all, with pride—because she needed the money.
    Needed .
    From the corner of her eye, Maxine caught Mr. Herrera, day manager of the Cluck-Cluck Palace in small-town Riverbend, New Jersey, exit 98 off the Garden State Parkway, attempting escape via the rear door. Silly man. He’d never be quick enough for her and her desperation, not even with her in three-inch stilettos. The clack of her frantic heels resonated on the tiled floor when she made a break through the lunch crowd to head him off at the pass.
    She caught him just as he was about to push his way out the door and into the humid heat of the day by placing a non-confrontational hand on his bicep. “Mr. Herrera. I’m so disappointed. All I want to do is make nice with you so you’ll hire me, and you run away at every opportunity like I’m the reincarnation of Jeffrey Dahmer. Why is that?”
    He winced, toying with his gingham-checked necktie. “Because you’ve been in here every day for the last week, and if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a million times—your application has to be processed through headquarters.”
    Maxine gave him a glossy-lipped pout. That used to work on almost everyone who had testosterone and walked upright. Or it had. Okay, so it wasn’t the glossy-lipped pout of twenty, but these lips, the forty-year-old ones, still totally untouched by Botox, were in damn fine shape for their age.
    Thus, she willed them to bedazzle her prey. “Oh, c’mon. You know that’s not true. Gabriella over there filled out an application on the same day I did. I know she did because she liked my bracelet and I told her if she had some cold hard cash, any cash, I’d fork it over free and clear. All this while she was in the process of filling out the same application I did. You hired her. Now look, she’s a chicken-frying engineer, and I still haven’t been called for an interview.”
    He grunted with a grimace.
    “So did she have to go through the same process as I do, or am I being discriminated against because I’m forty and you don’t think I’d be willing to work the hours these poor kids do for minimum wage?” She played the “forty” card extra loud, making several heads in the dining area turn. “Because you’d be wrong.” Way wrong.
    He blustered, frowning so that his bushy eyebrows scrunched together. “That’s not it at all, Ms. Cambridge.”
    Max fought for a centered calm. Her hysteria would only incite anxiousness that, in turn, would evoke rambling sentences she couldn’t control once she got wound up. “Then what is it? Look, I’m willing to work any hours you’ll give me. I’m willing to do all the dirty work you need done. I’ll scrub toilets, sinks, refill ketchup bottles, shred lettuce—”
    “Our lettuce comes already shredded.”
    How helpful. “Whatever. The point is, I’m all in. Just give me a chance,” she begged, her hand suddenly around his arm. Before she knew it, what was originally planned as a subtle, dignified nudge for employment became a hostage situation, if the way she was gripping his arm with firm fingers was any indication. Desperation had its blatant nuances. “ Please .”
    Rolling his shoulders in discomfort, he pulled