All the Wrong Choices by C.A. Harms

Chapter Nine

Jonah

"How much longer,"Todd asks as he sits in the chair and looks back at me. "I was hoping I'd have them off before summer."

"Have you been wearing your rubber bands like you're supposed to?"

"I hate them," he mumbles, and if I wasn't already in a mood from a lack of communication with a certain woman, I might have joked along with my patient.

"You may hate them, but without them, you'll be wearing your braces into the summer."

I glance over at his mom, who sits in the corner, and she rolls her eyes, feeling the same frustrations I'm feeling, only for entirely different reasons. Todd has been a problematic patient from the beginning. When he first came to see me, he had such a massive overbite I knew it would be a long road for him. Now we are rounding toward home, and the kid refuses to wear the rubber bands that attach to the hooks of his braces.

"Fine," he grumbles, and again I continue with our visit without telling him all the things I usually would say.

With a new package of rubber bands and a visit scheduled for next month, Todd and his mother walk toward the door, his mom offering me a wave as they step outside.

"Bad day?" I glance at Betty, my receptionist, and find her wearing a knowing smirk. She knows my moods well, and she has a motherly way about her that can pinpoint things before I have gotten the chance to accept them. She's been with me since I started this office. It's an easy transition from college to owning my practice due to my father's successful standing dentistry office in Greensboro. Everyone knows him, he is one of the best, so it's easy for them to trust me too.

We took a small section of the building my father owns, and I set out independently. Within the first six months, I had more patients than I could count. My small practice consisted of me, Betty, and one dental assistant, which has now turned into a twelve-member team. I find there are things in my life I'm missing outside of my accomplishments. Someone I can share my success with, someone to relax with after a long day.

I've recently hired another orthodontist, each of us having our own receptionist and one financial advisor handling all our accounts. I'm proud of how far I've come, and that path has left me very little time to focus on the things I don't have.

But then Addison, my best friend's girl, invites me to dinner to meet her best friend, and now I can't stop thinking about Dani.

She's beautiful, and I'm talking about the kind of beauty that makes your chest hurt and your heart race. But it isn't just that; she's also exciting and intelligent. Just one dinner with her, and I'm intrigued. The attraction is thick, the way she gave in to me kissing her, pressing her body to mine, Jesus, it was incredibly sexy.

So when I saw the fear in her eyes as I asked to see her again, I reacted. I pretty much offered myself up like some piece of meat to get more time with her. I probably freaked her out. I mean, who in the hell does that.

Use my body, please. What the fuck!

"Your next appointment had to reschedule for next week, so you're free for a bit since it's lunchtime." It dawns on me I have yet to respond to Betty. She doesn't call me out on it, knowing me better than I seem to know myself. She's been around since I was a kid. She and my mother grew up together, so hiring her was an easy choice. I could trust her.

"Why don't you go take a break?"

I don't argue. Instead, I give Betty a nod and do just as she suggested.

Instead of leaving, I walk around the building and into the front entrance of my father's practice. Amelia sitting behind the front desk looks up, and her smile widens. "Well, to what do we owe this visit?"

She has always been a little flirty, and from what my sister has told me, she is very interested in me taking the bait. Her being the bait, but I'm not going there. Not that Amelia is bad-looking by any means, but it's entirely too close for comfort. If shit goes wrong, I'll have both my father and sister down my throat.

“I'm looking for Avery," offering my sister lunch is something I don't often do, but she is one of my best friends next to Anthony, so I'm hoping maybe she can offer up some words of advice to help me out of this funk.

"She's in with a patient, but she shouldn't be too long," I nod my head and walk past the counter toward the back office. I can practically feel Amelia's eyes burning a hole in me from behind. I refuse to look back; again, the girl does not need any encouragement.

"Hey you," Avery is stepping out of a room as she looks up to see me walking in her direction. "What, slow day?"

"Cancelation, and it's lunchtime," throwing my arm over her shoulder, I drag her along with me. "I thought I'd offer my sister lunch."

"Wow," she pinches my side, and I release my hold on her, jumping out and away from her. "Free lunch, how can I pass up that offer?"

"Jonah," the sound of my name came from my father's office only a few feet away, and both Avery and I start in that direction. "I thought it was you." Setting down the tablet in his hands, he leans back in his chair and pulls off his glasses. "What's going on?"

"My next patient had to cancel, so I thought I'd stop by and see if this one wanted to get lunch." I point to my sister as she takes a seat opposite my father.

"I don't think you have anything else until after lunch anyway."

"So it's set, you're buying me lunch," I say as she swivels around, staring at me with her mouth hanging open in shock.

"You invited me," it is so easy to trigger a reaction from Avery. "Which means you're buying."

I ignore her argument and offer my father a knowing smile. Without waiting, I start down the hall toward the front and can hear the shuffle of Avery's feet behind me. Ignoring the gawking stare of Amelia, I look back at my sister, and she narrows her eyes. "You are buying. You make the big bucks."

Avery gets paid well for a hygienist; my father makes sure she's taken care of, so she is doing just fine.

"I'm going to lunch," she informs Amelia, still following me out the door in a hurry. After we get outside, she looks back at the office. "I wish you would bang the girl or tell her you’re gay because the dreamy eyes she offers every time she sees you is nauseating."

"I'm not telling her I'm gay."

"So then—"

"And I'm not banging her either." Avery laughs, and I grab my keys from my pocket as she moves toward my car. "Let's go, I'm hungry."

We wrestle for the keys, and quickly I regain them, holding them high above her head out of her reach. Glaring at me, she turns around and goes to the passenger side instead.

Once we are inside my car and on our way, she waits just a few minutes before she starts questioning me.

I knew it would only be a matter of time before her curiosity won out. "What's going on with you?"

"What, I can't take my sister to lunch?"

A few more seconds pass before she speaks again.

"I can tell your pouting."

Unable to stop smiling, I look over at her, and she crosses her arms over her chest.

"What's her name?"

"How do you know there's a her?"

"Because I'm a genius, and I know you. You have the dream job and a killer house most would die for. You have a ton of friends, but the one thing you don't have is a lady friend, so like I asked, and you've attempted to avoid, who is she?"

I turn toward my sister's favorite restaurant since I equally enjoy it. I park in the first available space. Killing the engine and pulling the handle of the door, I glance over at Avery. "Her name is Danielle, and I think I scared her off."

With that, I climb out of my car and start toward the front entrance of Gia's.

"Did she find out you have three balls or a tiny member?"

Hanging my head, I ignore the comment from my sister and hope there is no one close enough who overheard her. She is like a guy sometimes, and I know it's because she was always surrounded by my friends and me while growing up. I never let her out of my sight. We are close enough in age that it meant she grew up around many of the same people I did. I know what guys are like, so keeping her close meant I could shelter her. It also meant she had been exposed to a lot of things girls shouldn't.

My sister had no problem talking about booze and sex, and sometimes that's more than I need to hear coming out of her mouth.

At this point, I should have gone to lunch on my own.