She shrugs, looking disinterested in my distress over her dropping Millie off the line.
“Get me the number!” I bellow.
“Dave, you’re back on the air in three minutes, and you’re in the middle of another call.”
“I’m going to ignore the fact that you’re pretending to be my handler right now and ask again nicely. Give me her number.”
She sighs. “I don’t have her number. She was a scheduled call-in.”
I grit out, “Check the caller ID logs. I told her to stay on the line, so I need to call her back.”
Reagan stands up. “If I do this for you, will you get back in there and get ready to come back from commercial?”
She digs out the number from our call logs and I type it into my cell phone and click call.
She doesn’t answer.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Where the fuck is she?
I know she’s not sitting at her security desk ignoring me. Or is she?
No. No, I don’t think that’s right.
I pace around the studio, but I don’t prepare to go back on the air. Instead I check my computer’s email for the message she sent earlier with the photo of her face. Jackpot. At the end of her email is her automatic signature. Millie Hansen, her knitted animal accessories website link, some random quote about big-breasted girls, and her cell phone number.
I punch it into my personal cell phone and hit the call button.
And I wait.
Chapter Eight
Millie
“Where did you go?”
I’m still trying to process the fact that Dr. Dave is calling me on my cell phone. How is this happening? I mean, I’m glad it’s happening. I’m elated it’s happening. I now feel pretty sure this is not part of a long joke being played on me by his radio persona. This is real. He sought out my number and is sounding pretty peeved that my call got dropped.
“I don’t know. I was waiting, like you said. Then the call got dropped by accident, I guess. And in the meantime I had to leave my desk to do the lock checks. Normally, it’s not my job, but Paul’s kid is sick…well, you don’t want to hear about that. So now I’m doing that. You know, walking around to make sure everything is locked up and there’s no shenanigans going on late at night at the mall.”
I could be mistaken, but the noise he makes on the other end almost sounds like an angry caveman grunt. Even more shocking is that my body kind of likes it.
“I don’t like the idea of you walking around the dark mall alone late at night, Millie.”
“Trust me, nothing ever happens here. Unless you count the occasional rat rooting around the soft pretzel stand. I don’t think Pretzel Guy cleans it up very well at night.”
Dr. Dave mutters something about not wanting to talk about Pretzel Guy anymore.
“Hey,” I interject. “Aren’t you supposed to be on the air with another caller right now?”
“Yeah, in about another minute.”
My heart drops. “Oh. Well, do you want me to go?”
“No,” he growls. “Don’t fucking go anywhere. If the call gets dropped, find the best reception and I’ll call you back. OK? I don’t want to waste another second. Listen, where are you right now?”
I glance around and say, “I’m standing in front of that lingerie store. You know, the one with the fashion show with the angel wings…”
He grunts. “I’m familiar. Fuck. Now I’m picturing those gorgeous, lickable breasts of yours in something from that store.”