AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She opened the door and stepped back into the bedroom. Tildy gasped.
“You look so pretty, Daisy!” She moved forward and swept Daisy’s hair off her shoulder. “Easy’s going to love it.”
Daisy frowned and shrugged. “He won’t even be my date.”
“Well, he’ll be there anyway,” Tildy reminded her. “He won’t be able to resist.” She put one of the castoffs back on the hanger. “How’s it going with him?” she asked quietly.
Daisy sighed and shimmied out of the winning frock. “He’s a tough nut to crack,” she admitted. “And by nut I mean I think he might be slightly certifiable.”
“Daisy!”
“Oh, come on. The guy lives in perpetual fear of being judged because of how he looks, but he keeps on doing it to me. For a guy who’s so self-conscious, he’s about the least self-aware person I’ve ever met.”
“He just needs time,” Tildy insisted.
“Time I’ve got, but I can’t change who I am, even if I had forever.” She hung the dress back on the hanger and slipped the plastic over it. “Maybe I’m just the bridge girl,” she told Tildy. “The one who helps him get over it, on his way to something else.”
“You’re not! I mean, you’ll help him get over it. And then he’ll see he’s been an idiot and you’ll stay together.”
Daisy shook her head. “Yeah, the thing about bridges, Tildy, is they usually end up getting burned.”
Chapter 23
Easy raised the door to the garage and pulled out the lawn mower. As he came around the corner of the house, on his way to the back lawn he stopped short. Tildy and Daisy had apparently camped out on Tildy’s lawn. They had towels spread out and were wearing bathing suits like they were at the fucking beach.
Daisy spotted him and grinned. “Mow that lawn, baby. Give it hell!” she shouted.
He stalked over toward them, stopping at the edge of the towel Daisy was laying on. She propped herself up on her elbows and looked at him over her sunglasses.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Objectifying you.”
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered.
“It’s cheaper than a strip club,” she said, lifting a glass of sangria. “But I’ve got some ones in my wallet. If you come a little closer, I’ll stuff some in.”
“Give me a break,” he scoffed.
“Well, if you want fives and tens you’re going to have to shake that ass a little more. And lose the shirt.”
Tildy giggled. Easy frowned. “Well, stay out of my way,” he told them.
“We’re all the way over here. Doing important things,” Daisy pointed out. Tildy held up a wedding magazine for good measure.
“Well,” he said, flustered, “keep it that way.”
He stalked back to the mower and jerked on the handle a bit. He couldn’t very well tell Tildy not to be in her own damn backyard, but he didn’t much like the idea that they’d be watching. Eventually he’d slip in the grass and then what? They’d laugh. Or worse, get all concerned. Either way he didn’t want to deal with it.
He glanced around the lawn, sizing it up. The grass was too long. It had to be mowed immediately. He could perhaps put it off, but the wedding was tomorrow. If Hawk saw that it wasn’t mowed, he might offer to do it for him, and that made him almost as pissed off as the idea that the girls would laugh at him. He decided it had to be done and that there was just nothing for it. He leaned down to grab the pulley.
“There you go!” Daisy shouted from across the yard. “Very nice!”
He growled and shook his head, wishing he could angle himself differently so that she wasn’t looking right at his ass. But it would take longer to adjust his position than it would to just pull the goddamn starter.
He fired the thing up and set his mind to the task in front of him. It made no difference at all that there was a cute little blonde in a string bikini eyeing his every move. He set the mower on the first pass across the yard and got started. Midway through, though, his ankle twisted and his heel slipped a few inches on the loose cuttings. He quietly glanced over his shoulder at the girls. Daisy was smiling, but not at him. Tildy was showing her something in her magazine. He sighed in relief and vowed to be more careful.
After several more passes, being careful was starting to wear on him. He should have been at least halfway done by now. It was getting hot as hell out here, too. But hurrying through it would only result in falling on his ass. He grit his teeth and re-aligned the mower. He’d just have to suffer through the heat.
He was in the middle of doing just that, suffering and wiping the sweat off his brow with his forearm, when he noticed Daisy waving at him. She was up off her towel, standing at the edge of Tildy’s lawn. He debated simply ignoring her and returning to work, but Daisy didn’t strike him as the type to take being ignored all that well.
