Daisy Does It All (Clover Park, Book 2) Contemporary Romance (The Clover Park Series) (7 page)

Liz fixed her with her classic responsible sister look—a mixture of
listen up
, and
I know best
that used to make Daisy feel secure, but now irritated the hell out of her. “It just doesn’t seem wise to try to pull off lies on national television. I think you should back out of the interview. I’m sure they can find other guests. This could go very wrong. If people think you’ve misled them, gosh, all those moms who look up to you, you could be ruined career-wise. And I don’t like this rush wedding just because Trav says so. Get rid of the interview and everything goes back to normal. No lies. No rush wedding. Marry Trav if you love each other, not because of lies.”

“Are you done?” Daisy asked tightly.

Liz’s eyes widened. “Don’t be mad. I’m just trying to help you fix the problem.”

“There is no problem. I fixed the lie by making it the truth, and I
will
go forward with the interview. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and I’m not going to let it pass me by!” She stood. “I’d better get back to work.” She almost made it out the door when she heard her sister’s gentle rebuke.

“Are you sure you’re doing the right thing?”

Daisy shook her head and kept going. Liz didn’t believe in her. Her parents didn’t believe in her. She knew why, her past haunted her through their eyes. She just wished they’d give her a chance to prove she’d changed, that she could make good choices. She knew she could pull this off.

“Excuse me,” Mrs. Peters, Daisy’s old first-grade teacher, called. “Can someone take our order?”

Daisy got back to work. “Coming, Mrs. Peters!”

Chapter Six

Daisy Does It All

Mom, wife, domestic diva

I’m going to be on TV!!!

I’m super excited to announce I’m going to be on
Mornings with Jessica
! Thank you, ladies! I couldn’t have done it without all your comments, shares, and tweets! Ahhhhhhh!!!!!!! This Friday the crew will be arriving at my house to interview me, Darling Husband, and Baby Delight. I’ll let you know the air date as soon as I hear. I can’t wait!

I have no idea what to wear. Leave a comment and let me know what you think. Dressy as in a dress? Business casual as in whatever-the-heck that is nowadays? My usual casual attire—sweater, jeans, boots?

Happy dance!

Mojitos all-around!

See you on TV!

XOXO!

Daisy

~ ~ ~

Trav decided he’d cook for Daisy. And that meant the one and only thing he knew how to make: fried chicken. Gran used to make it for them once a month. After he’d left for college, he’d craved it so much he forced himself to master the recipe to keep homesickness at bay. While the chicken bubbled in the oil, he dumped a bag of frozen mashed potatoes into a pot, emptied a bag of salad for Daisy, and dreamed about some biscuits to go along with the meal. Not having the skill for biscuits, toasted slices of baguette would have to do. He turned the chicken.

He wasn’t one to quibble over details—he
was
getting the marriage he wanted—but it was hard to overlook the fact that he was husband number three for Daisy. What else hadn’t she told him?

Just as he pulled the last of the fried chicken from the pan, the doorbell rang.

Daisy stood on his doorstep, a wine bottle in hand. “Hi,” she said softly.

“Geez, don’t look so nervous,” he said, taking the wine. “It’s just dinner. I thought we should get our story straight before we go on national TV as loving husband and wife.”

She blew out a breath and brightened immediately. “Of course! Great idea.”

He led the way into his apartment on the second floor of the old blacksmith place. His landscape office and equipment storage area took up the bottom floor. “Have a seat,” he said, indicating the sofa. “I usually eat there at the coffee table.”

“Okay.” She took off her white down parka and draped it over the chair where his own coat hung. She wore a form-fitting shirt with stripes and shiny sequins, tight jeans, and the black high-heeled boots of his fantasies.
Screw dinner.
He wanted her for appetizer, entrée, and dessert.

She looked around curiously, and he tried to see his place through her eyes. The walls were white. He had one framed picture on the fireplace mantel of him with his brothers and Gran. That was it. TV, sofa, coffee table, couple of chairs he’d picked up at IKEA. The kitchen was tiny, added after the fact to the old place.

He filled a plate for her, then his own, and carried both to the coffee table.

“This looks wonderful,” Daisy enthused. “I only know how to make grilled cheese.”

He grinned. “I only know how to make fried chicken. Between the two of us, we’re all set. Be right back.” He opened the white wine and grabbed two wine glasses. He was more of a beer drinker, but he kept the glasses on hand because he’d found most women liked wine. He joined her on the sofa.

She dug into the chicken right away. “This is delicious! Wow! You should give my dad your recipe for Garner’s.”

He laughed. “Gran would kill me. It’s a family secret.”

“We’re practically family,” she said, licking fried chicken spices off her fingers.

His brain stopped working for a moment.
Talk first
, he reminded himself. He took a swallow of wine and regrouped. “So tell me about husband number one and two.”

She waved her hand. “Not much to tell. Husband number one was freshman year of college. We were too young. It lasted two weeks.” She looked away, and he knew there was more to the story. “And husband number two was a friend. He died shortly after our marriage.”

Wow. A divorce and a death, and she was only thirty-three.

“What happened to the guy who died?” he asked. “Was he sick?”

She set her plate down and wiped her mouth with a napkin. “No. Tom was in the army about to ship off to Iraq. He wanted someone to come home to, something to cling to, to help get through that time. We shouldn’t have married. We were good friends. Best friends. But not in love.” She began to shred the napkin in her hand, lost in her memories.

He stilled her hand. “You don’t have to tell me.”

“No, I want to. He…his convoy was hit by a roadside bomb. I still miss him. He was a good guy.” She blinked away tears.

“Daze, I’m sorry. That’s rough.”

She gave him a watery smile that just about killed him. “I refused his death benefits. It just didn’t feel right. We were only married for a day before he shipped out.”

Not much of a honeymoon. He was glad and instantly guilty for thinking it.

“Well, you’re marriage number one for me,” he said with a grin. “You get to train me up on being a good husband. I already know toilet seat down.”

She relaxed and went back to eating. “That’s right. Don’t forget, doing the laundry gets you bonus points.”

“What do I get for bonus points?”

“I’ll leave that as a surprise.”

His mind immediately went to those luscious lips and what they could do to him. “I like laundry.”

She laughed. “Yeah? It’s all yours.”

Trav launched into his favorite story of Ry doing laundry way back when, with Shane’s clothes still covered in baking powder and flour from his latest baking experiment, and too much detergent. The soap bubbles exploded from the washer. Gran hadn’t been happy, but the look on Ry’s face when he skidded through bubbles and ran around like a chicken with the sky falling was classic comedy. Trav called him Chicken Little for a while.

He left out the part where Ry threatened to tell the next girl who called the house Trav’s nickname, Turtle, because he was so slow getting ready in the morning. The rumpled-hair look took time. Trav had been mortified that the girls might think he was a slow dork, when he wanted to come off as too cool to care about anything or anyone.

“Any dark secrets I should know?” he asked.

“Nope,” she answered right quick. “How about you?”

He raised his palms. “Open book.”

His past troubles with the law weren’t exactly secrets. Still, he didn’t want to talk about them. He was trying to get away from that image.

She tossed back some wine. “Yeah, me too.”

He wasn’t so sure.

After they’d finished dinner, Daisy stood. “I’ll clear the dishes.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

She glanced toward the kitchen, which was a mess of pots with a sink piled high with dishes. “Sure?”

“Positive.”
Now comes the seduction part of our evening
. “More wine?”

“Yes, please.” She sat down again and held out her glass. After he refilled it, she tucked a leg under her and leaned back on the sofa, looking relaxed. Her cheeks were rosy from the drink, her full lips parted slightly…What were they supposed to talk about again?

He set his wineglass down and turned to her. “Maybe you should fill me in on this blog of yours. What did you say about your husband and our married life?”

She perked up. “Well, I call you ‘Darling Husband’ on the blog because you’re so, well, darling. You’re a great dad…”

He made checkmarks in the air. “Darling and great.”

“And a wonderful help around the house, always looking to give me time to relax and recharge.”

She smiled dreamily, and it occurred to him she’d created the life she wished she had, and, if he was smart, he’d make her dream a reality. That’s how he’d get in with her. He could help around the house. Couldn’t be that hard—stick some dishes in the dishwasher, toss clothes in the washing machine. He already liked being with Bryce.

She continued. “You appreciate all of my efforts at being a good mom. You surprise me with flowers just because.” Her eyes lit up. “And we do all sorts of fun things together, like horse-drawn sleigh rides in the snow, slow dancing in front of a toasty fire—”

“Paint each other’s toenails?” He couldn’t help interrupting. Their life was beginning to sound like a chick flick.

She shut her mouth with a snap. “You think it’s stupid.”

“I think it sounds like a wonderful fantasy,” he said diplomatically.

“What’s wrong with a fantasy? I have tons of blog readers—moms from all over the world—who find it inspirational.”

“Nothing wrong with a fantasy. But do your readers know that? Because nobody has that kind of life, except in the movies.”

She raised her chin. “I’m sure some people do. And I want it. It’s a good life.”

“It’s a fake life.”

Her brows knitted together. “Can you just pretend for one day?”

“I can do better than that. Be right back.” He headed for his bedroom and returned with the laptop. “Pull up the blog. I’ll read every entry and make your dream a reality. I’ll be your fantasy come true.”

She put a hand to her throat, her face flushing. “Really?”

That flushed, breathless reaction was exactly the reason he was happy to do it. “Really.”

He handed her the laptop. A moment later, the blog popped up. The title,
Daisy Does It All
, already had him thinking dirty. He began to read.

The first blog posts weren’t that interesting. “The Joy of Sunday Cooking” caught his eye. Apparently she made rosemary leg of lamb with baby potatoes and steamed asparagus, and then doubled the recipe to freeze for “busy weekdays.” He kept going. She talked about food a lot—spinach and leek quiche, lobster tail with saffron rice, vegetable lasagna. His mouth watered. He turned to her. “You said you only cooked grilled cheese. Here you’ve got all sorts of complicated recipes, and I know I’ve had that lamb at Garner’s.”

She smiled tightly. “I borrowed some from there, some from my travels.”

“You’d better hope Jessica doesn’t ask you for a cooking demonstration.”

“Don’t be silly. She just wants to interview me. Us.”

He turned back to the blog. Trips to the doctor with baby, driving with baby while listening to classical music, dressing baby up for holiday pictures—Bryce had looked adorable in his Santa hat—the New Year, and keeping a journal to remember all of baby’s firsts. So far, only hints of Darling Husband—he agreed with her, helped her with pictures, and reminded her of baby’s first laugh. Easy enough.

Oh, hey now, things were getting interesting. Valentine’s Day seemed to involve an elaborate seduction scene. Yup, he was all over that. Next was bedroom shenanigans—double yup—and a vacation with sex on the beach.
Hell, yeah
. He stopped reading and gave her a once-over.

She squirmed.

He laughed. “No worries. I got the gist. I’m your man.”

She gestured to the screen. “I mean, this wasn’t exactly
my
fantasy life, more like what I imagined my readers might like.” Her cheeks flushed pink, giving her away.

“Sure, sure.” He let her off the hook, for now. “We should have a first date story to tell everyone.”

They’d never had a first date. Just one crazy drunken night.

Daisy pursed her lips, trying to come up with a story they could actually tell people about. “How about we ran into each other at Garner’s one summer when I was home visiting my family? We caught up over dinner, sitting in a back booth, and ended up talking all night.”

They’d never spent much time talking besides stuff about Bryce. “What did we talk about?”

She turned to him, eyes bright. “Our dreams, our hopes for the future, what we love, what we hate.”

He tugged a lock of her hair, unable to resist touching her. “Kind of generic. Fill me in.”

She gestured with her hands as if they helped her talk. “You know…like, I told you I dreamed of a career I was passionate about, though I hadn’t yet found it. I hoped to learn French and play the guitar. Maybe travel to Australia.”

“Yeah? That sounds good. So that’s dreams and hopes. Tell me what you love and hate.”

“Love: wine”—she raised her glass—“chocolate, and horror movies.”

He sat up straighter, surprised she was into horror movies. “I’m with you on the horror movies. What do you hate?”

“Traffic, artificial sweetener, and people who don’t keep their promises.”

“Exactly!” The more he got to know her, the more he liked her. “Me too. Just give me the damn sugar, and do what you say you’ll do. Traffic’s a bitch no matter where you go.”