No Bunny But You (Holiday Romance Series) (4 page)

“Yes, ma’am.” He smiled broadly. “I was Superman and
one summer I played Batman. I can do all the characters, except
Tweety Bird. I’m a little too tall for that.”

Smiling as he laughed heartily, Molly made a mark on
his resume.

The next bunny also looked good. “So you worked with
Cheryl Summers for two years now?”

“Yes, I did, but my availability is considerably less
now that I’m raising my grandson.”

“Okay.” She made a notation on his paperwork. “Kudos
on that, by the way.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

“Now where did I put that?” Mike Tanner, Drake’s
boss, sifted through the messy pile on his desk a week later, the
florescent light reflecting off his bald head.

Sitting across from the older man, Drake waited,
knowing that the hunt could take a while. Mike had his own form of
organization that looked like chaos, but it worked for the older
man.

Drake didn’t say anything, just waiting for whatever
his boss wanted to show him. When he’d started the blog, he’d been
surprised to realize that rather than a hard-hitting television
executive, his boss was more like a guy wandering the aisles of
Home Depot in an orange apron.

“I thought I laid it right here,” the older man said
in frustration, growing more agitated as he shuffled through
papers. “Aha!! Here it is.”

He held up a slightly grubby sheet, peering over the
top of his reading glasses at it before tilting his head back to
look through the lenses. “Yes, this is it.”

Mike beamed over his glasses at Drake. The paper
looked like it had resided on the grimy floorboard of a work
pickup, despite the fact that his boss drove a moderately tidy
Camry.

Years before, Mike had worked with his tools as a
contractor and Drake had learned through their various interactions
that his hapless-appearing boss was quite a skilled and intelligent
man. He just didn’t look it.

Mike placed the paper on top of the pile with
apparent pride. “This is a very exciting opportunity for you
and
for us.”

“Okay.” He’d learned that the older man would have
his say in time.

Reading over the paper again, Mike looked up and
beamed at Drake.

Despite his conflicts with the work, Drake was always
glad to hear if the blog was picked up by another site. “So tell me
about the opportunity, sir.”

“Oh! Oh, I haven’t told you. Well, son. You’re going
to be on television.” Mike beamed at him.

“What do you mean? I’m going to be on tv?”

Mike picked up the paper again. “This is an
invitation for you to shoot a segment for House Today for the Home
Improvement network! And they’re doing this test right here in
Austin! You know the Bloggies are always announced here at the SBSW
Festival, right?”

“What?” Drake sat up in his chair. “What did you
say?”

Mike frowned in confusion. “The Bloggies? You know
they always have a big event at the Austin South By Southwest
festival.”

“Yes.” Waving a dismissive hand, Drake said, “What
did you say about my doing a television segment?”

“The Home Improvement people have requested you give
them several segment ideas for their House Today show—you know,
topics their viewers might be interested in—and they’ll pick one
that they’d like you to do. You know, my boy, this could lead to
big things for you…us, too, if you get to be a big name. This could
work into being a regular segment. Heck, you might even be offered
your own show….”

The older man rambled on happily, talking of
possibilities Drake couldn’t even imagine.

He held still in his chair, wondering how he needed
to go about getting out of this damned mess. He wasn’t qualified to
write the blog, much less appear on a home improvement show. What
the hell was he supposed to do? Wild thoughts occurred to him. If
he did the show, he’d surely be exposed and shamed. He couldn’t
imagine it. The possibility was too ugly.

What the crap had he been thinking? He couldn’t do
this! He should never have taken on the damned blog. Damn, Molly
and her pushing. He was a writer, for heaven’s sake. He liked news
stories and hard-hitting journalism, not this home improvement
fluff.

His face felt tight and all Drake could think about
was Molly. She knew this stuff. She’d help him. She
had
to
help him. No sooner had the thought echoes in his head than he
slammed the brakes on it.

Molly had said she wouldn’t keep helping with the
blog. No way she’d help him with a TV show.

What the hell was he going to do now?

* * *

Molly opened her front door, the banging having
brought her in a hurry.

Drake stood there in the fine misty afternoon,
looking haggard in a white dress shirt that was open at the collar.
His dark navy dress pants and loafers made him look like the
journalist he was. He leaned on her doorway, a tall and well-built
man. In that moment, Molly felt the impact of his dark blue eyes
and had a crazy, almost overpowering urge to throw herself at him,
to kiss his warm mouth and unbutton all those silly buttons.

She knew she couldn’t, of course, but she wanted to,
really badly.

“Hi,” she offered. They’d been friends for years and
she knew she wanted him in her life, somehow, even if love was off
the table. That ship had apparently sailed a long time ago.

“Molly,” he said, his gaze not leaving her face. “I
need your help. Really, really, need your help.”

“Come on in.” She stepped back. “What’s going
on?”

He seemed more serious than the blog situation called
for.

Drake walked over and sat down on her couch. She’d
seen him there, in her living room a million times, but something
shifted between them when she’d told him she wouldn’t keep doing
the blog stuff.

He hadn’t been over to her house since.

“You’ll never believe what Mike Tanner threw at me
today.” Drake looked down at his hands. “Totally out of the
blue.”

“What?”

He just looked at her a moment, apparently gathering
himself. “They want me to film a segment for the Home Improvement
Network. You know that show ‘House Today’? I’ve been asked to
audition to do short spots on it. I’m supposed to shoot them three
home improvement ideas that could be demonstrated in five minutes.
They’ll choose which one they want me to do. Tanner’s thrilled. I
tried to get out of it. To tell him I don’t televise well, that my
‘home improvement’ process isn’t quick like they always want it to
be.”

“I’ll bet he didn’t believe you wouldn’t televise
well, did he? You’re fairly good looking, you know.” Molly couldn’t
help pointing it out.

Drake stopped to stare at her. “What are you talking
about?”

She waved a hand. “All those guys on the home
improvement shows are hot. Well, except that bulldog guy who goes
to people’s houses and announces everything the contractor did
wrong. Haven’t you noticed how good looking the rest of those guys
are?”

“Umm. No, not really.”

“Well, they are and,” she raised her eyebrows at him,
“news flash: You’re a hot guy yourself.”

“Thanks, I think.” He didn’t look thrilled about the
compliment.

“You’re welcome.”

“Anyway, the network sent Mike a letter, saying they
want me to submit three different ideas of segments I could do.” He
looked over at her. “I can’t do any segments. I don’t know this
crap. I’m not a home improvement guy! Or a TV guy for that
matter.”

“Don’t sell yourself short. You’re smart and very
articulate.” She sat down at the other end of the couch, knowing
that part of his freaking out was because Drake didn’t tolerate not
doing well at anything. He wasn’t easily vulnerable. Giving him a
level glance, she said,“You can do this.”

“Really?” he said in sarcastic disbelief. “And you
know this how? Since I’ve never done any of this stuff and don’t
even know what a crescent wrench is?”

She sat a little straighter, smiling at him. “Because
I believe in you, that’s how I know. And you do know what a
crescent wrench is now that we fixed your toilet.”

“
You
fixed my toilet,” he returned a little
sulkily. “I just handed you tools and sprayed water all over both
of us.”

“Could you pick a crescent wrench out of a pile, if
you had to?”

Drake glanced at her before admitting, “Probably. If
I had to.”

“And you know now not to pull the toilet fill line
out of the overflow tube. I’d also bet you know how to turn off the
water behind a toilet.”

“Yes,” he admitted finally. “I did learn those things
from our toilet debacle the other day, but you can’t really make a
television segment out of that.”

“Maybe not—although I’ll bet most of the people who
watch that show have never done any home projects—but it’s a start
and you have to start somewhere. You won’t look stupid,” Molly
nudged his thigh with her foot, grinning. “Just think if I had to
write a thesis for a class or an article for the paper.”

“God help us.”

“I’m sure He is helping,” she said, flapping her hand
dismissively. “Now, what segments are you thinking of submitting to
House Today.”

“I’m not,” he said in a flat voice. “I’m thinking of
running for the border—of course, I could write a really great
piece on it before I lit out.”

“Silly.” Molly resisted the urge to run her foot
against his thigh again. “What about taking some ideas from the
blogs we’ve done before?”

“You might not realize this,” he told her, “but I
haven’t really absorbed much knowledge from smoothing your
text.”

She looked at him consideringly, “I bet you’ve
learned more than you realize.”

“You’d be wrong.”

“Well, let’s brain storm.”

He leaned forward, grabbing her hand, his dark blue
gaze on her face. “You’re going to help me with this?”

Ignoring the sudden racing of her heart and the heat
from his touch, she shot him another grin. “Just think of this as
giving you the right incentive to learn.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m not going to give you this. You’re going to have
to do it yourself, but with my help—at least for this.”

He dropped her hand. “Why do I feel scared?”

Molly vaulted off the couch. “Don’t be silly. This is
going to be great. We just need to practice some ideas for you to
write up. You know, do a few things to help you feel more
confident.”

Tapping her chin, she stared into space. “I’m seeing
some more costume character guys in the morning, but we could do
something tomorrow afternoon.”

“Haven’t you found someone to play Tweety Bird or
Superman or whatever? Couldn’t he be the Easter Bunny, too?”

“Maybe.” She walked back and forth behind the couch,
working off the nervousness that always attacked her when she
remembered the Easter picnic. “I just need to make sure I look at
all my choices and get the right guy. You’d be surprised how lame
most of these character people are and lots of them have other
jobs, too, so they can’t be available for the picnic, even if I did
want them. Crazy.”

“Actually, I’m not surprised that some of them are
lame. But do they audition for a job they can’t do?”

“Some of them. I’ve already seen one guy who’s a cop,
another who does some sort of call center work and a stay-at-home
mother who wants to make sure any jobs won’t conflict with her
coaching her kids’ soccer team. Most have regular nine-to-five jobs
and try to get ‘acting’ jobs, on the side.”

“Okay, so what do we do tomorrow afternoon?”

“I think we should do some jobs that are pretty
simple. After all, they can’t expect you to build a house in a
five-minute segment.”

“One would hope not.” He sounded gloomy.

A sudden idea hit. “I know, let’s refinish the floor
in my bedroom! That’s a longer job, but you could put the steps in
fairly quickly.”

“That doesn’t sound simple,” Drake protested.

“Yes, it is. We can do it in an afternoon. Make sure
and bring a notepad to write the steps down.”

“Yeah, then I can high-tail it to the border,” he
said fatalistically. “Thankfully it’s not too far from here.”

* * * * * * * * *

“Maybe I should suggest House Today let me do a
segment on moving furniture.” Drake flexed one arm while using the
other to carry his end of the dresser.

“Stop being a show off.” From the other end of the
dresser, Molly made a face. “Here. Just set it down and we’ll leave
everything in the living room while we do the bedroom floors.”

“The floor looked okay to me,” he commented as he
followed her back in her room.

Today, she’d abandoned the shorts for a pair of jeans
that had been washed almost white and fit her in loving detail.
Drake trailed behind her, noticing again what a cute butt she
had.

“It is okay. I just want to darken up the
finish.”

She looked at the bare room, a considering expression
on her face.

“This floor is fine. The bleached wood still looks
great. You do know that you suffer from a designer’s disease of
changing the inside of your house just to change it.”

“You should be glad there are people like me.” She
told him. “It keeps the blog in business to have lots of home
projects. Besides, keeping everything the same for years bores the
heck out of me.”

“You need a boyfriend.”

Molly’s head snapped around and she glared at him.
“What do you mean?”

“That way,” he explained, “you’d have labor on hand
to do this kind of work. Convenient.”

“There’s more to that than being a boyfriend.”

“Don’t I know it.” He dropped to the floor, preparing
to await her next direction. “My last two girlfriends wanted me to
do all sorts of things. And I’m not talking
fun
things, if
you know what I mean.”

Drake waggled his eyebrows at her, earning a deep
chuckle in response. He smiled. He liked making Molly laugh and he
especially liked the throaty sound of her amusement.