Story of My Life (Story Lake #1)

19. Prepare to be dated

19

PREPARE TO BE DATED

CAMPBELL

Levi offered the towel-clad Hazel his hand, leaving me to deal with the bedraggled, barking mutt.

“I changed my mind. I want a separate shower and tub. One that doesn’t require a stepladder,” Hazel said, as she did her best to keep the towel securely in place while straddling the lip of the claw-foot monstrosity. I got an eyeful of long, lotioned leg and realized Levi was probably enjoying the same view.

With one swift yank, I brought down the rest of the shower curtain and its hooks. “Here,” I said, shoving it at her.

“Hey!” Hazel complained.

“I’ll buy you a new one,” I said, climbing into the tub as she climbed out.

Levi’s grin was sharp and mercenary before it disappeared.

Melvin looked up at me mournfully. “What did I tell you about taking naps in other people’s tubs?”

He sat and held up one gigantic paw.

“You’re an idiot,” I complained as I picked up one hundred-ish pounds of wet dog.

This job was already a bigger pain in my ass than I’d anticipated, and I’d expected a lot of pain-in-the-assery.

Thudding came from downstairs, and Melvin exploded into a barking fit.

“I thought Gage had a meeting,” Hazel said, wrapping herself like a mummy in vinyl rubber duckies.

“He does. That’s your front door,” Levi explained.

I glared at him over the wet, writhing dog. My brother never used two words when one would do, yet here he was helping Hazel out of tubs and speaking in complete sentences.

Hazel looked down at her attire, a panicked expression on her face.

I started to volunteer, but Levi beat me to it.

“I’ll go see who it is,” he said and closed the bathroom door on his way out.

“Oh, uh, I need to get dressed,” Hazel said, beckoning toward the door.

“Not until you help me dry off this idiot,” I said. “If you open that door, he’ll tear through it and roll on every piece of furniture you have. The whole place will smell like wet dog.”

“You sound like you’re speaking from experience.”

“Just get a towel.”

“If he’s such a pain, why bring him to work with you?” she asked.

“Because he was used to going to work with my sister before the accident and now he drives her nuts if he’s home with her all day.”

“Oh,” she said quietly. “I’m sorry?—”

“You gettin’ that towel or do we need to use yours?” I said curtly.

Hazel shrugged the tail of the shower curtain over her shoulder and produced a fresh towel from the linen closet.

“I’ll hold him. You dry,” I instructed in a slightly less antagonistic tone.

No sooner did Melvin’s paws touch the ground than he tried to bolt. It took the two of us, all four hands, and a sacrificed shower curtain, but we managed to get the dog reasonably dry.

I opened the door. The damn dog sprinted for freedom, barking the whole way down the stairs. I slid down against the side of the tub, joining Hazel on the floor.

We both sat there in silence, catching our breath, shoulders brushing.

“What time is it?” she asked.

I glanced down at my watch. “Eleven thirty.”

She sighed. “Eleven thirty in the morning and I’m already exhausted and I need another shower…and a shower curtain.”

“And a shovel for the wet dog hair,” I said, gesturing toward the drain.

Her face scrunched. “Gross. Maybe I’ll just hose off in the backyard.”

I heard Levi’s boots on the stairs and got to my feet. I offered Hazel my hand and hauled her up.

“Towel,” I said, as the knot between her breasts began to unravel.

She yelped and turned around. I positioned myself between her and Levi when he poked his head in the room. “Your stuff’s here,” he said, jerking a thumb toward the front of the house.

Hazel popped out around my arm. “Really?” she squeaked.

She made a move for the door, but I stopped her. “Maybe put some clothes on first?” I suggested.

I intended to get back to work on the kitchen demo, but when it became clear the now-dressed Hazel thought she was going to unload the box truck herself, Levi and I did it for her. In ten minutes, we had all the boxes in her foyer and Hazel was ripping open each carton with enthusiasm.

“My books,” she squealed, holding up a paperback with a yellow cover like she was Mufasa with a baby Simba.

“Almost forgot this,” the driver said, wheeling a bike in through the open front door. “Didn’t want it getting smashed up in the back.”

Hazel’s face lit up like a kid at the start of a Halloween parade. “My bike!”

“I hope you ride better than you drive,” I said.

“Oh, I do,” she assured me very seriously.

Levi smirked.

I shoved the pry bar under the warped Formica counter on the short wall in the kitchen. It popped free with a reluctant groan that drowned out The Ramones playing on the wireless speaker. Once we cleared out the 1970s builder-grade cabinetry and mismatched countertops, we’d be able to start framing in the current breakfast nook as a new pantry and open up the access to the enclosed porch off the side, creating a new informal dining space.

Levi was working at the opposite end of the room, but he’d made frequent trips past the library’s glass doors where Hazel was working…or writing…or buying more houses in online auctions.

I didn’t like it. Not the buying houses at auctions. I didn’t like the part about my brother showing interest in the woman who had just last night propositioned me. And that confused me.

“Going somewhere, dickburger?” I called to Levi when I heard the telltale thunk of his pry bar hitting the plastic tool tote.

His face was as impassive as Mount Rushmore. “Gettin’ a drink.”

I turned down the volume on the speaker. An earthy snore sounded from the side porch, where Melvin was taking his second afternoon nap.

“What about the one you’ve got on the floor and the one you put on the bucket?” I asked, gesturing to an upside-down Bishop General Store bucket.

Levi stared at me, and I swore I could hear the cogs of his brain whirring into high speed. He was up to something, and whatever it was, he sure as hell wasn’t good at it.

“Thought I heard Gage come back a while ago,” he said finally.

I was just winding up to call him out on his bullshit when the muffled murmur of voices reached our ears. It was followed by a very feminine laugh. Levi and I frowned.

Someone—presumably our idiot brother—was entertaining Hazel in her office. And neither one of us liked it. Levi looked down at both sports drinks in his hand, as if wondering whether he could possibly need a third. I glanced around me, looking for an excuse.

The backsplash tile on the short cabinet wall against the porch was all intact and possibly not terrible. It looked like the kind of vintage pattern someone like Hazel would call “cute.”

“Liv?”

My brother looked up from his beverage collection. “Yeah?”

“Is this tile…cute?”

To Levi’s credit, he didn’t bat an eye at my newfound weird-ass vocabulary. “I guess.”

“Gonna ask Hazel if she wants to keep it,” I said as I speed-walked for the hall.

“I’ll come with you,” he volunteered.

We were both practically jogging by the time we hit the French doors. Neither of us bothered knocking, we just burst right in to find Gage with a hip cocked on the corner of the table Hazel was using as a desk, a stupid grin on his face. Hazel was leaning against the window, looking relaxed and amused.

“You guys need something?” Gage asked.

Levi and I took too long coming up with just the right insult, and Hazel took that as a cue to return to their conversation.

“Anyway, as I was saying. I’m just looking for some real-life inspiration,” she said to my brother, as she leaned down to pick up a moving box. Those leggings were doing a lot of complimentary things to every inch that they covered. And Gage appeared to be noticing.

“A method writer. I get it,” he said with a grin as she straightened. “Here. Let me take that.”

He was dumping charm like a toddler trying to pour a gallon jug of milk into a sippy cup.

“Now that you’ve met my brothers, I’m sure it doesn’t come as any surprise that I’m the charming one.”

“Get out,” I ordered.

“Which one of us?” Hazel asked. “Because I kind of live here.”

“Not you. Him,” I said, pointing at Gage with the business end of the pry bar I was still holding.

“We’ll continue this conversation later,” Gage offered.

“No. You won’t,” I insisted.

Gage raised an amused eyebrow in my direction. “There a problem?”

“Not if you leave in the next ten seconds.”

He glanced back at Hazel. “If he goes Gremlin-after-midnight on you, I’ll be within yelling distance.”

Gage rammed his shoulder into mine on his way past. But I let it slide.

Levi was still hovering by the door.

“Hey, man, help me unload the lumber and I’ll give you a hand getting that two-ton sink out of the kitchen,” Gage said, clapping Levi on the shoulder.

Levi looked at Hazel. Then at me. Then at the ceiling. He left without a word.

I closed the doors behind them and then turned to face her. “I don’t like being rushed,” I said.

“And I don’t like waiting in long lines,” she said conversationally as she bent over to take a pair of scissors to the packing tape on the box.

I stepped closer. “You asked me a question last night, and you expected an immediate answer. But I don’t like to be rushed.”

“Okay. Well, I don’t like waiting centuries for a simple yes or no.”

She wasn’t even looking at me, and that annoyed me.

“You sprung this on me last night,” I complained.

“And I waited all day . I’m on a deadline. I don’t have time to waste. If it’s too inconvenient or you think I’m too hideous for you to agree to take on one fake date, then I need to move on.”

“You’re not moving on to my brother.”

She pinned me with a glare. “And you’re not saying, ‘Gee, Hazel, I don’t find you too hideous to take on a fake date.’”

At least she was finally looking at me. But the grip she had on the scissors was concerning.

“Saturday. Seven o’clock.”

“In the morning? Can’t you guys at least give me until eight, preferably nine thirty?”

I crossed my arms. “Seven p.m. Prepare to be dated.”

It was the stupidest threat I’d ever made, and the twinkle in her brown eyes told me it was probably going to end up in the pages of a book.

“Fine. I will,” she said saucily. “But just so you know, I’m expecting your A game. Not some half-assed attempt.”

“What makes you think I have an A game?”

She looked me up and down. “If you don’t, it’ll be one of life’s great disappointments.”

“Fine,” I said, returning her once-over. “As long as you don’t act like it’s some kind of science experiment and weird me out.”

“Deal. But I’m bringing my notebook.”

“Whatever. One more thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Let’s keep this between the two of us,” I said. “If anyone catches us on anything that looks like a date, it’ll make the bird murder rumors look like nothing.”

“Fair enough. I wouldn’t want to damage your reputation,” she said sweetly. “But I’m totally telling Zoey.”

I was already regretting this. But at least I wouldn’t be sitting at home while one of my idiot brothers pretended to be the hero.