22. Daisy
CHAPTER 22
daisy
“Straight there, no detours. Drive under the speed limit and stop for ten seconds at every intersection. I’ll get Therese to meet you there,” JD instructs Ethan.
Ethan nods from his place in the driver’s seat and snatches the keys from the cupholder, grinning a little too eagerly for my liking. Then he pulls out his phone and poses for a selfie. “Aye-aye, sir. Sure you don’t want me to pass by the drive-thru liquor store, first?”
“Are you done being a smartass yet?” JD growls.
“Eh … mostly.”
“Good. Now hand your phone over to Miss Daisy and don’t touch it again until you text to let me know you’re all home safely.”
“Fine,” Ethan concedes and passes his phone back to me.
JD walks back inside, and Ethan continues adjusting the seat and fiddling with the mirrors. Landry laughs to himself, his head lolling back as we pull out of the parking lot of the reception hall.
“What’s so funny?” I ask, still annoyed with him.
“How much would it take for that dude to act like half the douchebag I am on a good day?”
“You could have threatened me,” Ethan pipes up. “That’ll do it.”
“Don’t give him any ideas,” I tell Ethan, and he chuckles.
“I just wanted a good reason to hate one of them, for once,” Landry goes on. “They’ve been taking everything important from me for as long as I can remember. My QB1 spot, the college scouts … Tenley, Loren, my dad, the twins … even Lilley and Emmett like him better than me. Next thing you know, Blake’ll be my mom’s new favorite, too.”
I frown as he heaves out a sigh. His eyes are closed, and he runs a hand through his hair before it drops between us. Then he lets out a sardonic laugh. “I take that back. I’ll be stuck looking after my mom forever while my sisters get to live their own lives with their husbands and their kids and never have to worry about our mother relapsing.”
I glance up, and Ethan’s eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror. He reaches out to turn the radio louder when we stop at the town’s only traffic light.
“You’re only thirty-three, Landry. It’s not too late for you to start a family of your own,” I offer reassuringly.
“Pfft,” he blows a loud raspberry with his lips. “I’ll never have a real wife …” My heart speeds up as I wait for him to say more and expose our fake marriage. “Or kids. No one can stand me. And all that soulmate shit is a load of crap, anyway.”
I cover his hand with mine, and he turns his wrist to intertwine our fingers. “You don’t mean that,” I whisper.
“I do,” he replies, his voice thick. “Why do you think I’ve been so hard on Blake? I know he thinks he’s doing the right thing, but marriages never last. And if they do, it’s only because they’re both too stubborn to admit they’re miserable later.”
“That’s not true.” I squeeze his hand, scolding him. He squeezes mine back weakly, and it almost breaks my heart. “My parents have been happily married for nearly forty years, and you know half of my siblings are just as content. Lilley and Emmett are happy, too, aren’t they?”
“Stubborn, not happy. And your parents may be the only exception. Must be all the weird, hippie sex.”
Ethan covers up his laugh with a cough.
“They did make a lot of babies, but I think you’ve got it backwards,” I say, stifling my own amusement. “They kept having kids because they were in love. Oh, take a right up ahead, please,” I direct Ethan.
“Oh, sorry. I thought …”
“Landry and I are both staying at his sister’s old house. We’re, um, roommates.”
Ethan’s brow rises, but he keeps his thoughts to himself. And Landry stays quiet so long that I would have assumed he’d passed out if he weren’t slowly stroking my thumb. I bite my lip and attempt to hide the way it makes me shiver.
“Thanks again for doing this, Ethan,” I begin, because I can’t stand the awkward silence. “If I’d have known my designated driver would get this sauced, I wouldn’t have …” I leave things ambiguous again, hoping he draws his own conclusions.
“No worries, Miss Daisy. Just don’t tell Dr. Reed I’m the one who drove his Jeep if he finds anything wrong with it later.”
I laugh softly. “Where’s Caidence? I didn’t see her tonight,” I remark as he pulls into the driveway and puts the car in park.
He reaches back to exchange the keys for his phone again, and I notice he looks sad. “She couldn’t make it. Well, not as a guest, anyway. She had to help her parents with their catering business.”
I nod and offer him a small smile before turning back to my charge. “Landry, hey, we’re home now. It’s time to go inside,” I croon near his ear.
He stirs and groans as Ethan comes around and opens the door. “We’re home?” Landry asks, seemingly lost.
“Yeah. Let’s get you to bed.”
“Okay.” He pulls himself up and out of the backseat with Ethan’s help, then he stops abruptly and squints at him. “You know, I wasn’t always this pathetic.”
“Really?” Ethan asks, obviously humoring him.
“Yeah. Your Aunt Ten had a huge crush on me when we were growing up.”
“No cap?” Ethan continues.
“What?”
“He means ‘no kidding,’ ” I translate for Landry, and he nods and starts walking again.
“Oh yeah, no cap. I’m pretty sure I was her first?—”
“Landry!” I turn to interrupt him in my rush to unlock the front door.
“Kiss. I was gonna say kiss .” Landry glares at me as he defends himself.
Ethan laughs. “So what happened?
“With Tenley? Oh, I tried to feel her up in front of everyone at a party, and she barely even acknowledged me again after that.”
The confession surprises me since Landry seems so anti-PDA.
“I was actually referring to the low point you seem to have hit in your life in general, but yeah, that tracks,” Ethan clarifies as we move Landry into the house.
“As for the rest, I guess it’s just finally getting too hard to keep up,” Landry mutters. “I’ve never been able to make my dad proud or keep my mom and my sister safe. And the only time I can hold a conversation without offending someone is when I’m talking to one of my patients.”
There’s a tiny ache in my chest after he says it. Because I know Landry’s infamous negativity isn’t just a character quirk; it’s a symptom of something bigger.
“Kids tell the truth, you know. They don’t have a filter, and it’s so much easier to read them than to guess what adults are really thinking,” Landry continues as I lead us to his bedroom. “Except for you, Daisy. You’re honest. Well, you try anyway.” I don’t respond as we steer him into the tiny bedroom, and he plops down onto his bed.
“You, uh, might want to help him with his tux,” Ethan volunteers, his eyes darting around the room and landing on the dresser. “JD mentioned having to return the rentals tomorrow.”
“Oh right, good idea,” I say, following Ethan’s gaze. My lips part in a slight gasp when I see Landry’s wedding band sitting there, but I move to block the ring from Ethan’s line of sight. “Come on, let’s get you changed.”
“Trying to get into my pants again, Blondie?” Landry’s mood takes a sudden upturn, and he bounces his eyebrows suggestively at me.
Ethan snorts loudly, and I bite my lip and will my cheeks not to redden any more than they already have. “You can undress yourself, and I’ll come back to collect the pieces once you’ve changed into your pajamas.”
“Aw, we both know I never wear pajamas.”
“Landry …” I struggle to camouflage my humiliation with a menacing glare.
“Sorry, I probably shouldn’t be saying that in front of Tenley’s kid,” he says, looking remorseful. “He might find out about our arrangement.”
Ethan covers up another laugh, and I clear my throat.
“The kid has a name. And he already knows that we’re roommates,” I tell Landry, making eye contact again and hoping he gets the message. “But you shouldn’t be saying things like that at all.”
“You’re right. I’m not even supposed to be thinking it, am I?” He sticks his lip out in a childish pout, and my insides start to feel all warm and tingly. “For the record, though, you’re the only one I want putting her hands down my pants. You’re my Blondie.”
I roll my lips in and nod while I help him out of his jacket and begin loosening his tie. But I can’t allow myself to stop and think about what he’s implying. All I can do now is move things along and pray I’m minimizing the damage.
“You know why I call you that? It’s because I like your hair,” Landry says, gazing up at me. “It’s so long … and it always looks so soft and shiny. And when you braid it, you remind me of Rapunzel.”
“That’s nice.” I hand the tie over to Ethan, who smirks and adds it to the pile accumulating on the dresser. “Come on, let’s get your shirt.”
He brings his hands up to the buttons but stops and blinks at me a few times. “You’re so pretty.”
I swallow hard and begin unfastening his shirt. “Mm-hmm.”
“I’m not supposed to be saying or thinking that either, but it’s true. And you know what else? I like your freckles.” He reaches up and brushes a knuckle over my cheek, and I feel my face flush with heat at the contact. “Especially the ones that go all the way down your back.”
I let out an audible gasp, and Ethan chokes on his spit and tries to cover it up with a cough. “Okay, Landry, that’s enough,” I tell him, my eyes nearly bugging out of my head.
“What? I mean it. They’re sexy,” he adds, shrugging. My stomach swoops much, much lower than I’m used to, and I swallow hard.
“ Aaand I think that’s my cue to hang out in the other room,” Ethan announces, his voice jarring me from my daze. “I’ll be waiting on the couch and pretending not to listen if you need me.”
“Thanks, Ethan.” I shoot him an apologetic smile. “Just so you know, he didn’t mean?—”
“Not my business,” Ethan replies, turning his lips to the side before he walks out of Landry’s bedroom.
“I’m sorry, I’m doing it again, saying too much,” Landry whines as I push his shirt back over his shoulders. I’m quickly reminded that he has very nice collarbones, located just above his very solid chest and …
Oh hello, objectively attractive ab muscles. Haven’t seen you guys in a while!
“At least I didn’t tell him that we’re married, right?” he whispers.
“Shh, he’s still here,” I scold him, my eyes darting around nervously, even though I doubt Ethan hears him from the other room.
“Oh, sorry,” he mouths, and I shake my head and force myself to turn away. Sometimes I wish my husband weren’t so gosh darn hot.
“It’s okay. But you can take off your own pants. Just leave them with the rest of your clothes for now. I’ll help you get everything together in the morning.”
“Sure you don’t need to check my pockets again?” I hear him drawl from behind me. The bed squeaks, and I hear the rustling of his clothing.
“It can wait until you’re not wearing them anymore,” I say as I move to leave him in the room.
He chuckles softly, tossing his slacks onto the dresser before he brushes my arm and stumbles past me in nothing but his underwear. “Where’s the fun in that, wifey?”
I bite my lip as I take in his form. Might as well get a good look in while I can, right? It’s not like he’ll remember me checking him out this time. “Wait, Landry, where are you going?”
“Gotta take a leak,” he mumbles. Then he stops and turns to shoot me a cocky smirk. “Wanna help? I’m not sure I can trust my aim right now.”
Ethan guffaws loudly from the living room, and I roll my eyes. “You’re on your own this time, buddy,” I barely manage to spit out.
“It was worth a shot,” he says before he sticks an arm out to brace himself against the wall, and I shove him and urge him on before he ducks clumsily into the bathroom. But I instantly regret the contact with his warm skin when my stomach dips again.
“I hate to interrupt, but I think my ride’s here,” Ethan calls out.
I shuffle back into the living room to bid him good night and thank him again. “And tell Mrs. T thanks for me.”
“No worries. She won’t mind once she hears about all this,” he says with a cheeky smile before he closes the front door behind him.
I don’t even get the chance to stress about what he means to tell his grandmother because there’s a loud thump in the bathroom.
“Landry? You okay in there?” I yell. I round the corner just in time to watch him staggering into my room and falling face-down onto my bed. “Landry?” I poke his shoulder. “This isn’t your bed.”
“But mine’s too far. Can’t we just share this one?” His voice is muffled by the blankets. “Married people sleep together.”
“Not in our case,” I remind him.
He lifts his head and smiles, patting the empty space beside him. “Hmm. Just think of it as a payment toward that marital debt. Night-night, ‘Punzel,” he murmurs before his cheek hits the pillow. Then the only sounds he makes are obnoxiously loud snores.
I groan in frustration. I’m tired. It’s past time for me to take my epilepsy medicine, and I know I’m more likely to have a seizure tomorrow if I don’t get a decent amount of sleep tonight. I change into my pajamas and return from the bathroom to find Landry hasn’t budged, but I don’t have the energy to do anything about it. I slip beneath the covers and drift off to sleep beside him in no time at all.