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A laugh burst out of her, taking me off guard. I hadn’t known Daisy Dunham capable of such effusive laughter. All the weight she carried rolled off her shoulders as they shook with her giggles.
I mentally added a new goal to my objective with Daisy: make her laugh like that as many times as I could before the end of our agreement.
Chapter Thirteen
Daisy
I shoved a cup of coffee at Miles when he opened his front door. He took it without a word and let me into his house. I plodded into the living room, my sunglasses firmly in place. He closed the door and strolled after me, casually sipping his coffee.
It was eight in the morning. Saturday morning. Being awake and functional on this day, at this time, didn’t make sense.
“You should know, I’m not a morning person,” I intoned.
He grinned—big surprise. And he was bouncing on his toes, all vim and vigor. “You could have come over later but…”
“I know. I’m helping at the funeral home.” I puffed out a breath. “We could have done this through email.”
“But then how would you have helped me remove the backsplash in my kitchen?”
I shoved my free hand in the pocket of my hoodie. “I’m surprised you haven’t done that yet. Smashing tile seems like something you would have done right away.”
“Oh yeah, I did. And I hung some marble and glass subway tile a couple weeks ago. Thing is, I hate it, so I’m going to rip it out.”
“You hate it?”
“Yeah. It’s dated. I should have gone more simple.”
“Shouldn’t you have thought that through before going through the trouble of hanging the tile the first time?”
He sipped his coffee and rocked back on his heels. “This house is my hobby. One day, I’ll get it right and sell it. I’m in no rush.”
I squeezed my eyes shut behind my sunglasses. “But the waste…”
“I’m thinking we can remove the backsplash without destroying it. The thing about me is I do shoddy work. Chances are, it’ll come off easily.”
I couldn’t stop the giggle that bubbled out of me. God, Miles just said anything on his mind. To be honest, it was an ability I was jealous of.
He circled his arm around my shoulders and spun us toward the kitchen. “Like that, Daisy-daze.”
“What?”
He squeezed my shoulder. “When I can make you laugh and all your troubles fall away. It’s nice.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, but he didn’t wait for me to come up with a response. We entered the kitchen, and he showed me the backsplash, then went on to point out all he wanted to do. To be fair, the kitchen looked like it hadn’t been touched in at least thirty years. It needed a lot of work I wasn’t sure Miles could provide, but I would reserve judgment. Plus, he had enough money to hire someone to come in and redo everything he messed up, so the stakes were low.
Over the next hour, we carefully pried the backsplash off the wall, only breaking a few pieces. Miles was going to donate them to a friend’s charity that built houses for the unhoused. That certainly softened my feelings about his casual, easy-come-easy-go attitude.
Once that was done, we ended up back on the deck. Miles ran inside to get drinks, returning with a big jug of pink lemonade and two glasses.
He poured it without a hint of smugness and handed me a glass before pouring one for himself and sitting beside me.
“You remembered.”
He kicked his feet up on the deck rail and took a long pull of his lemonade. “Of course. I just saw you a couple days ago. Unlike Edie, I don’t have issues with my memory.”
I groaned. “Landry said Edie’s been nonstop patting her head and rubbing her tummy.”
His mouth hitched. “Smart kid. As long as she keeps up the exercises, she’ll be good to go. Now,” he set his glass down on the table between us, “we have our first event the weekend after next, and at this point, I’m not sure we’re going to be able to sell this relationship.”
