Bad Girlfriend (First & Last #4) (14 page)

I pulled into my spot behind the salon just a
s my first client parked on the street out front.  Perfect timing.  My morning was packed with back to back clients, and I was grateful to have an open slot in the early afternoon so I could sit down for half an hour.

I peeled the banana I had grabbed on my way out the door and sat at the small table in the cramped backroom of the salon. 
No sooner had I taken my first bite than Loraine popped her head in.

“Brooke?  Julie Marshall is here as a walk in.  Can you take her?”

I rolled my eyes.  Julie knew full well we did not take walk-ins.  But Loraine wouldn’t appreciate me turning away business.  So I tossed my banana in the trash and followed Loraine out to the front.  What the hell was she doing here anyway?  It had only been two weeks since her last visit.

Oh, shit.

As soon as I walked out from the back I saw exactly why Julie was here off schedule.  The hair on the left side of her head was a tangled mess.  Not she-slept-on-it-wrong tangled, but a-giant-bird-made-a-nest-in-it tangled.

“Julie!  What happened?”
I asked.  As I walked closer I could see that not only was her hair tangled, but there was some kind of gooey blue substance in there too.

“My sister’s asshole kid shot chewed gumballs at my head with a slingshot.  I tried to get it out, but…
.”  She picked helplessly at the mess on the side of her head.

I had to bite the inside of my cheek, hard, to keep from laughing.  Julie
only had one daughter, and she wasn’t exactly the nurturing type.

“Okay, let’s see what we can do,” I said, gently steering her toward my chair.

I picked up a comb and began to divide her hair into small sections.  So much for a break before my afternoon clients.

Chapter Fourteen

Adam

It was really hard living fifty feet away from the girl I was dating.  If she lived across town, it would be so much easier to separate her from the rest of my life.  Instead
, I found myself thinking of a hundred different reasons to knock on her door.  Or just go outside in hopes I would run into her in the driveway.

Fortunately for me the wait for date number three was over, and I locked my apartment door behind me and went to get Brooke. 
I had spent an evening with Brooke’s friends last weekend, so I had an idea of what to expect today.  What I didn’t expect was to be completely floored by Brooke.  It happened every time I saw her, but today…

Good God.

The date hadn’t even begun and I already needed to go back inside for a cold shower.  Brooke met me in the driveway with a big smile on her face and not much on her body.  Her low cut white sundress didn’t leave much to the imagination, and I could see she wore a bright turquoise bikini underneath.  From the strings that tied behind her neck, it appeared to be a very small bikini.

Her hair was loose and wavy, and she wore a big floppy white hat and sunglasses.  When she removed her hat and sunglasses to give me a greeting kiss, her eyes
glowed the most amazing color of green in the sunlight.  Oh, yeah.  This was going to be the best Labor Day in the history of all Labor Days.

As Brooke walked ahead of me to my car, I said a silent prayer that she never realized she was way out of my league.

“Do we need to bring anything?  We can swing by the store on our way,” I offered as I pulled the car out of the driveway.

Brooke had replaced her sunglasses, but the hat lay across her lap.  “No.  Lindsay insisted the only things we bring are ourselves.”

“You’ll have to let me know when we’re close to their house.  I remember you pointing it out on our way to dinner, but it looked like their driveway was hidden.”

When we were out of town and driving down the road that lined the east side of the lake, I reached over and took Brooke’s hand.  The quick kiss in the driveway had left me wanting more.  It seemed
like the time I spent with Brooke only made me crave more time with her.

I lifted her hand to my mouth and kissed the back of her hand.  She smiled, showing the dimples on both of her cheeks. 
Never before had I been so grateful my car was an automatic.  That left my right hand free to hold Brooke’s, and I rested our joined hands on her leg.

Brooke gave me a quick rundown
of who would be at the party, and it wasn’t long before she directed me to turn at the next driveway.  The house wasn’t visible from the road, so I turned onto the long driveway that led to a large stone house.  The area between the house and the lake had been cleared of trees, most likely to provide an awesome view of the water.  The lawn was already filled with people and tables of food and drinks.  It looked like there was even a band set up to play on the far side of the yard.

I walked around the front of the car to meet Brooke.  She sw
ung a large pink bag over her shoulder and reached for my hand.  On the way toward the house, we stopped so she could introduce me to a couple of people.

We had just reached the stairs to the deck that spanned the entire front of the house when Lindsay rushed over to greet us.

“Hi, guys!” Lindsay said with wide eyes, stepping directly in front of us.

“Hi, Lindsay,” I replied.

Brooke didn’t return her greeting.  Instead she removed her sunglasses and eyed Lindsay suspiciously.  “Why are you acting weird?”

Lindsay glanced over her shoulder in the direction of the house.  When she looked back to us, her expression was worried.  “Okay, don’t freak out.  But Chet’s here.”

Not sure who Chet was and why his presence was concerning, I looked between Brooke and Lindsay.

“I’m sorry, Brooke.  Grady was in charge of booking the band, and he’s a guy.  He doesn’t think about these things, you know.”

Brooke tilted her chin up and shrugged her shoulders.  “It’s okay, Lindsay.  Don’t worry about it.”  She looked over at me.  “Unless it’s a problem for you?”

“I’m not sure
why a guy I don’t even know would be a problem for me,” I said.

“Chet is my last boyfriend
or whatever.  You did meet him…when I was screaming at him in the driveway.”

Ah. 
Chet.

Logically I should be intimidated by the guy.
  But I wasn’t.  I was taller than him, but he had a good fifty pounds of muscle on me.  Not to mention he could put an eye out with his facial piercings alone.

There was no doubt I would get my ass kicked, but if it came down to it I would welcome punching that asshole in the face.

“It’s not a problem for me,” I said, smiling reassuringly at Brooke.

No sooner had we settled that matter than Chet
, along with who I assumed to be his band mates judging from their similar appearance, walked out of the house.  He was halfway down the stairs to the lawn where we stood when his eyes locked on Brooke.

The smirk on his face made me feel like maybe I could take him
after all.

“Hey, babe,” he drawled when he reached where we were standing with Lindsay, who was motioning wildly to Grady across the yard.

“Chet,” Brooke said in a snotty voice I was glad had never been directed at me.

Only then did Chet look down at our joined hands.  He narrowed his eyes at me.  “Who’s your friend?”

“This is Adam Branigan.  We’re here together,” Brooke said.  She tilted her head and gave Chet a look that dared him to say anything else.

Before he could, Grady walked over. 
“Hey, Brooke.  Adam.”  He stepped in between Chet and us to give Brooke a hug and shake my hand.  Over his shoulder he said to Chet, “You guys ready to start playing?”

Now I was sixty five percent sure I could handle Chet on my own, but if I was going to have someone at my back, Grady would be it.  If I thought Brooke and I were opposites, we had nothing on Lindsay and Grady.  His long blond hair was tucked behind his ears, and he was only wearing swim trunks that showed his upper body and arms covered in tattoos.  Lindsay
, on the other hand, looked very much like the Manhattan socialite I knew her to have been.

Chet
locked eyes with me and rubbed his hand over his rough jaw.  I didn’t realize I had taken a step forward until I felt Brooke’s hand on my forearm.  Grady casually slung his arm around my shoulder and gave Chet a pointed look.

“
Come on inside, Adam.  I’ll get you a beer and give you a tour of the house.”

Chet was forced to move aside - it was either that or get into it with Grady.  He wisely chose the first option. 
Brooke flipped her hair in his face as she walked by, but that didn’t stop him from checking out her ass.  Fucker.

Grady clapped my shoulder as we walked up the stairs.  “Sorry about that, man.  Apparently I hired the wrong band.  But don’t worry about him.  Chet knows better than to stir up shit here.”

I cracked my knuckles.  “I’m not worried.  I can take him.”

Grady and Lindsay both laughed.

“What?” I asked, slightly offended.

Now it was Brooke
who laughed as she pressed a kiss to my cheek.  I was definitely going to need to amp up my workout routine.

Grady gave me a beer from the refrigerator and walked me though the house.  Brooke had given me the background on Grady and Lindsay’s relationship
, so I knew what this house meant to them.  It was a beautiful home.

We had just started down the stairs from the second floor when a cry sounded from behind a closed door with the letters BRIE stenciled in pink on the white wood.  Grady turned on his heel and went toward the sound.

Over his shoulder he said to me, “Go on down and find Brooke.  If you see Lindsay, tell her I’m getting Brie up from her nap.”

“Okay.”

I jogged down the stairs and tossed my empty beer bottle in the recycle bin next to the back door.  There were several people I didn’t know milling around in the kitchen when I reached into the fridge for another beer.  My eyes scanned the room and then the lawn outside for Brooke.  I caught a flash of red hair down by the water and grabbed another beer for her.

Crossing the lawn, I watched Chet playing with his band.  I begrudgingly admitted to myself that they were decent
.  But that didn’t stop me from wishing the asshole didn’t exist.  Of the guys Brooke had told me about, he was possibly the least offensive.  Although he clearly still had an interest in Brooke, and that didn’t sit well with me.  Somewhere between our first date and today, I had come to think of her as mine.

It boosted my ego to see her eyes light up when she saw me approaching.  She was lounging on a chair with her long legs stretched out in front of her.  Lindsay was applying copious amounts of sunscreen to her own pale skin.

“It’s really not fair, Brooke,” she was saying.  “You have red hair, and yet you tan like some kind of sun goddess.  And I turn as red as a lobster if I set foot outside without sunscreen for five minutes.”

I handed the extra beer to Brooke and leaned down to kiss the top of her head.  “Grady is getting Brie up from her nap,” I told Lindsay.

“Oh, good.  Mitch can watch her while Grady takes the boat out.  Leah just texted me that she and Josh are on their way with Ford and Poppy.  I know the guys want to go skiing as soon as they get here.  Do you like to water ski, Adam?”

“Yeah, I’m not too bad,” I replied.  Growing up in New Jersey, I had spent plenty
of time on the shore during the summer.

“The guys have established that Ford is the best skier with Grady a close second.  Josh does his best, but he’s just not a natural.  We’ll have to see where you fall in the pecking order,” Lindsay said.

“Sounds good,” I said, taking a swig of my beer.

Lindsay stood up and slipped her cover up back on over her bikini.  “You can have my chair, Adam.  I’m going to go make sure Brie is settled in with her grandpa and get Grady to start up the boat.”

I sat down on the lounge chair next to Brooke and stripped off my t-shirt.  Brooke followed suit and sat up straight, pulling her sundress very slowly over her head.  She tossed it at my head and leaned back in her chair.  When I could see again, I wondered again what I did to get so lucky.

“You want to go in the water?”
I asked, thinking I needed an excuse to get my hands on her in a more discreet manner than jumping onto her chair with her.

“Sure,” Brooke said.  She sat back up and swung her legs over the side of the chair.  With both hands, she smoothed her hair back and secured it on top of her head with the band she had wrapped around her wrist.  I could sit here forever watching the smooth expanse of her shoulders and back.

She reached for my hand when we stood up, and we walked to the edge of the water.  The water was cold, but it felt refreshing considering it had to be close to 90 degrees out today.  There were a few other people floating around on rafts, and Brooke led me to the left as we waded in until the water was up to our chests.

Brooke wrapped her arms around my neck and pressed her body close to mine.  I looked back to the party and was glad to see we were partially obscured by the large willow tree that sat on the property line between Grady and Lindsay’s yard and the neighbor
’s.