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“What about it, honey?”
“It’s a mess,” I pointed out. “I can’t live there.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. It’ll be fixed in no time. In the meantime, just stay with that nice young man who pulled you out of the basement.”
Her solution to everything was to rely on a man. In fact, if I had to guess, she purposely chose the house that needed the most work so I would be out of options.
“I know what you’re doing!” I called after her as she headed to her car.
“Good, then you won’t waste time arguing with yourself about it.”
And then she was in her car and pulling out of the driveway. I looked back at the house and cringed. Yeah, there was no way I was staying in Andrew’s house.
“Areyou sure you don’t mind?” I asked for the tenth time since I arrived at Dash’s house.
“If it was a problem, I would tell you.” He leaned his elbows on the counter, watching me chop veggies. “So, what are you making?”
“Soup. I know it’s kind of hot for soup, but you didn’t have a lot to make.”
“I had steak in the freezer,” he frowned.
“Yeah, but I’m not great at making steak, and I didn’t want to ruin meat that cost twenty dollars a piece.”
“I appreciate that. It’s just wrong to butcher a fine piece of meat.”
I grinned at him as I turned and dumped the veggies in the pot, listening to them as they hissed as they hit the oil. I was so grateful that he was allowing me to stay. I would cook dinner every night for him if it meant I didn’t have to stay in Andrew’s house while I was waiting for my house to be finished. Edith said it would be at least two months. That seemed like an intrusion on Dash’s space, but when I told him, he just smiled at me and welcomed me in.
“You know, I was thinking that I should go shopping this weekend for a bed for the guest room,” I said as I turned back to him.
“Why would you do that?”
“Well, so you can have your bed back. I mean, eventually you’ll want privacy for…things.”
He shrugged slightly. “It’s fine. I don’t mind. Besides, you don’t need to spend your money on a bed.”
“I’ll need to anyway. This way, I can just move it into the house when it’s finished.”
“Then why don’t you wait until then? It doesn’t make sense to move it all around.”
I flushed bright red, trying not to let this conversation get too awkward. “Um…because you’ll want to…bring a woman home at some point. And I don’t think she’d appreciate me being in your bed.”
He was silent for a minute, his brows furrowed in thought. “Oh. Right. Yeah, I didn’t think about that.”
For just a moment, I hoped that he would say he didn’t want anyone but me in his bed, but I knew that was a long shot. And when he acknowledged my very fear, something inside me sank in disappointment.
“I was surprised Brock let Lee stay here. She’s not really his type.”
“And what is his type?” I asked curiously.
“Probably someone as vain as him,” he answered, his lips tilting up in a grin.
“How does that even work? He works construction with you. Isn’t that sort of a dirty job?”
“Well, the key is to always carry a comb in your back pocket.”
“Doesn’t it get all smashed when he’s wearing his hard hat?”
“Yeah, but the gel pretty much ensures it’ll always stay perfectly styled,” Dash teased.