A Little Like Love (Robin and Tyler 2)

He shakes his head. “I don’t understand why you can’t just go on one tiny date with me.”

“I’m sure there’s plenty of things you can’t understand.”

He shrugs off my insult and lowers his head, giving me a piercing stare with two brown puppy eyes. “

What about a practice date?”

Ugh, I want to so bad. “No.”

“A pretend date?”

“No.”

“A fake date?”

“What does that even mean?” I hold back a smile because I’m trying to act serious while he’s being so freaking ridiculous. As confident as I am in my decision to decline a date with another man who definitely likes another girl and will undoubtedly rip my heart to shreds, I have to admit that it feels awesome to be pursued so intently.

“You should have dinner with me and tell me the reasons that you feel are justified enough to banish dating from your life. It won’t be a date… it’ll be two people…talking about not dating.”

I slowly let out the breath I’d been holding. “I don’t even know what that means.”

He winks and steps out of the doorway. “I’ll pick you up at seven.”

“Why do you keep tricking me into having dinner with you?”

He shrugs. “Why do you keep falling for it?

Chapter 13

The drive home is blissful and nerve-wracking and I’d kill for something to take my mind off thinking about Tyler. I am a grown ass woman after all. I am mature and not a fourteen-year-old so it really shouldn’t be so hard. I’m still kicking myself mentally for being so attracted to someone I am not going to date, (despite having accepted a fake date with him) when I turn into my driveway and find something that makes me forget Tyler even exists.

Marcus’s truck. I cut the engine and scramble outside as quickly as possible, trying to listen for signs of them talking over the beating of my heart. She is freaking pregnant and he needs to stay away. Being knocked up by one loser does not mean she’s open for getting banged by another one.

The door swings open the moment I unlock it and I practically run inside, hoping to catch that boy before he’s got his hands all over my niece. If he so much as makes a move on her, I will treat him the way he treated my car the first night I came to Salt Gap.

Miranda’s laugh is the first thing I hear. I stop short in the living room, realizing that I don’t have to barge in her room and murder anyone. They’re both on the floor surrounded by pieces of wood and screws. A tiny mattress rests against the wall. Marcus’s clothes are all on his body and their hair isn’t disheveled. Thank God.

“What’s going on?” I ask, plastering a friendly smile on my face. If Miranda knew what I was thinking, she’d bitch me out for an hour.

Miranda stares at an instruction manual in her hand and points to two identical shaped wooden rails. Marcus takes the rails and lines them up on his half-finished crib frame. “Marcus’s sister give me her crib now that her baby is in a toddler bed. Isn’t this awesome?”

“That was really nice of her.” I kneel on the floor near her and pick up a piece of the bed. It’s a black wooden piece that looks sturdy and expensive. “Marcus please tell your sister how much we appreciate it.”

“Aw, it’s no problem,” he says while his tongue pokes out of his lips in concentration as he screws two parts together. “If I knew we’d be meeting Miranda so soon, I wouldn’t have taken this thing apart a few months ago. This would be a hell of a lot easier if it wasn’t in pieces.”

Miranda pulls herself up on the newly purchased couch with a lot more effort than usual. Her pregnant belly is finally starting to show so much that she leaves her jeans unbuttoned and unzipped, covered with an oversized T-shirt. I’m starting to feel kind of stupid for assuming Marcus would be making out with her when I got home. He seems like a decent enough kid. You know, minus the car vandalism and all.

“So how was your talk with the Sugar Plum Fairy?” Miranda asks.

I snort. “You must mean Ms. Candy.”

I make a pot of coffee, decaf for Miranda, and tell her all about my visit with Salt Gap’s resident pin up girl. Then I ignore all of her squees and giggles and jokes about Tyler as I tell her how he brought me to the library and showed me the box of photos. She’s still making fun of me and singing the k-i-s-s-i-n-g song when I slap the photos on the counter to shut her up.

By six-fifteen in the evening Marcus has finished the crib and we’ve all agreed that it’s the most beautiful piece of furniture in the house. Miranda puts it in her bedroom next to her own bed. Marcus makes himself comfortable on our couch as he tells Miranda all about his sister and the struggles she’s been through as a single mom and how the two of them totally need to hang out and share motherly advice.

My stomach twists into knots with every minute they keep chatting because every stupid joke he makes and every time she giggles is just time wasted until seven o’clock when I really don’t want either one of them to know that I have a fake date with Tyler tonight. I manage to slip into my bedroom and get dressed, making sure to look cute but not desirable or date-worthy because the last thing I want to do is lead him on.

Or do I?