The Wingman (Alpha Men 1)

“Great, I’m parked just around the corner.”

He had a wholly masculine vehicle; a very rugged Jeep Wrangler, which was caked with mud and looked like it had seen a lot of serious adventuring.

“How’d you get it into such a state?” she asked, struggling to keep the awe out of her voice.

“I’ve been doing a lot of camping and off-road traveling since my return. This baby has been up north to all the major national parks and over countless mountain passes . . . she’s a good car,” he said as he patted the square bonnet of the black Jeep appreciatively.

“So you haven’t really been in town a lot since returning to the country?” That would explain why people hadn’t seen him around much.

“Nope.” He tugged open the passenger door and gave her a hand up as she awkwardly climbed into the aggravatingly high car. She had grown up around similar vehicles but had never really mastered the art of climbing into one with dignity and grace.

“Sorry it’s nothing fancier,” he muttered apologetically as she gave a quick glance around the inside of his car. He shut the door and was in the driver’s seat seconds later. His delicious, clean, and crisp masculine fragrance enveloped her as he shut himself in with her. “And I apologize for the smell.”

She flushed, grateful for the dark. How had he known she was appreciating his scent, and why would he apologize for it?

“No need to apologize,” she said quickly.

“I took my dog, Cooper, for a run on the beach this morning, and he can never resist going in for a dip, even though it’s colder than a witch’s . . . uh . . . boob. That’s why it reeks of wet dog in here.”

Wet dog? All she could smell was Mason, but now that he had mentioned it, she did detect the underlying scent of eau de soaked pooch.

“I barely smell it,” she said honestly, clicking her seat belt into place. He followed suit and started the car without saying anything more.

“You’re going to have to refresh my memory,” he said as he started up the car. “I can’t quite remember how to get there.”

A little puzzled by that statement—why would he ever have known how to get to her house in the first place?—Daisy shrugged and proceeded to give him directions to her small home on the outskirts of town. There were no other words between them for the next five minutes until he pulled to a stop outside her place.

“This isn’t the farm,” he observed lamely as he sized up the neat little house, with its perfectly cut pocket-size front lawn behind a wrought-iron fence.

“God no,” she muttered, self-consciously playing with the zipper of her jacket. “I couldn’t continue living there with my sisters and their constant well-intentioned attempts to dress me ‘properly’ or paint makeup on me while I slept.”

“Wait, they actually did that? The makeup thing?”

“Yep, I once woke up with my left eye glued shut because my sisters had botched up the fake eyelash application.”

“You must sleep like the dead,” Mason observed in a wobbly voice, clearly struggling to conceal his amusement from her.

“I’ve been known to sleep through a plane crash or two.” She nodded.

“So why don’t you just let them get it out of their systems? Let them make you over or whatever?”

“What do you see when you look at me?” she huffed impatiently.

Mason considered her question as he peered at her in the scant illumination provided by the moonlight sifting in through the car windows. How the hell was he supposed to answer that question without getting into a shitload of trouble?

“A woman?” He ventured tentatively after a long pause, and even in the dim light he could see her rolling her eyes.

“A short, dumpy, and frumpy woman. No amount of makeup or clothing will change the first two, and as for the latter . . .” She paused, and Mason thought he caught a glimmer of yearning in her moonlit eyes. “Let me put it this way: I’m a bridesmaid at Lia’s wedding.”

“Yeah?”

“So are Daff, Sharlotte Bridges, Zinzi Khulani, and Nina Clark. Basically, most of the women you saw at that table tonight. Lia has found a bridesmaid dress that manages to flatter everybody. Everybody, that is, except me. I look completely ridiculous and—yes—frumpy in the stupid thing. So you see, it doesn’t matter what they put me in, I always look the same.” She said it so matter-of-factly and with such a lack of bitterness that Mason could only stare at her for a long moment; her gray eyes looked colorless in the moonlight, her crazy brown hair managed to catch the faint light, and the bits that were sticking up looked like they had tiny shards of moonbeams trapped in them.

“I’m sure you look . . .”