Stacking the Deck (A Betting on Romance Novel Book 2)(28)
“What do I deserve, Grams? You know I don’t do well with the straight and narrow. Never have. Heck, Liz Beacon is the straight and narrow. This is a pointless conversation. ”
“Maybe you’ve misjudged her. How come you quit the fire department?” The sudden change in topic threw him off balance, which was probably intentional. Carter closed his eyes. He’d been a volunteer firefighter ever since dropping out of college.
Until last week, that is.
“It took too much time.”
“Uh-huh,” she nodded, although her expression told him she didn’t buy it. “Well, maybe it’ll fit your schedule again in the future.”
“Maybe.” He scraped the mortar in the wheelbarrow.
“Carter.”
“Grams, some things just aren’t meant to be.”
“Are we talking about Liz or the department?”
“I don’t know. Both.”
“Then why are you taking her to the reunion?”
Carter shook his head in frustration wishing he were done so he could leave. “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation again. It’s getting old. Doesn’t it feel like it’s getting old to you? I think it’s getting old…”
“Fine! Take her. But remember, she’s here to help her parents. She’s not here to have her heart broken because you can’t move beyond—”
“I’m not breaking any hearts, Grams—sheesh! —I’m putting in a patio! I promise not to do anything Liz doesn’t want me to, okay?” Carter bent down to test the sizing of the stone he’d selected and set it aside.
“Don’t lift like that! Use your knees or you’ll end up like your uncle!”
He sat back on his heels with no small amount of exasperation. “Don’t you have a game to get to?”
“In a minute,” she waved a hand dismissively. “Lydia needed a bathroom break. For never having had children, that woman is amazingly poor at holding her fluids.” She stood watch like a garden gnome in a calico apron as he laid the paving stone in its mortar bed with a few hard raps of the trowel’s handle.
“So, I followed up on the fountain project. The specs will be out this week. It’s a short timeline, though, because they want it finished by Founders’ Day, so keep an eye out for it.”
Carter slopped a trowel full of mortar down for the next stone with more force than he’d intended. My God, the woman was like a terrier with a bone. Or a calico-printed battering ram. “Follow up on the fountain project, consider Liz, stay away from Liz, don’t break anyone’s heart and bend with the knees. Did I miss anything?”
“Don’t be snarky,” Grams sniffed, sitting down on the bench beside him despite the fact that he’d heard the downstairs toilet flush like two minutes ago. “And, yes, I know what that means. I’m just trying to be helpful. We all saw your last girlfriend. She had so many tattoos I wasn’t sure if she was a person or a billboard.”
“Marlena was colorful, I’ll grant you that,” Carter murmured. “But, she was also—”
“I don’t want to know!” Grams held up a palm in alarm. “But I do want to see you happy. Oh, honey, you’re not happy dating the women you’ve been dating. A grandmother can tell.”
“Is that so? I feel happy…”
“Well, you’re not. Those women are far too superficial for you.”
“Maybe I’m attracted to superficial.”
“No, you’re not. You only choose superficial because it seems safe, but these women don’t see the real you. And they won’t make you happy.”
An image of flexible, colorful Marlena flashed in his mind’s eye. “Actually—”
“You know,” Grams cut in, clearly not in listening mode, “I can’t believe I didn’t see it before. You’re exactly like that Brian on Happily Ever After!” Carter choked on his surprise at being compared to the current bachelor on the matchmaking show. “Don’t you agree, girls?”
Unanimous sounds of agreement floated in from the next room as Carter dropped a glob of mortar on his boot. Good grief. He should have known they were all listening. “The stamp collector? Gee, thanks. The man was stupid enough to get rid of a chef and a masseuse.”
“He was a respected antiquities dealer, but that’s beside the point. Don’t you see? He was originally attracted to Amber and that Ellen girl, you know the ones with the big—? Anyway, but then that Julie Anne snuck under his radar and made him see himself differently. See?”
“Uh-huh.” He didn’t see at all.
“What you need is an under-the-radar girl!” Grams announced.
“So I can see myself differently?”
“Exactly.”
“And who, pray tell, is radar girl?”
Grams wiggled her eyebrows.
“Liz Beacon? You think Liz is Radar Girl?” he whispered in disbelief.
“Under-the-radar girl,” she whispered back.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
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“WHAT DO YOU THINK you’re doing?”
Liz swiped at the sweat beading on her brow from the unusually warm spring sun and thanked the Fates the black flies had yet to make an appearance. She turned to her sister. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m tearing out the old deck.”