Crazy for Loving You

by Grant, Pippa

  Daisy grimaces. “Sure. Let’s go with that.”

  She lifts the phone again, and I lean closer to watch the video on the small screen.

  The scent of coconut floods my nose as I get within sniffing distance of Daisy, and I suddenly need to know what Sierra is doing. How big Baxter and Nina are now. If she ever got remarried.

  Noise off Daisy’s phone reminds me to breathe, and there’s another flash of weirdness in my chest as Julienne Carter-Roderick appears on the screen, stalking across the kitchen in her Coconut Grove mansion, wearing heels and a baby sling and talking to the camera. “Mington is three weeks old today, and he’s brilliant, naturally. He said Hello in Mandarin this morning when I woke him up. That baby course in Italian clearly is a piece of shit, since it’s teaching Mington to speak Mandarin, but at least he’s learning to be quatralingualistic before he can crawl.”

  “Quatralingualistic?”

  “She tried, poor thing. Her father—my uncle—abandoned her mother when she was two, and her mom never got over it, which meant the Graminator was basically the closest thing she had to a solid maternal role model. Nicely done with her yesterday, by the way. Tiana showed me the video last night. You’re hot when you’re all bossy and protective. And we could get married. That’d prove to the social workers that we’re good for the baby.”

  I switch my attention from the video to her face.

  She blinks innocently.

  “If I’m not going to be an asshole, you need to not be an asshole.”

  “What? I’ve read a ton of romance novels on marriages of convenience, and it’s not a bad idea.”

  She’s honestly incapable of being serious for three fucking seconds. And I’m not nearly as annoyed by it as I should be. I stop when I realize I’m subconsciously leaning toward her, nearly smiling. “Do you flirt with everything that moves?”

  “Basically. I hit on my friends all the time, but they all have boyfriends or fiancés now, so I have to find another object to practice on. And you, clearly, need to feel like you’re attractive so you can find a higher caliber of crushes.”

  She gives me that grin again, shrugging her shoulders in a little oopsie move. “Sorry. I’m done. I swear. I just—you really could do better. Look at you. You deserve to have a woman who’ll worship you the way Derek, Beck, and Jude worship Emily, Luna, and Cam, because I don’t tolerate my friends being in relationships with people who don’t deserve them.”

  “Just when I think we’re making progress, you go and say something that makes me want to leave.”

  “West.” She loops her arms around my neck, much like she leaped on me for that kiss that I can’t erase off my lips, and she lowers her voice conspiratorially. “Friends watch out for friends. You’d tell me if I was dating someone horrifically wrong for me, wouldn’t you?”

  I study her blue eyes, then slowly nod. “Probably owe you that much.”

  She quirks another grin, and I realize she has tiny laugh lines at the corners of her eyes.

  She really does laugh all the time. Because she’s happy?

  Or because she’s faking it?

  But her attention drops to my wet T-shirt, and an uncharacteristic seriousness touches her gaze. “You know what occurred to me yesterday, while I was at the emergency room?”

  “That money can’t buy your way out of allergies?”

  She shakes her head. “You don’t have Carter genes. Maybe Julienne didn’t just draw names out of a hat. Maybe she looked at you, and how you told her off when she had her hissy fit about that wall and the fountain, and she realized she wanted her son to be raised by someone with the cojones to stand up to people. Like The Dame.”

  “I didn’t tell her off.”

  “But you didn’t tear the wall out either, did you?”

  “She couldn’t fire me if she wanted the nursery to get done. No one else would take the job.”

  Daisy tips her head back and laughs again, her arms still looped around my neck, and my cock twitches in interest.

  Again.

  Not. Good.

  Let go and get down with your bad self, my nuts chide. You’re a grown-up. She’s a grown-up. Do her and get her out of your system.

  I honestly don’t know where I went wrong with my balls.

  She looks back at me, still smiling, and swear to fuck, she’s even prettier now than she is when she’s wearing makeup. “Every single person in my family on my mother’s side either does exactly what my grandmother tells them to do, or they do the exact opposite and think they’re sticking it to her by disobeying, but not a single one of them is actually doing what they want to do. They’re all being controlled by her to some degree.”

  “And you?”

  She traces a finger down my neck. “I walk the line between doing what she wants and pissing her off. But only because I know her secret. She’s actually the last living immortal Highlander, so even if I literally buried her, she’d rise again. Probably stronger this time. With a new shiny sword for—gah. Sorry. Wasn’t supposed to let that part of the family legend slip out.”

  “You’re terrible at avoiding questions.” If she doesn’t quit touching me, I’m going to kiss her again, and we’ll both regret it.

  No, check that.

  I’ll regret it. I will definitely regret it.

  She grins, as if to reinforce the idea that she never regrets anything. “Of everything I’ve ever been accused of, that’s a new one.”

  “What would you be if you could be anything?”

  “Immortal like my grandmother, but more on the butterfly side than the orc side.”

  She’s so—so—so fucking infuriating.

  She wants my help, but she won’t tell me why. She smiles, but I don’t believe she’s fully happy. She says she wants to be nice, but she runs one of the biggest real estate empires in the world.

  You can’t run an empire and be nice.

  “Wow, you have really thick veins in your neck,” she whispers.

  She touches my neck again, and fuck.

  I’m going to kiss her.

  I’m going to kiss chaos. Disorder. Unpredictability.

  Because fuck it.

  If this is what life’s throwing at me, why the hell shouldn’t I take it?

  Twenty

  Daisy

  One minute, I’m sitting on the edge of the pool, getting ready to kiss this delicious hunk of a man who’s stepped up in a way no man has ever stepped up in my life, and the next, I’m three feet underwater.

  I surge to the surface, ready to pounce, but West is already halfway across the pool.

  “Oh, so that’s how you want to play?” I call.

  He tilts his ear toward me. “I don’t know what your end game is, but you can’t use your feminine wiles against me. I’m a highly trained military operative who can resist torture and interrogation with the best of them.”

  He’s freaking hilarious.

  And unexpectedly fun this afternoon.

  And intent on resisting me, which makes him all that much more irresistible.

  “Oh, you can, can you?” I reach under the water and grab the bottom of my tank top to slowly peel it over my head.

  Even from halfway across the pool, I can see his eyes dilate.

  He’s not immune to me.

  Not in the least.

  Is flirting with my co-guardian a bad idea?

  Probably.

  But do I love bad ideas?

  Most definitely.

  “Do your worst,” he says.

  The water’s cool, but my skin’s hot, and my competitive streak is bubbling to the surface. “I’m going to make you want to kiss me,” I tell him.

  “No, you’re not.”

  I smile and fling my tank somewhere behind me.

  A cat yowls, and then a streak of gray tabby shoots from the bushes to the outdoor kitchen at the top of my courtyard.

  West wipes the water off his face. “You just hit the cat with your shirt.”

 
“Without looking.” I wiggle my brows. “You could be kissing that level of talent right now.”

  “I’m not kissing you.”

  “Not yet.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “Westley. This is not how you win an argument with me.” I reach behind my neck and untie my bikini top.

  He freezes in the water. Hard freezes. “What are you doing?”

  “Playing dirty.”

  “I have four sisters. I was flashed more times before I was eighteen than most men are in a lifetime. I’m immune.”

  “So you’ve never seen breasts you liked? You poor man. You really didn’t get a good look at mine the other day.”

  “I’ve seen plenty of breasts I liked. I just don’t need to see—dammit, Daisy.”

  I glide into the water toward where he’s hiding in the deep end. “You changed in front of me. This is only fair.”

  “You charged into my room naked. We’re even. And I wasn’t trying to seduce you.”

  “I wrestle better in the water when I’m naked, and I owe you for dunking me.”

  He slices through the water, effortlessly avoiding me. “That was free of charge. No repayment necessary.”

  “I’m not one of those billionaires who uses her status to get things for free. I need to pay you back.”

  “Nope. I’m a giver. We’re even at a karmic level.”

  “Am I really that unattractive?”

  “Yes.”

  I laugh, because he’s starting to smile, and I know he’s lying.

  “But you have a mediocre personality to compensate for your physical shortcomings,” he adds, and that’s it.

  He could be the love child of Michael Phelps and Idris Elba—so basically a gorgeous fast swimmer—and I would still absolutely catch this man and dunk him right back.

  I lunge for him, and he dives under the water, only to surface a moment later back in the shallow end of my awesome D pool.

  “Time out,” I call.

  “Pussy,” he calls back with a full shit-eating grin that makes the butterflies and geckos and probably even Steve the alligator, who can’t see him, all faint with swooniness.

  I’m torn between swooning and jumping him.

  But first, I need to be more aerodynamic.

  Aquadynamic?

  Yeah.

  Aquadynamic.

  I reach under the water as my feet touch the bottom, and I wiggle out of my shorts. “You should probably strip too. Then you might stand a chance.”

  “You—”

  He stops and shakes his head, and I send my shorts flying back over my shoulder.

  No more cats yowl, but there’s a crash and a crack, and West covers a grin with his hand. “You just murdered a pot of orchids.”

  “No, I gave them a new viewpoint. They were getting tired of just staring at the pool from the same angle day after day after—aah!”

  He’s like a fish.

  One minute he’s in the shallow end, then next he’s halfway across the pool toward me.

  And despite my bravado, there’s nothing I can do to make my milk jugs aquadynamic.

  And really, would I want to when a buff hottie like West is chasing me?

  Still, I make a show of trying to swim away.

  Friends can bang, right? We can bang out some stress, maybe have dinner together once or twice a week, and then we’ll be much more friendly while all the legal crap gets sorted.

  He surfaces right next to me, and I shriek—for show, of course—and flap about helplessly trying half-heartedly to splash him.

  “Daisy?” He shakes his head, treading water, droplets sluicing from his thick hair down his face, dripping off his nose, his eyes a mossy green that goes perfectly with the palm trees overhead.

  “Yes, my scary captor? Do you need to impale me on your sword? Please?”

  He sputters a laugh. “You don’t quit, do you?”

  “Quitters don’t win. Oh, help. Help. I only have three fingers holding me up in this water that’s trying to swallow me whole.”

  I don’t thrash about and pretend I’m drowning, because that’s one of my few other lines. Don’t cry wolf when it matters.

  He’s studying me, and the smile is sliding off his face. That won’t do.

  “Oh, no. I’m being dragged down by the weight of my panties. You must take them off me. Please! Please help me, noble captor! I must get back to my baby!”

  He doesn’t smile this time.

  I don’t know what just went through his head, but whatever it was, it’s changed something. He suddenly looks away.

  “West?” I want to reach out and touch his face and turn it to me, but there’s a back off shield going up in place again.

  “The last time I got seriously involved with a woman, she had kids, and I was left high and dry without any of them when she decided we were over. I’m not doing that again.”

  My heart twists, and another unfamiliar emotion drags at my stomach. “You can’t judge all women by one who treated you poorly.”

  “Pretty sure I can judge you.”

  Ouch.

  Also, probably fair.

  He shoves away and dives back into the water.

  I should slip out of the pool and let him enjoy some laps and some sun while Remy’s sleeping, but I don’t do the walk of shame.

  Not after a one-night stand.

  And not after sticking my foot in my mouth.

  And not after accidentally pushing good men too far.

  But where I’d usually do the walk of I live the fuck out of my life, and I enjoy every minute, instead, I stay in the pool, watching until he surfaces with his back to me.

  “Maternal instincts,” I blurt.

  His shoulders bunch.

  He’s still in his white T-shirt, which is plastered to his body, not at all hiding the epic tattoos on his back. I want a closer look, to see what all he has inked there, but now’s not the time.

  “Of everyone in my family, I’m Remy’s best shot at having the closest thing he’ll ever have to a real mother, and I don’t want to fuck him up. I want him to know where he came from without feeling obligated to repeat all of our mistakes. I want him to have a chance at growing up to be the best man he can be. I can’t explain it any other way than to call it latent maternal instincts. That’s why I want to be in his life. That’s why I want to keep him. Because I look at him, and I see an innocent little creature who can be shaped and molded into something better than I am, and I want to be the person to help him get there. But I also don’t know jack about how to turn a baby into a good person, whereas you—you just ooze good person, and I’m pretty sure I don’t deserve to have a co-guardian like you, but for some reason, Julienne named you, and for some other reason, you’re still here, and I—I’ll quit being a flirty asshole. Sorry. I didn’t realize…what you’d been through.”

  He hangs his head and rubs his temples, still without looking at me, and I know what he’s thinking.

  If you want him to have a chance, then you need to get the fuck out of his life, because you’re just as screwed up as the rest of your family.

  So maybe I can do the walk of shame.

  That’s what it feels like as I slip mostly naked out of the pool and head back into my house without looking back.

  Twenty-One

  West

  After the pool incident, Daisy emails me with an updated proposed schedule for Remy that includes her taking the majority of the responsibility for him. She’d take it all, she says, but for the legal challenge sake, I need to actually show evidence of taking some responsibility for him. She ends with a brief apology for making me uncomfortable.

  It’s oddly human.

  And I don’t mean I don’t think Daisy’s human. I think she’s the biggest kind of human—big personality, big bank account, big sex account.

  Fuck.

  She’s like a female Tyler, except bigger.

  And weirdly more professional.

  Didn’t see t
hat coming. And I don’t know if she’s proving she can be professional, or if she had her assistant write it out for her, or if she’s proving a point that she’s not just a chaotic hornball.

  But Monday morning, when I leave the Pepto Bismol room that I’ve been assigned and take Remy to her in her office, she’s typing away at a computer in neon pink reading glasses that remind me of the 1960s. Her shoulders are bare, because she’s in one of those shirts that has sleeves attached under her armpits. It’s pink and skintight, but her cleavage is covered.

  “Good morning! You’re right on time.” She lifts a small crystal bowl. “Frozen yogurt?”

  “No. Thank you.”

  She peels off the reading glasses, tosses her bright, unnaturally red hair, and takes a bite while her eyes slide shut and a blissful smile slides over her lips. She visibly swallows. “Here if you ever want it.” And then she rises to show off skintight, silver glitter pants. And when she crosses around her desk, my nuts start drooling.

  Can we slather her in froyo and then fuck her while she’s wearing those strappy stilettos? they want to know.

  I tell them to shut the fuck up, because she’s like this for everyone. Whether she knows she’s capable of lifting a thousand flagpoles with one lick of her tongue on a frozen yogurt spoon, and if she does it on purpose for fun, I have no idea.

  But my flagpole needs to stand at ease. “Diaper bag’s packed with six bottles and enough diapers for an army.”

  “West! You didn’t have to do that. Thank you. I’ll make sure to return the favor. How is our little handsome man this morning?”

  Remy yawns and waves a fist at her.

  “Up at one and again at four,” I report.

  “Such a good boy.” She bends over, giving me another whiff of coconut-scented Daisy, along with something fruity. She’s a tropical bundle of chaos and unpredictability, but she’s also something more.

  The byproduct of a divorce that affected her more than she wants to admit, if that flash of panic and pain on her face yesterday afternoon was any indication.

  Doesn’t matter how much money a person has. Can’t stop a heart from hurting.

  She straightens and smiles at me. “I’ll keep him until dinner, then you have him until bedtime, and I’ll handle the overnight shift. I have three nannies coming in for interviews today, which will also help both of us get back to normal schedules.”