Counterfeit Date: Echo Ridge Romance

by Checketts, Cami

  “Hey, big man.” The towhead toddler grinned and chucked the juice box again, this time hitting Mason in the leg. The little guy laughed. His brother watched with wide eyes and his thumb in his mouth.

  Mason picked up the juice box and grinned at the little punk, who reminded him of his feisty sister, Maryn. “It’s mine now,” Mason said.

  “No fair!” the toddler protested.

  “You can’t just throw things at people,” Jessica reprimanded, taking the juice box from Mason and shoving it into a side pocket.

  The boy sat back in the stroller with a huff.

  “Do you have time for a story?” Mason asked Jessica.

  “Walk with us.” She pushed the stroller toward the park.

  Mason fell into step beside her and everything that had happened with Lolly yesterday spilled out. As they talked, she lifted her little boys out of the stroller and they threw rocks into the small lake. Mason helped the oldest learn how to skip a rock, and all the while he talked and Jessica schemed.

  “Okay, let me get this straight,” she said when he’d spilled far more than he wanted to. “You want Lolly?”

  Mason arched an eyebrow and rubbed at his neck. “Yeah.”

  “For, like, one date, or for, like, forever?”

  Mason stared at her, playing the question through his mind. Maybe he was jumping too fast, but he’d never felt this way about anyone, not even Kaitlyn. He and Kaitlyn had been friends and things had been comfortable and fun between them. With Lolly, it was sparks, excitement, and a joy he never wanted to be without.

  Finally, he admitted, “Let’s focus on forever and see where it goes.”

  Jessica’s eyes got big. “Yes! You’re the coolest, Mace, so it won’t be hard to hook her, but we have to plan this out. You’re not just after one date; you want her to fall for you, and with the way Lolly flits through men, it’s going to take some scheming, right?”

  Mason’s stomach churned. He didn’t want to mislead Lolly or lose her to the next guy in line. He pushed out a breath. “I’m trusting you on this.”

  “Sweet!” She got a mischievous look on her face, “We’ve got to bring in the big guns. I’m calling Kait.”

  “Uh, no.” Mason shook his head.

  “You want to hook Lolly? You need the best friend’s help.” She yanked out her phone and pushed a few buttons.

  Mason could’ve easily grabbed the phone, but he wanted to know where Kaitlyn stood on this. Jessica was right: to stand a chance of winning over Lolly for more than just a short time, he needed Kaitlyn’s advice.

  Jessica talked quickly, and Mason could hear Kaitlyn shriek, “Mason and Lolly? Yes, yes, yes!”

  An hour later, he’d returned to his office with a plan that just might make Lolly fall for him. The women were excited about it. He was a little more apprehensive. He’d rather just tell Lolly outright that she was the one he wanted, but he’d told Jessica and Kaitlyn he’d trust them. If it would truly make Lolly fall for him permanently, he’d stay the course.

  Chapter Four

  Tuesday afternoon, Lolly met Mason on the sidewalk out front of Sherisse’s shop. It wasn’t really a full-on spa, more of a hair and nail salon, but Jessica and Kaitlyn had recommended Sherisse and it looked uptown.

  “Hey.” She swung her purse back and forth.

  “Hi.” Mason’s slow grin manifested itself. Lolly’s purse stopped swinging and she felt decidedly weak. “So you’re really going to make me do this?” He glanced up at the salon sign.

  “Hey, you want your dream girl? You gotta put forth a little effort.” Thinking of his dream girl being someone else honestly made her sick, and Mason was perfect without any kind of beauty treatments, but Lolly couldn’t resist this chance to be with him.

  Mason took a step closer; his blue gaze was intense on her. He smelled clean and fresh, like pine trees and manly soap combined. “I definitely want my dream girl.”

  Lolly’s breath caught. Should he be looking at her like that if he was going out with someone else? “So you got the date all set for Saturday night?”

  Mason’s eyes shuttered and he stepped back. “Yeah.”

  “Great. Perfect.” Good thing she’d reminded him. He was dating someone else. Not her. Dang, the world sucked right now. She turned and grabbed the door handle of the salon. Mason reached above her and swung the door open, but not wide enough, and she had to brush his lovely chest with her shoulder to get by. Her stomach filled with heat. Ignoring the sensation, she rushed in and greeted Sherisse.

  Mason came up right behind her and she swore she could feel the heat from his body. If she stepped back an inch, she’d bump into him. Was she going to be able to get through this week? How was she going to hand him over to some other chick when she wanted him all to herself?

  “I blocked out a few hours. What do we want to do here?” Sherisse asked.

  Lolly stepped to the side so Mason could stand next to her. She rubbed her hands together. “Haircut, facial, manicure, eyebrow wax.” She was teasing about the eyebrow wax.

  Mason’s brows got higher at each word. “No. Nuh-uh. No on the manicure, and no way are you waxing my eyebrows.”

  Sherisse stepped up closer and inspected his face. “I think he’s right about the eyebrows. I like the shape of them.”

  Lolly liked the shape of all of him, but she wasn’t about to say that.

  Sherisse’s phone rang. “Excuse me for a second. You two decide about the manicure and I’ll grab the stuff for the facial.” She pulled her phone out, said hello, and strode to the back room.

  “No on the manicure?” Lolly challenged.

  “Definite no.” Mason smirked down at her.

  Why did he have to be so tall and manly? She held in a sigh of longing. “Don’t you want your hands soft for Saturday so you can hold her hand?” Lolly asked. Her stomach curdled. Maybe he wouldn’t want to hold Faceless Chick’s hand. Lolly could hope.

  Mason studied her. “Do you like a man’s hands to be soft?”

  “Well, I …” Lolly had to think about it. Maybe he was on to something. She didn’t really like a guy’s hands to feel like he’d never worked a day in his life.

  Mason extended his right hand, palm up. “Do you think I need a manicure?”

  Lolly stared at his hand, then back into his blue eyes. She gulped and reached out, tentatively touching his fingers with hers. Sparks seemed to shoot through her fingertips. Yikes. She pulled back, but Mason was quicker. He reached out and wrapped his hand around hers, gently tugging her closer. Lolly stuttered a step, placing her free hand on his chest to steady herself. Her stomach did a flip. His chest was all muscular and perfect.

  He bent down closer and said in a husky voice, “Would you want to hold a hand like this, Lolly?”

  Her eyes widened. She swallowed hard. Sign me up! she wanted to scream. “Yes. Yes, I would,” she murmured.

  Mason’s slow grin lit up his face and his blue eyes twinkled.

  Sherisse appeared in Lolly’s peripheral vision. Lolly tried to pull back, but Mason held on to her hand.

  “No manicure,” he told Sherisse, still staring at Lolly.

  Sherisse’s eyebrows rose. “All right. Let’s get started with the facial and haircut, then. Come sit over here, Mason.”

  Mason finally released Lolly’s hand, gave her a wink, and followed Sherisse. Lolly couldn’t catch a breath. She didn’t follow them. Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out, and hot shame coursed through her veins. Kaitlyn. Even if Faceless Chick wasn’t in the picture, she couldn’t date Mason and betray her best friend.

  “Hey, sis,” she greeted, keeping her focus on Mason. He lay back in a chair and Sherisse started rubbing some kind of mask into his handsome face. Lolly wanted to be the one touching his face.

  “Hi! I need a favor.”

  “Name it.” She’d better do lots of favors for Kaitlyn the way she was feeling about her best friend’s ex. Good thing Mason had another woman he was interested i
n, because Lolly was about to beg him to hold her hand for life. Not good.

  “Axel’s got a friend he wants to set you up with.”

  “No! I don’t do blind date torture. You know I get plenty of dates on my own.”

  Mason flinched and Sherisse’s green goop landed in his ear and hair. “Sorry,” he muttered.

  “It’s okay.” Sherisse grabbed a towel and wiped the excess off.

  Mason didn’t move again, but Lolly noticed his fists were clenched and the muscles in his arms were on fine display. Did he hate the facial that much, or could she hope that her dating record bugged him a little bit?

  “I know you do, but please. This guy’s great. I promise you’ll like him.”

  Lolly was staring at the man she already liked. He looked really good, even with green goop on his face. How cute was he to let them do a facial on him? “Is he a lacrosse player?” she asked.

  Mason’s body tensed again.

  “Yes. It’ll be great. Axel and I will double with you, so if you’re not into him, it won’t get awkward. But I promise, you’re gonna love this one.”

  “They always love me, sis. I don’t always return the favor.”

  Kaitlyn laughed. “I’ll let Axel know it’s a go.”

  Lolly sighed. She might as well go on a blind date Saturday night. Mason was going to be with his dream girl. A chill raced down her spine. If she spent this week with him, could she somehow convince him to choose her instead? No! That was wrong of her. He had Faceless Chick, the luckiest girl in the world in her book, even though she was missing a face. “Okay. I’ll see you in a few hours.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Sherisse’s.”

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot. Don’t cut any length off. I love your hair.”

  “Gotcha.” She hung up the phone and studied Mason lying there, his face green and cucumbers on his eyes. Sherisse had finished the mask and walked into the back room again.

  “You’re going out with a lacrosse player?” Mason’s lips barely moved as he tried not to disrupt the mask on his face.

  “Guess so. Axel wants to set me up.”

  “Axel’s a good guy.”

  Lolly stared at him. He was so chill and mature about Axel. It said a lot about Mason that he could forgive and move on. She wondered what on earth would rile this guy. “Yeah, he is.”

  “So the men always love you but you don’t return the favor?”

  Lolly smiled, wishing he could open his eyes. “It’s the life I lead.”

  He grinned and the mask on his face crinkled.

  She walked up closer to where he lay, studying his muscular form and the manly planes of his face highlighted by the green film. It was fun to watch him without him knowing it. “How does the mask feel?”

  “Sticky.” His hand reached out and found her arm. He trailed his lean fingers down her forearm and then wrapped them around hers.

  Lolly trembled from his simple touch.

  “I feel totally out of it. Do you think you can hold my hand to comfort me?”

  Lolly laughed. “Torture for a tough guy, huh?”

  “The facial? Yes. Holding your hand? No.”

  He traced a pattern on the back of her hand with his thumb, and Lolly swayed. Why did it have to feel amazing every time he simply touched her? She wanted to beg him to ditch his dream girl on Saturday and take her out instead.

  Sherisse returned and wrapped a heated towel around Mason’s face. She started talking with Lolly about her and Kaitlyn’s latest swimwear line. The conversation helped, but nothing could distract her from the wonderful pressure of Mason’s hand around hers.

  * * *

  Mason endured the facial because Lolly held his hand through most of it. He loved the feel of her small hand in his, and he didn’t mind lying there and listening to her lilting voice as she talked and Sherisse massaged different kinds of junk into his face, sometimes letting the mask harden, occasionally peeling off some and rubbing off others. When they finished, he couldn’t see much difference in his face, but it was time spent with Lolly, so he wasn’t complaining. He debated agreeing to the manicure just to extend their time.

  Sherisse cut his hair pretty quickly, shaping it a little more around his face and neck. She left most of the length on top and raved about the strawberry-blond color.

  When they finished, he paid, tipped, and thanked Sherisse, then held the door for Lolly. They walked out into the evening sun. It was a perfect night in Echo Ridge, and he wished he could spend every minute with Lolly. “Are you hungry? Chinese? Pizza? Fay’s?” Man, he sounded desperate to be with her.

  She glanced up at him. Her face was so beautiful, and he loved how petite yet shapely she was. It made him feel all protective and tough around her. “I wish I could. I promised Jessica I’d help with the boys tonight so she and Gentry could go on a date.”

  Jessica. She and Kaitlyn were convinced this plan they’d worked up would be perfect. He wanted to just tell Lolly that she was the girl he wanted to be with, but hearing that one-sided conversation with Kaitlyn reminded him that Lolly dated anyone and everyone. She was a player, and he was definitely not. He had no clue how to play hard to get like Jessica and Kaitlyn had told him would make Lolly salivate for him—their word, not his. He’d better listen to her friends and follow through with the plan, and hope beyond hope that Lolly would fall for him like they’d both promised she would. How did they know? She’d agreed to go out with Axel’s lacrosse buddy pretty quickly. Okay, so that buddy was Mason, but she didn’t know that.

  “I’ll meet you there,” he said. “What do you like on your pizza?”

  Lolly pumped her eyebrows. “You want to help me babysit?”

  “Sure.”

  “I’m not gonna turn down pizza. Or help. Have you been around those two?”

  “The bigger one hit me with his juice box yesterday.”

  “That was mild. Fin is the Tasmanian Devil.”

  Mason grinned down at her and winked. “You two must be related. You’ve got more spunk than anyone I know.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.” She tilted her chin up and blinked those long eyelashes at him.

  “You should.” He leaned closer without really intending to. Lolly’s lips were parted partially, and he wanted to pull her in and kiss her. “You should also take this as a compliment: you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

  Lolly’s eyes widened and her breath quickened. Jessica and Kaitlyn were going to shoot him, because he was messing up their plan. The new plan called for him to kiss Lolly here and now. He slowly covered the distance, savoring the warm welcome in her eyes.

  “Mason!”

  Mason glanced up and saw Drew and Chelsea, his parents’ closest friends, walking toward them holding hands. “Hey,” he muttered.

  Lolly spun to face them, pulling out of his arms. “Hi.” She waved. “Where’s Ladd and Mylee?”

  “Addie’s babysitting.” Chelsea grinned at Mason. “She’s their favorite.”

  Mason’s little sister Addison was almost twelve now. She was very responsible and proper, as opposed to his younger sister, Maryn, who was a firecracker and wanted to play boys’ lacrosse so she could knock people down. Mason kind of missed knocking people down with his stick, but the professional offers he’d received were far from home, and he was realistic enough to know he would never be at Axel’s level of sponsorship and he could make more money as an accountant.

  “What is it with date night being on Tuesday?” Mason asked. Lolly was so close to his side that he couldn’t resist placing his hand on her lower back. She glanced sharply up at him but didn’t say anything or move away. Her silky shirt was thin, and he loved the feel of her smooth lower back under his palm.

  “Just wait till you get old and have a bunch of kids,” Drew said. “You take date night whenever the babysitter says they can fit you in.”

  “You’re so old,” Lolly teased.

  “I am. Chelsea’s still f
it and perfect.”

  “Good save, buddy.” Chelsea elbowed him in the gut. Drew grinned and pulled her in close to his side.

  Mason would forever love this tall, dark-haired couple. They’d changed his future in high school. He was certain they were the guardian angels who’d given his family Christmas and made it possible for him to secure a lacrosse scholarship with Syracuse.

  “Are you two … together?” Chelsea asked.

  Okay, sometimes he didn’t love these two. Chelsea was without guile and would ask anything.

  Lolly shifted away from him and his hand dropped to his side. “I’m helping him get ready for a date with his dream girl on Saturday.”

  Both of his friends’ eyebrows went up. “Oh?” Chelsea sounded disappointed. “What’s Dream Girl’s name?”

  Mason was caught like a deer in the headlights. He had no name for the fictitious girl. Where were Kaitlyn and Jessica when he needed them? “Um … L-L-Lily.”

  All three of them were staring at him in disbelief now. “Lily?” Lolly asked. She flipped her hair and harrumphed. “Interesting.”

  He raised his shoulders and splayed his hands. “I didn’t name her.”

  “Hmm.” Chelsea pursed her lips together. “Well, good luck on your dream date.”

  “Thanks.” Mason’s face got warm. He’d need luck to pull any of this off. Was Lolly going to fall for him, or would she walk out when they met for dinner Saturday night? Who was he to think he could be the one to capture her heart when so many others had failed? In his mind, nobody was worthy of Lolly.

  Drew and Chelsea said goodbye and strolled off arm in arm.

  “I love those two,” Lolly said.

  “Me too. Great people.”

  “I’d better go.”

  “Same here. I’ve got to meet Axel for a workout; then I’ll shower, pick up the pizza, and meet you at Jessica’s.”

  Lolly’s eyes widened. “You and Axel work out together?”

  He shrugged. “We’ve done lacrosse clinics together, and when he’s in town he likes me to push him at the gym.”