“Eat. You’ve made your point. No use in wasting the meal.” Daisy turned to eat some more.
He walked over, his boots clunking on the steps as he sat on the one above hers. “I was about to say the same thing,” he muttered after biting into a fried chicken leg. He grunted, “This is good.”
“Yeah. My mom made them. I don’t cook. See? Another reason why I can’t be a good farm-wife.”
“I never claimed to want a farm-wife, certainly not like you just suggested.”
His tone was grumpy, annoyed, and snappish. She took another bite and savored the flavor, smiling because she knew she definitely bothered him. Score for her. “You kind of did. You sure gleaned a lot from one tepid date with me. Maybe you should evaluate why you felt so compelled to scare me away from you like I was proposing marriage.”
“Our date wasn’t tepid.” His tone was growing surlier and grumpier as she leaned back, her elbows resting on the stair behind her. She liked lounging in the warm twilight.
Well, shit. There seemed to be no future here. Not even for the next few hours; her nerves settled and seemed to evaporate. “Tepid is a nice word to describe our date. You weren’t actually very much fun. Or very interesting. If I didn’t know you better, I would’ve jumped out of the truck at the first opportunity, seeing what a lackluster first date you turned out to be.”
She tilted her head back and looked at him upside-down. Her hair piled up on the stair. Smirking, she winked. His chewing slowed and his frown deepened. “It was not a lackluster first date. I was trying not to think of you as my freaking… ugh! little cousin or whatever you are to me. It was just weird.”
“Because you made it weird,” she countered.
“Because it is weird. We share an uncle and an aunt and your cousin, Charlie, is married to my sister, Cami. Are you kidding? How could that not be weird?”
Her head tipped back, and she wouldn’t look at him. “Shall I remind you that you knew all that and still you asked me out? I might have told you my feelings, the ones that are not family-affiliated but also that I am not seeking a relationship in which our goals perfectly match, along with our lifestyles and desires. But whatever. Reality keeps getting lost in that epically dramatic head of yours.”
He slammed his leg of chicken back into the container. “I have never once been accused of being dramatic.”
“Well, perhaps because you don’t ever date. Maybe you scared away any woman who had a singular date with you or tried to kiss you to see if a second date were possible. Perhaps when you announced where you plan to live, work and fulfill yourself for the next fifty years, and explained why they could not fit into that, they took it like a bucket of cold water being poured on their heads.” She snorted and scoffed. “It sure as shit had that effect on me.”
“My dating history is just fine. Healthy and active, and you know that because you were watching me for years before I noticed you. So, don’t try to rewrite history, Daisy Rydell. What I’m doing with you is different because our relationship is so different. I’m being practical. And making sure we don’t ruin anything. And it’s entirely because of our shared family connection. Call it what you want. But we exist within those confines. We aren’t blood, granted, but it doesn’t matter. I still call AJ and Kate my mom and dad and Cami is my sister. You see all that. You’re just trying to be obtuse now. And my dating life is packed full, thank you very much. You must know that too already.”
Wincing, she realized he had her there. She leaned forward to dig into the basket for a drink. Pulling out a soda, she opened it and chugged down half the bottle. Without looking at him, she sighed. “Fine. I know you must have some kind of game. But thankfully, you kept that hidden from me.”
“Really? It was that bad? Then why were you begging me to kiss you? Couldn’t you just accept a goodnight embrace and leave it at that, huh, cuzz?”
Irritated, Daisy wrestled a piece of chicken inside her mouth, chewing and biting until she swallowed it. She plopped the bone into the container. “At least, you’re acting more like yourself now. The old, anal-retentive, far-planning, controlling jerk who thinks he knows everything.”
“And last night? I was what? Nice and polite? Trying not to hurt you? But today, I am none of those things.”
“Perhaps that’s why you were friends with Violet and not me, huh?”
He angrily ate his fried chicken and drank from a bottle of water. Tilting his head back, he washed it all down. His throat visibly and audibly gulped with each swallow. He lowered it and wiped his sleeve across his mouth. “Well, as it turns out, my gentle rebuff was for nothing.”
She snorted. Rising to her feet, she set the food on the stair. “Oh, volumes could be written about your gentleness. Great. Maybe I planned to rebuff you after seeing how weird you were around me.”
He snorted right back. Shoving his water aside, he rose and hovered over her. “The reason I liked Violet is because she was never flaky and annoying like her brat of a sister. She never bothered me. She never changed her mind or waffled. When she liked someone, she didn’t insist they break all the usual rules or suddenly treat her unkindly. What did you want me to do? Call you names? Ice you out? Ghost you? The decent thing was to illustrate all the issues that I foresaw.”
“Issues about what? Being together? God… maybe I just wanted to date. No expectations. No plans. No indication of where I might want to live years from now,” she snarled, lifting her face up to his and glaring at him.
Breathing hard, his jaw jutted out and his eyes flashed. “You’re trying to provoke me.”
“I’m not. I’m the one who’s freaking provoked. Annoyed. Frustrated. Now I’m wondering what I ever saw in you.”
“Apparently, enough to crush on me for years, and yet, none of this mattered to you? None of the real issues, sooner or later, even put a dent in your attraction. Nothing got through that thick head of yours. See? You’re just a flaky brat.” He shook his head, squinting with disdain as his gaze scoured her. “Wanting something you can’t have, with no thought as to how that could affect the future. Including our shared families. That connection is real and it’s important to me. Being adopted, maybe I’m far more cognizant of it than you. I appreciate it and I won’t do anything to damage or alter it. The potential that exists between you and me is really something. It should have influenced your decision to even tell me the shit you did. And for what? Just the fun of it? Playing around with a fucking family member? No worries. Daisy Rydell makes no commitments to anyone. Nothing matters except what she wants here and now. You’re fucking right, I was friends with Violet and not you.”
Her neck jerked back. She was blinking and in shock, feeling more than surprise and hurt. She replied, “That was… that was just mean. I didn’t set out to do anything like that. I don’t fuck around as you so rudely call it. But even if I did, who are you to judge me?”
Blinking back tears, she took a step down and then another one. Her face must have reflected the astonishment and incredulity she felt in her heart. Asher thought that of her? So bluntly? So rudely? So dramatically?
“I don’t. But I despise the lack of forethought you put into things. Especially big decisions. As much as you pretend this isn’t a major one between us, it would be. How can you not see that? Give some thought beforehand as to what might or might not go right? What happens if it goes wrong? How do we see each other in passing if we end up detesting one another? With so much family we share, who would intervene between us? Don’t you ever think about those scenarios? So, when I brought up some of it, you interpreted it as me wanting to make you a farm-wife. Whatever, Daisy. You’re as immature as everyone says. Now I’ve witnessed it for myself.”