“Let me guess.” Ivy swung her legs sideways over one arm of her chair and took a slug of beer. “The checkout girl with the—”
“Never mind.” Cade cut her off with a glare. “That’s not important. What is important is no matter what I say, she won’t leave me alone.”
“There’s your problem.” Gabe, always the analytical one, rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You know the old saying about actions speaking louder than words.”
“Sure.” Cade popped the top of his beer and took a long, slow sip. “But what’s that got to do with Sasha?”
Gabe crossed one Sperry-clad foot over his knee. “You need to show her you mean business, not just tell her.”
“Show her how?”
“By dating someone else.”
“Like who?”
“I don’t know.” Gabe lifted a shoulder. “You’re the local ladies’ man. You tell me.”
“Yeah, well, that’s the problem.” Cade picked at the label on his beer bottle. “Stockton’s not all that big. I’ve sort of exhausted the dating pool.”
“Hello.” Ivy waggled her fingers at him. “Available female here.”
“Huh?” Cade couldn’t have heard her right. She did not just offer herself up to him like a virgin sacrifice.
“I volunteer as tribute.”
She did.
He continued to stare at her, not sure how to respond. Gabe, on the other hand, had no such problem. He burst into hysterical laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Ivy pressed her lips into a thin line.
“You?” Gabe choked out between laughs. “And Cade? You might as well be brother and sister.”
Only Cade didn’t think of her that way, not anymore. And that was exactly why he didn’t want to go out with her. Couldn’t go out with her.
“Look, Ivy, I appreciate the offer but...”
“But what?” She crossed and uncrossed her legs over the arm of the chair, giving him a tantalizing glimpse of creamy flesh under the hem of her shorts. “Are you chicken? Afraid you’ll succumb to my many charms?”
“Not exactly.” Liar.
“Hang on.” Gabe grinned over the lip of his beer bottle, his laughter finally contained. “The more I think about it, it’s actually pretty perfect. You don’t have to really go out. Just show up somewhere Sasha will be and pretend you’re a couple. That should be enough to get her to back off.”
Great. Pretend dating. Being together and not at the same time. “I don’t know...”
“Come on, man.” Gabe’s grin widened. “What have you got to lose?”
His mind. His heart. The only family he’d ever known if things got serious and then they crashed and burned.
“Tell you what.” Ivy’s tone softened. “Consider it my way of satisfying the dare.”
“Since when does the dare-ee get to decide her own terms?”
“Since the dar-er needs her help to get rid of his ex.”
“Okay.” The corners of his mouth curled upward as he thought of a way to play along without risking anything. “One date. You can come watch me tear it up at third base in the Battle of the Badges game.”
“Battle of the Badges?”
“Softball—cops versus firefighters. They kicked our asses last year.” Cade tipped back his beer, letting the rich, chocolatey liquid slide down his throat, and mentally patted himself on the back. It was genius. Him on the field. Ivy in the stands, cheering him on. Sasha watching the whole thing. He’d convince his ex it was over and still keep Ivy at a safe distance.
“One tiny flaw in your plan.” Ivy shifted her legs back over the arm of the chair and sat facing forward. “How do you know Sasha will be there?”
“Oh, she’ll be there,” Gabe chimed in. “It’s a huge event. Almost the whole town turns out. Winners get bragging rights and pizza after the game, courtesy of the losers.”
“How come I’ve never been? Never even heard of it.” Ivy’s nose wrinkled again. A habit of hers, apparently.
Cade frowned, wondering why he’d never noticed it before. What else had he missed? He shook off the thought and focused on answering Ivy’s question. “We only started playing a few years ago.”
“When is it?”
“Friday at six.”
“All I’d have to do is watch you play?” Ivy bit her lip. The unconsciously erotic gesture sent his sex drive into orbit.
Cade cleared his throat and scraped a hand through his hair. “And root for me. Maybe wear my extra jersey. Typical girlfriend stuff.”
A strange look crossed her face, and for a moment he thought she was going to say no. But then she stood, chugged the rest of her beer and faced him.
“Okay. Pick me up at five thirty. And don’t forget the jersey.”
IVY CURSED HERSELF for the thousandth time as she pulled back the curtain and peered out the upstairs window, watching for Cade’s SUV. What the hell had she been thinking? Or maybe she hadn’t been. One too many chocolate stouts and her damned ego had gotten her into this mess.
But she couldn’t help it. It had hurt like hell when Gabe and Cade started discussing the eligible female population of Stockton as if she wasn’t sitting two feet away. What, pray tell, was wrong with her? Did they think she wasn’t good enough for Cade, that no one would believe a super stud like him would date a girl like her?
She wasn’t Jabba the Mutt anymore. She wasn’t.
Not that those two dumb-asses recognized it. To them she’d always be an overweight, insecure, pimply-faced kid.
Well, she’d show them. Especially the chief dumb-ass. Cade.
Ivy abandoned her vigil at the window and headed for the full-length mirror in the master bathroom, needing one last confirmation that all her primping had paid off. Hair tamed in a ponytail, adorably pulled through the back of a Stockton Fire Department baseball cap she’d found in Holly’s closet? Check. Just enough makeup to hide her freckles and play up the pale green flecks in her hazel eyes? Check. Legs tanned, shaved and showcased in an appropriately snug pair of denim cutoffs? Check.
She smiled at her reflection, thinking back to a few years ago when tight had been a four-letter word in her fashion vocabulary. If there was one thing Andre had taught her—over and above all the lessons in photography she’d learned as his apprentice-turned-associate—it was that she wasn’t doing herself any favors wearing clothes that looked like they were designed by Omar the tent maker. “Remember,” he’d said. “You wear the clothes. They don’t wear you.”
Well, she’d wear the hell out of this outfit. She grabbed a pair of silver hoop earrings and her collection of Alex and Ani bracelets off the counter and started downstairs, humming the latest pop radio earworm courtesy of Taylor Swift. All she needed now was Cade’s jersey, which he’d promised to bring. She’d look a little strange if she showed up in only a sports bra. Even if it did wonders for her double Ds.
The doorbell rang when she was halfway down.
“Be right there,” she called, taking the rest of the steps two at a time.
But