Page 18 of The Damaged Hearts Bargain

“Farm them?” Lucy looked over at the rose bushes. “Like in some sort of Pixar film or something?”

“Really,” Billy said, putting his shears down and collapsing onto the grass with his legs outspread, soaking in the sun. “Aphids let off a sweet kind of liquid called honeydew, and ants love it. So they keep the aphids around to milk them, in a way. Sometimes the ants fight the ladybirds to defend their herd of aphids.”

“Jesus,” said Lucy. “I’m not sure how I feel about that. Nature’s weird.”

“No more weird than people are,” Billy said reasonably. “At least the ants are attacking the ladybirds for a good reason. You attacked a woman today for no reason at all.”

“I didn’t attack her,” Lucy said, groaning. “It was an accident.”

Billy ignored this. “And now here you are, going to all theeffort of washing your hair on a day when you normally don’t, using water that I know as well as you do wasn’t nearly warm enough to stand in for that long.”

Lucy shifted so that the sun could catch and warm her other side. “You making a point there, Bill?”

“More of an observation.”

“Hmm.”

“So… off out later then?” Billy asked, his dark eyes wide and innocent.

Lucy sighed. “Just to the pub.”

“Mmmhmmm. Meeting anyone there?”

“Why are you asking?”

Billy raised an eyebrow at her. “Because you’ve been walking around like a lost puppy for the last few weeks. And Pen says you’ve joined all the dating apps. It’s not much of a stretch to figure out that you’re on the hunt for someone, Luce.”

“I’m not hunting.”

“So you’re not off on a date tonight then?”

Lucy glared at him. “If you must know, I’m meeting the woman who isn’t a shoplifter at the pub to buy her a drink as an apology for ‘attacking’ her, as you put it.”

“And that’s not a date then?”

“No!” The word had come fast to her lips.

Billy nodded and for a second she thought he was going to let it go. But he didn’t. “Why not?”

“Well…” Lucy thought for a second. “Well, for a start she doesn’t fulfill any of my requirements. My app profile clearly says I’m looking for tall blondes with long hair and she’s… not any of those things.”

Which was true, she wasn’t. She was warm though. And solid between Lucy’s legs when she’d been astride her on the pavement like that. Sort of… comfortable.

“So?” Billy asked

“Dunno. I suppose I know what I like, what I’m looking for.”

“And you’re willing to write someone off because they don’t fit those criteria?” Billy said. “Sounds a bit shallow.”

“No, I never said that… Just, I don’t know.”

Billy grinned at her. “How many women do you invite for drinks?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Is it not? Because if there wasn’t something there, you wouldn’t have offered to buy her a drink. You’d have been horrifically embarrassed and wanted to apologize and get the hell out of Dodge and never see her again.”

Lucy opened her mouth to reply to this then closed it again because Billy might have a point. “Maybe.”

---