Page 66 of Nailed (Dad Bod Contracting 3)
Me, with an eye-roll emoji: Neither of you are cold. It’s just a defense mechanism.
Nova: quit analyzing us, Laurel.
Me: I’m not. I just can’t help being observant of human nature.
Nova: okay, enough mushy shit. Imogen, would you like me to officially come out of retirement to plan your double-fake surprise party?
Imogen: I mean, yeah, I’d love that! But you don’t have to. I don’t want you to feel obligated.
Nova: Having real, actual friends is kind of fun. It would be my pleasure.
Imogen: You can’t see, but I’m totally squealing like a crazy person right now. I hate planning parties.
Nova: I suppose this means I’ll have to dust off my sense of fun. It’s kind of rusty at the moment.
Audra: Hey, I think that was a joke!
Nova: Sort of. Okay, not really. I stopped having fun a long time ago.
Audra: Well, you let yourself get adopted by the wrong people in that case, because Imogen and I are addicted to fun.
Nova: Maybe I let myself get adopted by you exactly because you have fun. Maybe I missed being fun, and having friends, and I’m hoping you guys will help me get out of my cold, neurotic, antisocial bitch shell.
Audra: Well if that’s the case, then you got it exactly right!
Me: Hey, I like fun too!
Imogen: I have a feeling this party is going to be the bestest best thing ever!
Audra: Will there be strippers? Because there should totally be strippers.
Nova: Yes, Audra. Strippers are definitely appropriate for a baby shower.
Audra: Strippers are never appropriate, which is why they’re always appropriate. And I mean the male kind. If I wanted to see sexy naked bitches, I’d throw us a pajama party.
Nova: what the hell does that mean?
Audra: you guys all come over, we get drunk and end up naked playing truth or dare while listening to The Greatest Showman soundtrack.
Imogen: That sounds fun.
Me: Actually, it does.
Imogen: I can’t drink, but I don’t need to be drunk for any of that! Plus, someone would need to babysit you lushes.
Me: I have to go, my son is done with basketball practice and I need to feed him. Bye, bitches!
I put my phone away as Nate trots over, sweaty and grinning. “Hey, buddy! Ready for dinner?”
“Yeah!” he shouts. “I’m starved. Can we have mac ’n cheese with bacon in it?”
I laugh as we head to my car. “Sure. You make the macaroni, I’ll make the bacon.”
A few minutes later, we’re home, and Nate immediately starts making the macaroni. It was the first thing I taught him to cook, and now he’s basically a pro.
We’re sitting down to eat about twenty minutes later when the doorbell rings.
I sigh. “I’ll get it. Go ahead and eat, Nate.”
I’m anticipating the worst as I open the front door. Instead of Paul, however, it’s a young man in dirty jeans, a baggy Bears hoodie, wearing a backward Blackhawks hat, and holding a clipboard.
“Laurel Madison?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say, my voice trepidatious.
He holds out the clipboard. “I have a delivery for you. Sign at the bottom, please.”
“A delivery of what, and from whom?”
He digs in the kangaroo pouch of his hoodie and pulls out an envelope, hands it to me. I open it, and within is a small rectangle of plain white linen paper. On the front is a simple line drawing of a single rose, done in black ink. On the back, in the same black ink, in neat, all-caps block handwriting that I somehow know immediately is Ryder’s, is a short message:
If I’m going to send you flowers, it’ll look like this. —Ryder
“Oh dear,” I mumble to myself, signing the slip, and then look up to address the delivery guy. “So, you have some flowers for me?”
The young man’s eyes widen and he blows out a breath and nods his head. “You could say that.”
I frown. “What does that mean?”
He just laughs. “Just…leave the door propped open.”
I snort. “Did he go overboard?”
The guy scoops his hat off, scrubs his hand through his hair, and replaces the hat. “All I can say is, either he messed up really bad, or he really likes you.”
I prop the door open, and the delivery guy enters…wheeling a dolly on which are three giant boxes.
He opens the first box and pulls out a vase filled with a dozen red roses.
Then a second.
A third, and fourth.
The next box contains another four vases, each filled with a dozen roses.
Same with the third box.
I groan and laugh at the same time. “Oh my god. Seriously?”
The delivery guy gives me a stare. “That’s just the first load.”
“The what?”
He grins, indicating the now-empty boxes. “This is just the first three boxes.”
I close my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose. “Of how many?”
The guy glances out the front door at the cube van parked rear-end first in my driveway. “A lot.”
