Page 33 of One Bride for Three Single Dads

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Harrison sneers as he picks up his phone. “Neither one of you knows how to do this? Jesus. It has been a long, long time since either of you got any pussy.”

“Online dating is gross,” Ambrose sniffs.

Harrison glances up from his phone only long enough to raise his eyebrows in challenge at Ambrose. “Oh yeah? Are you getting a lot of action offline, then?”

Ambrose just sucks his teeth in response. Never mind.

And I have heard of it, of course, but I never tried it. Besides, Anastasia still lives just a few miles from here. What if I saw her? Good God, what she saw me? Online?

No way. Knowing that she is still around is one of the things I found most attractive about Ireland, truth be told. It’s pretty far fucking away.

Harrison keeps the phone close to his chest, but I can still see.

“Oh, wow, those are girls!” I blurt out.

“What the fuck else did you expect them to be?” Harrison sniffs.

“Yeah, well, you know what I mean. They’re cute. Wait, what was wrong with that one? Are you clicking Nope on all of them?”

He scowls as he stares at the screen, tapping the X button way too fast for my liking. Shouldn’t he give them a chance? How are you supposed to get to know somebody?

“I’m just looking for… you know. Something special. Something that feels right.”

“Do any of them say that they are looking for three boyfriends at once?” Ambrose calls out sarcastically.

Harrison just ignores him. Thank God.

“See, people think you can’t tell anything from a picture, but you totally can. This one with the cats? No. This one with the nine-year-old child? No. This one, no way she is twenty-four. More like fifty-four.”

Then he stops.

“What? Something better?” I ask, craning my neck to see what he sees.

He pauses, grinning, then holds the phone out to me.

“Yeah, wow, hot…” I reply, instantly taken by the glowing, bronzed skin. The sunlit smile. The sassy angle of the sunglasses down to the tip of the nose…

Oh, what?

“Hey…”

“What is it?” Ambrose asks, finally curious. “Can I see? Is she hot?”

“Fuck yeah, she is hot,” Harrison grins, now all teeth.

He punches the screen with his thumb. The screen changes.

Ambrose leans over.

“Is that…

Across the room, I hear a door open, just a click. The far hallway lightens with the sunlight from Jolene’s room.

Harrison waves like a crazy person over his head.

“It’s a match!” he yells out, still waving.

She takes a couple of steps into the hallway. She is still wearing her nightgown. Her hair is still a mess.

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