Page 6 of Quid Pro Beau

“Ten miles from your house.”

“It’s not ten miles.” More like seven, but what the fuck ever!

“You’re playing with fire, brother.”

“By walking my dog? Hardly.” Am I being deliberately obtuse? Yes, of course I am. Does Romeo know what I’m doing? Also, yes. Still, I’m not ready to admit to my—whatever this is, because it is most definitely not an obsession.

“So you drove your truck to this side—over here, away from your house—to walk your dog?”

“You know how skittish Mouse is. There are some corgis in my neighborhood and their barking at the fence always makes Mouse nervous,” I say.

“Corgis?”

“Yes. Two of them. They’re a menace.”

“They’re smaller than my feet.”

“Only because you’re a big motherfucker.” I exhale. “Was there a point to this phone call?”

“Just a reminder that Flynn was pretty clear on Daisy being off-limits,” Romeo says.

“I’m just walking my dog.”

“Dude, I saw the way you looked at her when Flynn brought her out to the sanctuary,” Romeo says.

I look up then and see the sun glint off of some golden curls. My heart thunders in my chest. For fuck’s sake, I’ve become a damned cliche. But that is obviously her walking towards me.

“I’m hanging up on you,” I tell my buddy.

He just laughs.

Daisy’s thick curves are outlined by a bright pink sports bra that is barely containing her magnificent tits. Her hips and thighs are encased in some sort of black, skintight fabric clearly handed down from the gods. It clings and molds, accenting the flare of her wide hips and the shapely curves of her thighs. Goddammit if I’m not getting a fucking hard on just watching her walk towards me.

I stop my progress on the sidewalk as she draws closer. Recognition lights her features.

“Beau? Right?” she says in that sweet voice of hers.

“Yeah,” I say, conversation genius that I am.

Her cheeks are flushed pink, and that color continues down her throat onto the pale, freckled skin above her distracting cleavage. She’s the prettiest woman I’ve ever seen in real life. Probably the prettiest woman in the world.

Mouse immediately walks over to her and presses his leg against her body. When he does that on me, he hits my thigh. But on Daisy since she’s not tall and he is, he hits her right in the belly. She scratches his chin, and he looks up at her, completely smitten.

I get it buddy, I really do. I don’t understand it, but I get it.

Maybe it’s her pheromones.

What am I even saying?

Mouse shifts his body back to me.

“It’s almost too hot out here to walk,” Daisy says. She holds up the t-shirt she was wearing, now discarded across her shoulder. “Normally I wouldn’t just walk around town like this, but it just got too hot. Not sure if it’s the hormones or what.”

I want to tell her that she should always dress like that. Or wear even less. Any of that would work well for me. But seriously, it’s like my brain has left the building.

“You look perfect,” I say, then glance away, clearing my throat. “That is to say, I hear you about the heat. I normally end up taking mine off too.”

Which is completely a lie. I would never take my shirt off out here in the open. And bare all of my scars for the entire town to see? No thank you. Still, I just said those words to her. They seem to give her some comfort because she smiles at me.