Page 58 of Beautiful Life

And I’ll do everything I can to keep her here.

*****

Leigh

“Do not go see your mother. And do not answer your phone if she calls. Don’t answer her texts, either. I’ll call you as soon as I hear from Mac. The crew should be here finishing the fence, call me if they need anything. If there’s something special you want for dinner, let me know, I’ll pick it up on the way home or we can cook here. And you know the code, keep the alarm set. But call me if you need anything else.”

“Good gravy, bossy man. Would you just leave already? I was happy to have the day off from the front desk, but now I’m freaking elated I get to spend the day with Leigh and not you. You’re awful. Why she likes you, I’ll never know.”

Yep, this is Tony giving me orders for the day. And yep, again, this is Paige not putting up with crap from her older brother. Here I am again, sitting silently in the middle of yet another one of their sibling verbal combats.

“Bite me, pest,” Tony spits, glaring at Paige. “Why are you complaining, you have the day off.”

Paige rolls her eyes at her brother and they eventually land on me. “Honest to goodness. I like you Leigh. I like you in the middle of the chaos that’s my family, but seriously. Why do you like him?”

I press my lips together to keep from smiling and look to Tony. He’s glaring murderously at his sister and I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing.

Finally, Tony sighs, looks to the ceiling. “Fuck me.”

“We’re good, honey,” I interject quietly, still trying to suppress my grin. “Go to work.”

“We’re cooking today,” Paige informs Tony. “My friend is paying me to make dinner for a party of six tonight since she can hardly manage Ramen Noodles. And because I like Leigh,” she stresses, “I brought enough to make dinner for her. If she feels the urge, she can share with you,” she finishes, smiling fake-like at her brother.

Tony glares at his sister then looks to me and shakes his head. I just shrug, losing my battle to suppress my grin. He moves to where I’m sitting on a stool at his kitchen island, grabs his suit jacket with one hand and tags me behind the head with the other, leaning down to kiss me. He pulls back two inches, I smile big and he shakes his head, barely grinning back.

“Bye,” he says.

“Have a good day,” I respond.

He kisses me quickly one more time, moves around me and while passing Paige on her stool next to me, quickly sticks out his elbow and jabs her shoulder hard enough to make her rock to the side.

“Hey!” Paige yells and, just as quickly, reaches around and punches him in the back of the arm.

I hear Tony laugh as he makes his way to the garage door where he slams it shut.

I look back at Paige when I hear her talking while she moves to the coffee pot. “I mean, I know why you like him. If he wasn’t my brother and gross, I’d think he was hot, too. I’m just really glad he finally picked someone I like. We all like you, Leigh. Everyone’s happy you’re together now that the proverbial cat is finally out of the proverbial bag. But I will tell you this, love has made him way more annoying than his normal level of annoying, which I thought was off the charts to begin with.” She turns holding up the coffee pot and raises her eyebrows in question, silently asking me if I want another cup. I silently give her a nod and she moves to me with the pot. “We’ve never seen him like this. The Carpino women have been chewing it up all weekend since the wedding Saturday. And Sophia passed on the intel about your new dog, which I hear is cute by the way.”

“He is,” I agree.

“I can’t wait to meet him,” Paige keeps on. “I love dogs. And it was a hoot to hear Soph go on about how Lanny told her all about how pissed Tony was about showing you a Golden Doodle because he wanted some manly dog. Knowing Tony, he probably Googled the Top Ten Dogs Containing the Most Testosterone or something ridiculous like that. But she said yours is blonde with wavy hair. I Googled them last night and, hoe-ly smokes, so cute! As much as my brother annoys me, the three of you are going to look like you stepped out of a fashion magazine. Tony, tall and dark. You, tall, blonde with your model-like body, and your precious curly, blond Golden Doodle sitting at your feet? Perfection.”

“Tony was pissed about Finny being a Golden Doodle?” I ask.

Paige plops her petite behind attached to her petite body down on the stool next to me with her coffee answering an affirmative, “Uh-huh,” into her coffee. “But from the sounds of it from Lanny, who told Sophia, who told Charlotte, who told my mom, he was completely wooed by seeing you with the dog and couldn’t say no.”

“Huh,” I mutter into my own coffee cup.

But before I can lament the fact Tony got a dog that he didn’t want—basically for me, which I already knew, but can’t really let myself think about—Paige keeps talking. “You guys are coming to Joe’s party, right?”

“What party?” I ask.

“Figures.” Paige huffs in frustration. “Men are so last minute with stuff. I mean, you’re gonna need time to get a costume together.”

“Costume?”

“Well, sort of. You’ll need an eighties outfit. So, to me that’s a costume. My cousin, Micah, has a birthday party for her husband, Joe, every year. It’s their thing. She throws him a party on his birthday and he takes her away for a long weekend on hers. Anyway, Joe loves a party and he’s a total product of the eighties—wha-la an eighties theme this year. Now that I’m thinking about it, Tony probably doesn’t want to go because he doesn’t want to dress up, but you have to come. It’s gonna be a blast. And I’m doing the food.”

Trying not to let that feeling seep into me that Tony and I have plans like people have when they’re couples, I say, “I’ll have to see if Tony wants to go.”

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