Laura felt a twinge of guilt—albeit a very tiny twinge—for playing in Cassidy’s pool before she’d even done one single thing that constituted yardwork. She was mentally planning flowerbeds, she’d told herself as way of an excuse. But she really didn’t need an excuse, did she? No. Cassidy had given her permission to use the pool. She never once put qualifiers on it.
And it was simply glorious. The water looked crisp and blue. Refreshing. And oh, it was. And she’d had two beers. And she was relaxed. No, there would be no yardwork this afternoon. She’d make up for it tomorrow. She’d head into town—in Frankie’s old truck—and buy the materials she’d need for the flowerbed. She’d also buy two large planters for out here at the pool. She’d definitely get those done before Cassidy came on Friday.
She sighed as she looked up into the sky. Wonder who she’ll bring this weekend? She shook her head as the float bumped an edge and she shoved off with her foot, pushing her back into the middle. She didn’t profess to know Cassidy in the least. They’d only had a handful of conversations, after all. But still, she seemed nice. Normal. Attractive. Really attractive. Obviously wealthy enough to afford this huge ass house. She’d seen her car—a Mercedes. So yeah, she probably could get any date she wanted. Why then would she settle for these bimbos that she’d had over?
Oh, in all fairness, bimbo might be too strong a word. She’d not actually spoken to any of them. No, but she’d seen them through binoculars, seen enough to know that not a single one of them was a keeper. But even though those women weren’t her type, that didn’t mean they weren’t Cassidy’s type.
“The worst taste,” she murmured.
The ringing of her phone brought her around and she paddled as fast as she could to the side, sliding the towel toward her, the towel that her phone rested on. Her eyes widened when she saw who it was. Crap!
She cleared her throat before answering. “Hello.”
“Hey…it’s me. Cassidy.”
“Hi.” She looked around her guiltily, hoping Cassidy couldn’t hear the sound of the pool water lapping at her float.
“Am I calling at a bad time?”
“No, no. I’m just…just…actually, I’m over at your place. Scoping out possible flowerbeds,” she lied.
“Oh, that’s great. I was just thinking, it was presumptuous of me to expect you to pay for everything and get reimbursed later. I mean—”
“A couple of hundred bucks won’t break me,” she said.
“Well, I didn’t know. I assumed you didn’t have a job.”
“Actually, I don’t.”
“Independently wealthy?”
Laura snorted. “In my dreams. I’m…” What? A writer? “I’m taking a break from…from my job. My mother needed someone to stay with her after Frankie died. I got the short straw.”
“Oh, I see. Well, this weekend, if you could give me an idea of what you’re spending, then I’ll leave some cash for you to use. In fact, I should have done that anyway.”
“Cassidy, you don’t—”
“I’ll leave it in the pool closet,” she said, ignoring Laura’s protest. “Whatever you take out, put a receipt in. That’s fair, right?”
It would help, she acknowledged. Lately, if she kept more than five hundred dollars in her checking account, it was an anomaly. She had been milking her savings account for the last year, touching it as little as possible. Still, to be thirty-seven years old—thirty-eight in two days—and barely have ten thousand dollars in savings was a little scary.
“Okay. Deal.”
“Great.” A pause. “So…how’s the pool?”
Laura rolled her eyes. “I swear, do you have a sixth sense or what?”
Cassidy laughed. “Don’t drown. It’s so hard to find good yard help these days.” Another light laugh. “I’ll see you over the weekend.”
Laura was smiling as she placed her phone back on the towel. So much for feeling guilty. There was no need to now. Cassidy knew she was in the pool. She flipped off the float, dipping under the water to cool off.
Yep, she had a pretty sweet deal going on here.
* * *
Cassidy twirled around in her chair, a smile still playing on her face. So Laura Fry was in her pool. She wondered what she was wearing. She didn’t picture her as the bikini type. She was a little too tomboyish for that. Of course, she’d been called a tomboy more times than she could count and she still wore a bikini on occasion. But hell, at what age do you give up the bikini and go to a one-piece?
“When your body tells you to,” she murmured. “Or your friends tell you to.”
She tapped her thigh absently with her fingers, her mind still on Laura. She was…nice? Would she call her nice? Their first couple of conversations weren’t exactly pleasant. She grinned quickly. She’d called Laura a bitch. Oh, that was so bad, she thought, still smiling. But yeah, she would call her nice. And honest. She could have very well denied being in the pool, even though Cassidy had heard the subtle sound of water. And she could have denied watching the pool from her upstairs window, but she hadn’t. All she’d accused Cassidy of having was a sixth sense, thus admitting that it was true.
She turned back around to face her desk, wondering how she was going to kill the last few hours of the afternoon. The company was running like a well-oiled machine. Her brother had a handle on the crews. Tanya managed the office staff without much help from her. She’d already gone over the new marketing plan and had approved it. There was no crisis for her to handle since the glitch with the online appointments had been fixed. There was actually nothing for her to do. Maybe she should take a page out of her father’s book. He was out at the lake, on his boat.
But she needed something to do. Something to organize, to plan. She smiled slightly. A party. A pool party. A real pool party. The one she’d thrown earlier had been more party and less pool, even though some had taken advantage of the heated water. But a daytime party sounded like more fun. A casual party with burgers or hot dogs on the grill. Or catered again. She mentally went over her list of friends, trying to come up with twenty or twenty-five who would mesh in that casual setting. Memorial Day Weekend was coming up. Could she plan a party in less than two weeks?
She decided she could.