The Cinderella Deal - Jennifer Crusie [75]
He thought about Daisy, about everything that exasperated him about her, about everything that disappointed her about him, about everything that made her Daisy, and then he left to make some changes.
When Daisy came home at eleven, she parked the Nazimobile behind a red four-wheel-drive sport van.
“Whose car is that?” she asked as she came up the walk, and then she stopped.
Linc was sitting on the porch steps with Liz, Annie, and Jupiter. The animals were wearing bright red collars, and Annie screeched her hello, and Jupiter barked and fell off the porch, and Liz opened one eye and then closed it. Linc wore a bright red sweater that matched.
“Color.” Daisy shook her head, blinded by the red.
“Come here.” Linc reached for her, and Daisy stepped back. “Linc, this is the front porch. People can see.”
“Good. Let ’em.” He pulled her down and kissed her and she blushed, but then the old heat started in her again and she relaxed into his warmth and kissed him back. She looked up dazedly and saw Dr. Banks across the street, coming down his walk. He waved, and she blushed even harder, but Linc just waved back.
“What is this?” she asked, and he said, “This is the new Linc.”
“Hey.” She tried to push him away. “I like the old Linc. Leave him alone.”
“He didn’t have enough color in his life. When’s Chickie moving in?”
“She’s not. She got a lawyer. Crawford’s moving out. She’s happier than I’ve ever seen her.”
“Good.” Linc nuzzled her hair. “Your hair smells so good. What do you put on it?”
“Shampoo. You look great in this sweater. Whose car is that?”
“Ours.”
Daisy jerked her head up. “That’s ours?”
Linc grinned. “Well, it’s ours for a test drive. If we like it, it’s ours forever, and we won’t get stuck in the snow anymore.”
Daisy stood to see it better. “Can we drive it around and wave at people? I’ve never had a new car before.”
“Later.” Linc tugged her down into his lap. “First I have to tell you a story.”
“Really?” She snuggled into his arms. “Am I too heavy for your lap?”
“No. Pay attention.” She was so warm, he held her close for a moment and couldn’t speak. Then she looked up at him, and he began.
“Once upon a time there was a prince who was imprisoned in a tower with track lighting.”
“Oh, a true story.”
“Shut up. Then along came a curly-haired witch and set him free. But he wasn’t very happy about it because the witch made him nervous.”
Daisy scowled at him, and he remembered the first time he’d seen her, in that horrible hat, and he laughed.
“Why did she make him nervous?” Daisy demanded.
“Because she was a witch. In fact, he was so nervous about her being a witch that he kept trying to change her into a princess.”
“Dumbbell,” Daisy said, and Linc said, “Exactly. And he couldn’t leave her because they’d made a deal. A Cinderella deal. He had to stay with her until midnight, no matter how weird she acted.”
Daisy stuck her nose in the air. “Must have been embarrassing for the prince.”
“What he minded most was that she kept interrupting his story.”
“Sorry.”
“Then one day the witch turned herself into a princess. She dressed in black and sat quietly and behaved herself. She also stopped telling stories.” He hugged her tighter at the thought. “It scared the prince into fits because by then he’d fallen in love with her.”
Daisy put her face close to his. “Why?”
He grinned and kissed her nose. “Because she was kind and funny and warm and great in bed. She was damn near impossible to tell stories to, though.”
“Well, it’s a long story.”
“We’re almost at the end. So the prince told the princess to change back into a witch, and she did, but they had some more problems because witches and princes are going to run into problems no matter how much they love each other.”
Daisy got very still in his arms, and he held her close.
“Some more problems?” she asked quietly.
“The kids brought us a record. We’ll play it later. Where was I? Oh, yeah. The prince, who was not a complete idiot although he acted like one sometimes, noticed that she wasn’t completely a witch, that she had changed