Free Better Than You (The Walker Family Series Book 3) by Lauren Gilley Page A

out of bed by a woman.
    “I don’t care what she looks like,” Tam said, “she’s not worth however much begging you had to do.”
    “Hey, I beg for no one.”
    “You were too busy pissing her off for that,” Jordan said.
    “Jealous,” Mike insisted, but his head flopped back against the plush leather of his living room couch and he choked down the urge to tell both of them to shove it. So what if Delta still acted like she hated his damn guts? The key word was act , because he still had a shot and he was convinced she’d almost caved that morning. What the hell did Tam and Jordan know anyway? They were neck-and-neck in a race to see who could offend the most women.
    Most Sundays, beer and football put him to sleep and the three of them woke sometime after dark, covered in spilled Cheetos and hungry for ordered-in pizza. But he was restless today, even if he should have been passed out by now given he’d been awake since three.
    He fished his phone out of his pocket and shoved to his feet.
    “Oh, Mikey,” Jordan said in a breathy falsetto, “I’m so glad you called. I couldn’t wait to tell you what a douchebag you are again.”
    Mike popped his little brother in the shoulder as he rounded the arm of the couch and slipped into his galley kitchen. As he dialed, he glanced through the half-wall into the living room and saw Jordan rubbing the place where he’d been punched, grimacing. Served him right.
    Delta picked up on the third ring. “Hi,” she said, and if nothing else, it was better than last night’s hello .
    “Hey, dollface,” he greeted, and waited for the verbal slap.
    It didn’t come, though, not directly at least. “You called.” There was a clear note of surprise in her voice and he could envision the smooth arches of her brows going up her forehead.
    “I said I would.”
    “I know…but people say a lot of things.”
    Mike grinned. He was so still in the running. “How’s your day going?”
    “Good.” But she wasn’t enthusiastic about that statement.
    “You wishing you’d let me stay?”
    There was the briefest of pauses that meant yes . “No.”
    “What are you doing tonight?”
    She was somewhere quiet because he couldn’t hear even the softest murmur of background noise. Probably at home; he called up a fast mental picture of her champagne and cream bedroom, the dainty chair in the corner, and could see sunlight pouring in through the window across her face, her eyes toffee and chocolate. “You want to go out again?”
    “I want to see you again,” he corrected. “I’m having some friends over for pizza and to watch the game if you wanna come.”
    She made him wait. “Where do y ou live?”
    “Like three miles from you. I’ll text you the address and gate code.”
    “I don’t know. What time?”
    “You’re being difficult again.”
    “What time?”
    “Six.”
    “Then text away and maybe I’ll drop by.”
     
    **
     
    If Delta had learned anything about Mike Walker in the past four days, it was that when he did casual, he was pretty damn casual. She wasn’t wasting a good dress on pizza and friends, especially not when he already knew what was underneath. But as she stepped into skinny jeans and plucked her favorite red sweater out of the drawer in her closet, a ripple of nervous energy moved through her.
    After the night before, her anticipation should have been back to zero, but for some reason, she had the jitters, and the sudden knock on her door as she arranged the V neck of her sweater didn’t help.
    “Coming!” she called as she gave herself one last check in her dressing table mirror and snatched up her ankle boots on the way out the door. The knock sounded again, louder and more insistent. It was probably Regina; she’d threatened to stop by and harass her into calling Mike if she hadn’t already. “Coming, coming,” she repeated, and stood up on her tiptoes to check the peephole.
    Big-headed, elongated and distorted by the glass, it was Greg