Ladies' Night by Andrews, Kay (popular books of all time .TXT) 📕

“I’m going to clean up the kitchen, sweep the floor, and take out a week’s worth of garbage. I already cleaned and disinfected the bathroom, so don’t either of you dare go in there.”

“What if I gotta pee?” Bo asked.

“Take it outside,” his father said.

“Who’s coming over, the queen of England?” Nelson griped. He was folding T-shirts and shorts and underpants, matching socks.

“It’s Grace, Dad’s new girlfriend,” Bo told his grandfather.

“Who told you Grace was my girlfriend?” Wyatt said. “I never said that.”

“Well, she is, isn’t she?” Nelson asked.

“Anna said it’s okay for Dad to have a girlfriend, since Mom already has you know who,” Bo commented.

“Remind me to have a discussion with Anna about minding her own business,” Wyatt said. “In the meantime, just get busy, you two. She’ll be here in, like, ten minutes. And she’s bringing dinner, so be nice. And whatever she brings, pretend like you like it.”

“What if she brings fried liver?” Bo asked. “Or lima beans?”

“Or tofu?” Nelson said darkly. “I’m warning you right now. I don’t do tofu.”

“If she tries to make me eat liver and lima beans, I’ll blow chow,” Bo said.

“She’s not bringing liver or tofu,” Wyatt said. “Just remember what I told you. Nice.”

“I’m always nice,” Nelson said under his breath. He looked over at Bo, who was busily wadding up the newspapers and paper bags and stuffing them under the sofa. “Aren’t I always nice?”

Bo gave it some thought. “Mostly. Except when my mom calls.”

*   *   *

Wyatt sprayed the chipped Formica countertops with Windex and surveyed the kitchen. He had no idea what Grace’s reaction would be to his place. He knew she’d lived in some mansion, because he’d surreptitiously looked at pictures of the place on her old blog. It was huge, with something like five bedrooms and four bathrooms, a screening room, home gym, swimming pool, pool house. Hell, from the looks of it, her pool house was bigger than his crappy little double-wide.

Still, she seemed happy enough, working over at the house on Mandevilla, even admitting she’d fantasized about living there. Maybe she wouldn’t turn around and run screaming into the night after she got a look at this dump.

At least it was a fairly tidy dump now. He’d picked some zinnias from the flower bed by the back door and stuck them in an empty jelly jar. The table looked okay, set with his mother’s good dishes, the ones with little sprigs of blue cornflowers and gold edges. The silverware all matched, and there were paper napkins at every place, which was a huge step up from the usual roll of paper towels he kept on the table.

But there were only three chairs. How had he missed that? At one time, the dinette set had four chairs, but just a few months ago Bo had been leaning back in his chair when one of the back legs buckled and cracked. He’d meant to try to fix that. But it was too late now. He hurried through the house, looking for an extra chair. Nothing. In desperation, he went out to the carport, found an old plastic beach chair, and dragged it inside. He frowned. It was too short. He went out to the living room, where Nelson and Bo were again wrapped up in the baseball game. He snatched a throw pillow from the sofa and tossed it onto the seat of the chair, just as he heard a knock at the door.

Wyatt wiped his sweaty palms on the seat of his shorts and went to answer the door.

*   *   *

As Rochelle’d predicted, the taco casserole was a hit with the Keeler men.

“Pretty good,” Nelson said, scraping a last bit of hamburger, tomato sauce, and cheese from his plate. He pointed at the nearly empty Pyrex dish Grace had used to warm up the casserole. “Is that a Frito?”

“Afraid so,” Grace said. “Not very healthy, I know, but…”

Before she could apologize further, Nelson reached across the table and scooped up the last remaining spoonful.

“Dad loves Fritos,” Wyatt said. “Almost as much as chicken potpie.”

“Just the Marie Callender’s ones,” Nelson said. “Not Swanson. The Marie Callender’s are more expensive, but I can usually find a coupon in the Sunday paper.”

“Dad does most of the grocery shopping,” Wyatt said. “He’s a fiend for those coupons. Knows where all the best deals are.”

Nelson beamed at the compliment. “Do you like baked beans? Because I’ve got an extra BOGO for Bush’s baked beans at Winn-Dixie this week.”

“What’s a BOGO?” Wyatt asked.

“Buy one, get-one,” Grace said. “And yes, I’d love a coupon, if you’ve got an extra.”

Dinner, she thought, had been a breeze. It was so cute, the way Wyatt had obviously gone to such pains to make a good impression. She looked down at her plate. “I know this china pattern. It’s Bachelor’s Button, right?”

“Uh, maybe,” Wyatt said.

“That’s right,” Nelson volunteered. “It was our wedding china. Peggy picked it out. Blue flowers were always her favorite.”

“Mine too,” Grace confided. “Bachelor’s buttons, or cornflowers, any shade of hydrangea, iris, those deep-blue pansies with the little clown faces…”

“Plumbago?” Wyatt said. “You like plumbago?”

“I love it, especially the ferny leaves,” Grace said.

“I grow it in our nursery here,” Wyatt said. “We could dig up some clumps and plant it at Mandevilla if you want, maybe a swath of it in front of the gardenias by the porch. The lighter green foliage would be a good contrast against the dark-green gardenia leaves.”

“Great idea,” Grace said. She looked around the table, beaming at the sight of all the empty plates. “I brought dessert, if anyone’s interested.”

“I’m interested,” Bo said.

“You’re interested in any kind of food,” Nelson observed.

“Except liver and lima beans,” the child said. “Gross.”

Grace laughed. “I have to agree with you there. Totally, gag-me-with-a-spoon gross.”

She’d sliced the brownie pie into generous squares and arranged them on one of the chipped white plates she’d found in the cupboard. Now, she set it in the center of the table. “My mom’s brownie