“I’ll take care of handing out the eggs for you,” he said, moving to stand by the table before Susan had a chance to object. He grinned as she trotted away to direct the egg-throwers into position.
“Tyler Penrith, I saw that,” Josie said in a low voice. “You pinched that girl’s bottom.”
“Did I?” He aimed for innocent and failed. Badly.
Josie scanned his face while Tyler pretended to watch the boys throw their next egg. “Do you know her?”
“No comment.”
“We’ll take one egg please.” The elderly woman leaned forward and whispered loudly, “I’m going to throw the egg. I might aim for my husband’s head.”
Tyler chuckled and handed over an egg. “Maybe I should warn Stan his wife is gunning for him.”
“I’m more interested in learning about Susan,” Josie said.
“I want to win that date,” Tyler said.
Josie sent him a quizzical glance. “I see.”
“We could never pull anything over on you,” Tyler said.
For ten minutes, they were busy taking money and handing out eggs while Susan kept everyone honest.
Stan and his wife managed to get to the second marker before the egg broke in his hands.
“Old fool made the mistake of saying he had a thing for dancers. That will teach him,” Mabel said as she watched Stan rub at the egg yolk decorating his white shirt.
“I think a few people are interested in dancers,” Josie said with a knowing glance in Tyler’s direction.
Tyler grinned widely, his gaze going to Susan. She was good with people and already they’d collected a crowd of participants. Each waited impatiently to have their turn. When the crowd started to tail off, Tyler whispered to Josie, “You ready to have a go at winning a date?”
“Is this important to you?” Josie asked, her gaze on Susan.
“Yes.”
“Well, then,” Josie said. “I’ll bring my A game.”
“And the winner of the egg throwing competition is Josie Murdoch and Tyler Penrith,” the principal announced an hour later. “Sam Gibbs is the winner of the nail driving contest and Rita James wins the prize for guessing the correct weight of the porker. Come and collect your prizes.”
Everyone cheered, and Tyler clutched his daughter’s hand while Eric shooed Josie up to the makeshift stage to claim their prize.
“Nolan, you’ll have to share one of your girls,” someone shouted.
“Hell, he’s got three of them. Maybe I could have one too,” a male voice shouted from the rear.
“If you wanted a wife, you should have applied to appear in the reality show,” Nolan said.
“Daddy, you’re hurting my hand,” Katey objected.
Tyler loosened his grip. “Sorry, sweetie.”
“Can I do a lucky dip?” she asked.
“Soon,” Tyler promised.
He and Katey clapped hard when Josie received a certificate.
“Now that I’ve distributed the prizes and still have you gathered,” the principal said, “we’re going to do some quick fire raffles. Dig deep folks. The first prize is a meat pack donated by Judson Butchers.”
