Page 12 of My Redneck Baby Daddy

He’d run the whole thing off the original sketch instead of the revised one. That was gonna put us over by about two yards, and he was bracing for it.

Damn, I know that look, I took in Cody’s face and I was caught off gaurd.

I’d worn it in front of men who hollered, and my daddy had been one of them.

"All right. Call Frank back, tell him to cut it to the revised length, and if he already loaded it, we'll eat the difference. Still gotta pour the walkway with it Monday." I handed the sheet back. "Now tell me what you're gonna do different next time."

Cody had the nerve to look bashful. "Check the date on the sheet."

I nodded. "Check the date on the sheet. Every time. This one costs me about three hundred dollars, and I can live with three hundred. I can't live with it twice."

"Yes, sir,” he murmured softly and off he went.

Marcus, another member of my team, came the other way with his phone in his hand, asking could he take Friday morning because his little girl had a thing at her school and his wife was working.

"Take it," I said. "Be back by noon if you can. If you can't, don't worry about it."

When I turned around, Rue was standing there looking at me like I had done long division in my head.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"That was a whole lot of face for nothing."

Hamilton arrived and saved her by walking up with that damn cake pan. Rue handed over a grocery bag Regina had sent back.

"So y'all made it past the first date," Hamilton said grinning between the two of us.

Rue adjusted her glasses. "Barely."

"She kissed me," I said.

She whipped around. "You kissed me!"

"After you asked."

Hamilton held up both hands. "I don't need to know this."

"Then why'd you bring it up?"

He looked between us again. "Regina's gonna ask."

My phone went off before I could enjoy that, and it was Frank about the Hensley order, so I stepped off toward the shop and left the two of them standing in the dust.

I was gone maybe five minutes, and I came back across the gravel quiet enough to catch the tail of it.

"Fair," Hamilton was saying. "He expects you to work, and he'll tell you when you didn't. But I ain't missed a check in six years, and he sent my whole family groceries when Regina had her surgery." He paused. "You know he ain't the same man everybody keeps talking about, right?"

Rue was looking out across the yard at the trucks.

"I'm starting to figure that out."

"Good," Hamilton said.

I made more noise with my boots than I needed to for the last few steps, and neither one of them told me what they had been talking about.

"You eat yet?" I asked her.