“Give me fifteen minutes to clean up, and we’ll have dinner.” She stepped back from the door and gestured for him to follow her inside where the odor of fresh paint was pervasive. “I was fixing the hole Truck put in the wall, and once I got going, I decided to change the color.” She took a measuring look at the dark orange wall. “What do you think?”

“It’s not one you see every day.”

“I know,” she said with a laugh. “You probably think I’m crazy.”

“Not at all. I like it.”

“You don’t have to say that. I’m not sure I like it. I’d hoped it would be warm and welcoming, but it’s just kinda…orange.”

He laughed. “That it is, but you might like it better when you finish.”

“Maybe. What do you feel like eating? Pizza?”

Watching her talk about the paint had him oddly captivated, which gave him the courage to take a gamble. “I had something a little nicer in mind. Maybe Stephanie’s?”

“Oh.”

“That doesn’t sound good to you?”

“It sounds expensive. I don’t need that if you don’t.”

“It’s not that I need it. I thought it would be fun, and you might enjoy it. After all the nights you’ve fed me lately, I wanted to return the favor.”

“Pizza would be fine.”

“I’ve heard such raves about Stephanie’s, but I haven’t had time to try it yet,” he said, hoping to cajole her.

“I don’t have anything to wear there.”

David wanted to shoot himself for not thinking of that. “No problem. We can go there another time.” Great, he thought, commit to a second date when this one was starting off so well.

“I might have one thing that would work.”

“We can go wherever you want. It wasn’t my intention to make you uncomfortable.”

She shocked the hell out of him when she went up on tiptoes to kiss his cheek. “I know, and you didn’t. I’ll be quick.”

After she dashed upstairs to change, he stood rooted to the spot where she’d left him, his cheek still tingling from her impulsive kiss. If she could unman him with a simple kiss to the cheek, what would a real kiss with her be like?

He’d never kissed anyone but Janey. And the woman he’d cheated on her with, of course.

Remembering that incident jarred him out of his thoughts about kissing Daisy, and he wandered over to plop down on the old sofa she’d once delightedly told him she found abandoned by the side of the road outside of town. He recalled her pleasure in telling him about the find.