Clean Slate Read Online Free PDF

come along, too. She’d
give him that much credit. But his jaw would have started flapping from the
very first twang of the slide guitar, and he wouldn’t have stopped criticizing
until days or weeks later.
    Before the divorce, she’d gotten to the point she just
wouldn’t go anywhere anymore because the fun wasn’t worth the aftermath. She’d
tried to go off on her own a time or two without him, but Barry had always
found out and given her the third degree. “Who were you with? What’d you do?
Why are you so late?”
    “Who were you with?”
    “Who were you with?”
    “Who were you with?”
    Always the same damned thing, and she regretted it took
her as long as it did to reach her breaking point.
    Then, a year passed before she even thought about being
with anyone else. The marriage had left a bad taste in her mouth, and she knew
she wasn’t being entirely fair in judging other men before they’d had a chance
to meet or exceed Barry’s particular brand of fuck-up-itude.
    Still, she wasn’t going to start letting her guard down
for a man who was due to return to Europe in a bit over two weeks. That just
sounded like the worst kind of stupid. She was a lot of things, but stupid
wasn’t one of them…regardless of what Barry had said.
    “That was a damn fine concert,” Charlie said as they
waited comfortably on the benches for the amphitheater to clear out. “Well
worth the cost of park admission.”
    “You’re not a fan of roller coasters, Charlie?” Daisy
asked.
    He rubbed the sandy blond scruff on his chin and shook his
head. “I tolerate them for Nikki, but I kinda like having my feet planted
firmly on the ground.”
    “I suppose you’d never take a trans-Atlantic flight?” Ben
asked.
    Charlie closed his eyes and shook his head again. “Fuck.
No.”
    “How about you, Daisy? Do much traveling?”
    “No.” She could never afford it.
    “Want to?”
    They stood. The crowd had thinned enough that the trio
could make it up the aisle without becoming separated.
    She had to think about it. She’d never fantasized much
about traveling, save for the occasional thought of being on a tropical island.
Perhaps in a little hut with no air-conditioning where she’d be forced to
lounge around semi-clothed or else sweat to death. Maybe she could share a
double-hammock and a bucket of ice with a tall, sexy swimmer with an accent she
couldn’t make out half the damn time.
    “Daisy?” Ben nudged.
    She gulped. “Yes. I want to.”
    “Where do you want to go?”
    “Oh, nowhere in particular.”
    “Ever thought of visiting Europe?”
    She laughed. “I haven’t, really. Seems like such a cold,
rainy place.”
    “Parts of it are. Doesn’t get hot in Belgium like it does
here. I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to the feeling I’m being roasted alive.”
    “Hmm. I love the humidity, but I can’t handle the sun…for
obvious reasons.” She held out her pale forearms.
    “I’ve never had sunburn.”
    She stopped walking and stared at him. “You’re lying.”
    “Nope. I’m an indoor swimmer.”
    Charlie turned and said, “Don’t worry, Ben. You’ll have
your very first one tonight, judging by the way your nose looks right now. If
you stay out of the sun, you might be golden brown instead of lobster-esque by
the time the wedding rolls around.”
    “Hmm.” Ben pressed two fingers against his forearm and
watched the coloring shift from pink to white and back to pink.
    “N-by-N makes a sunburn butter that’s pretty good. Makes
the itching less noticeable.”
    “Itching?”
    “Oh, yeah. It’ll burn, then it’ll itch before it starts
peeling.”
    “ Peeling ?”
    “Yep. It’ll be all done before the wedding, I promise.
Jerry and Trinity probably have some burn butter at the house. Lord knows Jerry
gets a burn or two each summer those first couple times he forgets to take his
wetsuits to the beach. Remind ’em when y’all get home.”
    Daisy gave Ben’s hand a little squeeze to get