“I ammostcomfortable not having the hardwood ruined.” She stepped forward to grab the door and gestured emphatically for him to come inside.
He forced his feet to move, grateful to get out of the rain.
She shoved the door closed and toed the welcome mat closer to him. “Here. I’ll get you a towel and you can use the phone.” She rummaged in a basket beneath one of the display shelves and retrieved a couple of rumpled terry cloth rags. “I’m Erin Finley, by the way. One of the owners. You must be from out of town?”
“Remy Weldon, from Miami.” He mopped off his face and hands, knowing the rest of him was a lost cause. “Sorry to bother you?—”
“It’s no bother.” She was already grabbing the phone and yanking free some extra cord so she could bring it to him while he stood on the mat. “I’m glad I could help. It’s a small-town thing, you know? Be nice to strangers and all that.”
She shrugged a shoulder like it was no big deal, and something about the gesture hinted at the feminine curves beneath the overalls, catching him off guard. He hadn’t noticed women in anything but the most detached way in a long time.
Dropping the heavy, old-fashioned phone into his hands, Erin gave him a fleeting smile.
Remy swallowed hard, his thoughts all over the place. The anxiety in the car had spiraled into worries about a total stranger opening the door to him, and now this surprise awareness of her. He gripped the phone tighter.
“I didn’t mean to stand outside and let the rain in for so long,” he said finally, his brain clearly short-circuiting. “I—ah—didn’t think…”
And then no words freaking came. Remy Weldon, who’d built a career on his ability to get funding for anyshow and sweet-talk talent into any role, gaped like a fish out of water.
Not that Erin seemed to notice. She was too busy running a hand over the wooden molding on the front of the checkout counter. Pressing a thumb over one raised spot, she lifted her nail gun to the wood andthwack!put the trim back into place.
She looked at him. “I figure it’s safe enough to let a stranger inside when I’m the one carrying the air nail framer with enough compression power to staple your hands to the wall.” Her mouth stretched into a smile that he bet some guys would find intimidating. “That is, if I needed to.”
“Awesome. Good thinking.” He liked Erin immediately. Not only because she thought about a weapon to bring to the door, but also because she didn’t seem to notice the fits and starts of his speech that had plagued him the past two years. Bad enough to be caught thinking about his wife in the middle of a meeting and have everyone’s expression turn embarrassed, impatient or—worse—pitying. But then, to stumble over his own words or realize he’d lost his place in the conversation completely? He hated that.
Dialing his daughter’s phone number, Remy already felt his heart rate slowing. Some of the weight stopped crushing his chest.
“Daddy?” Sarah sounded surprised. “It’s late.”
He checked his watch and realized it was midnight. Crap.
“Sorry.” He lowered his voice even though Erin was halfway across the store, her fingers traveling over more molding around a set of bay windows. “I didn’t realize how late it was and I had trouble getting a call out in a storm. Everything okay there?”
His daughter’s exasperated sigh sounded more like a growl. With teens, the intonation of a sigh could be all you had to decode a mood sometimes.
“Fine. Everything is fine as always, and you can’t call in the middle of the night to check on me or you might wake up Mr. and Mrs. Stedder— Unless you’re calling to invite me on your scouting trip?”
She sounded so hopeful Remy hated to say no. She’d been asking that a lot lately. Why did his work travel suddenly interest her? She’d resented it mightily when he had stayed home for over a year after Liv’s death, needing to keep tabs on their daughter. Going back to work hadn’t been easy.
“Not this time, Sarah. And I thought you had a big field trip with some kids from school this week?” He wasn’t home as much as he’d like to be, but he tried to pay attention to her school activities.
“Right. Whatever. Dad, I’m tired of being at the Stedders all the time. I could help you?—”
“Tomorrow, okay?” He didn’t want to get into a disagreement now, not after how worried he’d been. He just needed his life to feel normal again tonight.
“Tomorrow? While I’m on an overnight field trip?”
“When you get home.” He wished he could get on a flight home. Now. “I promise.”
Disconnecting the call, he hoped Sarah understood. She’d been through so much.
He’d love to surprise her and show up in Miami by the time she was back from the field trip. Except he hadn’t scouted jack squat for locations unless Erin Finley could be talked into a spot.
The nail-gun-wielding store proprietor would be a great guest. Everything about the store was perfect, too,except he didn’t see many antiques besides those used as decor.
He set the store’s phone on a shelf—a shelf that used a tarnished silver cake stand to display an assortment of brooches from cameos to cubic zirconia cartoon cats. The store seemed to be a hybrid consignment shop where used and new items rubbed elbows comfortably. On second glance, he realized the “shelf” was actually a repurposed plantation shutter.
He definitely wanted to discuss the show with Erin, but dripping wet on her floor at midnight didn’t seem like the best way to make a pitch.
