“Do you want the bad news or the bad news?” Landon said. It was two days after our initial tour of Milkweed Mansion. We were sitting on a couple of folding lawn chairs on the porch, which was the first project he’d tackled while I started cleaning. Now fresh boards created a solid stage here in front and where the porch popped out in the covered hexagon. He’d do the rest of the porch before the haunted house, because we figured there would be a lot of people hanging around outside for the event. That was item number one on a to-do list longer than a Super Bowl halftime show.
“There’s bad news?” I asked, knowing the whole house was bad news. It was a hot day, and we were both drinking heavily from our personal water bottles, which Landon kept filling from the giant coolers he kept in his truck. The house still didn’t have water or power, so he’d parked a port-a-potty next to the driveaway. It really classed up the joint. On the other hand, it made the bathroom we shared at the apartment seem palatial in comparison.
“Yes, there’s bad news.” He seemed content as he sat there looking over the grounds in his jeans and dusty T-shirt. In his element. “There’s evidence of dry-wood termites. If you don’t want the rest of the house to fall down around your ears, we’re probably going to have to get it tented.”
“Tented?”
“When they cover up the house and pump it full of poison gas.”
“Oh, no.”
“Oh, yes,” he said. “So we’re going to lose a few days when that happens, and we’ll have to clear the brush that’s growing really close to the house before the bug guys even come out.”
“How fast can we get someone?”
“Usually you have to schedule weeks in advance, but I’ll see what I can do. I know a guy.”
I heard my voice get smaller. “And how much is that going to cost?”
Landon took another sip of water from his metal bottle, then looked at me. “I know a guy.”
“No, really. No one is going to do that for free. How much?”
He mumbled something into his bottle.
“What?”
“Maybe eighteen thousand dollars.”
I dropped my plastic bottle. Since the lid was off, water splashed everywhere. “You’re kidding.”
He gave me a half smile. “I’m not kidding nearly as much as you think I am. It’s about two dollars per square foot. This place is about nine thousand square feet. Ergo…”
“This isn’t happening.” I set my bottle upright on the solid new floorboards and stood at the railing, which wiggled under my hands.Cha-ching.
“Don’t get discouraged.” He got up and stood next to me, bumping my shoulder with his.
A volcanic burst of warmth shot through my already hot body, but I shrugged him off, not in the mood for comfort. Or the kind of heat he’d been igniting in my blood since I brought him into this strange house.
I wiggled the railing again. “Why not get discouraged? I can’t afford that.”
“First, if the termites defeat you, you might as well walk away. This is going to be the first of many battles with the house. For the house. Do you want to do this?”
I looked up at him. Landon was definitely not kidding, and he had an earnest, determined look in his eyes, like he was a knight about to go into battle.
It was disturbingly sexy.
I surveyed the gloomy oaks, the scrubby plants, the ramshackle gazebo and the sparkle of the river in the distance, then turned back to him. “I want to do this.”
“Are yousure?Because youcan,but you have toreallywant it.”
There was something so confident and reassuring in his gaze, I couldn’t help nodding.
“OK, then. I know a guy, and he might want to get on that list of sponsors I was talking about. We’ll probably have to pay something, but it won’t be terrible.”
“It’s notwe,Landon. I mean, I’m really grateful you’re going to help me, but I’m the one who needs to pay for this.” I mentally calculated what was in my bank account and the limits on my two credit cards. “I’ll figure it out.”
“We’ll figure it out.” He smiled then, a lesser version of the Fireworks, this one more reassuring.
