He tucked a finger under his collar, dragged the fabric away from his neck. I couldn't explain it but I wanted—I wanted to lick him there. "I didn't expect to, you know, feel anything."
"Mmhmm," I repeated.
"I thought my ex had reached in and torn out my heart with a soldering iron and I was incapable of doing anything but slowly bleeding to death."
Again, "Mmhmm."
He looked up at me, his brow wrinkled and his lips pulled up in a slight grin. "But I wanted to beat the shit out of that guy just now."
"And that's a good thing? I wouldn't call that progress, Rob."
He laughed. "It's something. It's a lot more than I've managed in months." He brought his fingers to his temples, his smile faltering. "But you should know I don't share. I can't. Not after what she—no, we're not poisoning this air with that story."
"I'm helping Ben with construction because I don't want him to accidentally take down the power grid in my neighborhood," I said. "Not for any"—those forearms flashed in my mind before I chased them away with an impatient eyeroll—"other reason."
Rob pressed both palms to his eyes and let out a groan. The noise was deep, sexy. "Yeah, it's not you I'm worried about, Magnolia. It's the way that guy looked at you."
He pulled his hands away from his eyes and pushed to his feet. A pang of sadness quivered through my belly when I realized he was leaving. Despite our odd history, I had a soft spot for Rob and all his personal drama. I didn't want to nurse him back to health, but I enjoyed the guy.
Instead of leaving, Rob rounded the table and beckoned toward me. "Stand up," he ordered.
I stood but asked, "Excuse me?" That was how I rolled—I followed directions while arguing about them.
"Just—just come here," Rob said, gripping my elbow. He tugged me closer and slipped a hand up my spine, into my hair. He gazed down at me, his focus locked on my lips. "I don't know whether I should resent you for making me feel again or love you for it." Before I could respond, he continued. "Don't say anything. I already know."
Then he kissed me.
Lips, tongues, hands, heat, sighs—all at once. Everything beyond us dissolved. The bakery, this city, the convoluted premise behind our lunch date. None of it existed when I pressed my hands to his back and urged him closer.
I was certain he hadn't gone looking for it but somewhere between yanking me into his arms and claiming my mouth, he stumbled upon my bleak blankness.
Chapter Thirteen
My date was a disaster.
Ben knew nothing about home improvement. Nothing worth knowing. Still, he wielded his tools with a swagger that suggested otherwise.
"Stop, stop," I yelled, waving my hands to get his attention. He was cutting plywood to replace parts of the subfloor in the living room, but even from ten feet away I knew he was doing it wrong.
Ben switched off the saw and pushed his safety goggles to his forehead. "What now?"
I walked over to him, studying the long, narrow strips of plywood on the bench. "What…what are you doing?"
He gave meisn't it obvioushands. "Cutting the flooring, just like you told me to."
I stared at the boards for a long moment. "But why? Given the dimensions of that room, you should only need to cut a few pieces. The rest can be nailed down as is."
Ben glanced between me and the saw bench, his lips pressed together in a scowl. "If you say so," he murmured. "I just thought it would look better if they were all the same size. Fancier, you know?"
I brought my gloved fist to my lips to hold back a laugh. It was better than crying—which was how I wanted to react after taking a hard look at Ben's work—but I didn't want to be cruel.
"Right, so, this isn't the floor-floor," I said, dropping both hands on the boards. "This is the subfloor. We put this floor down, the subfloor, to keep the actual flooring surface level and steady. In other words, we're going to put something on top of this. Something fancy."
Ben blinked at me for a second before ripping his goggles off his head and chucking them across the room. "I fucking hate this shit," he yelled. "Fuckinghateit."
Before meeting Ben this morning, I'd decided I wasn't going to mention anything about our run-in at the bakery. I didn't want to harvest any of those sentiments again and I didn't want to defend myself or Rob. Also, I wasn't sure I wanted to return to the alternative universe where he was sorta-kinda-maybe flirting with me. Without my boob flapping in the wind, I didn't understand the motivation for it at all. And even if he was flirting with me, I didn't have the brain space to juggle two men. If history served as any proof, I barely possessed the skill to juggle a single man.
Instead, I'd slipped into my favorite on-the-job jeans and t-shirt, laced up my boots, and stepped into boss mode. No time was wasted on pleasantries. I rattled off a list of basic tasks for Ben while I set to righting some of the more alarming issues at this property. I didn't ask after his intentions for this remodel or why I'd seen several people here previously, but it was only him on the job now. Nope, I went straight for the electrical panel and then checked the water shut-off, and left Ben to organize the materials and cut some plywood to size.
