I blink sleep from my eyes. “Is that good?”
“For now.” He glances over his shoulder. “We might get a break before the next system rolls in.”
“Next system,” I repeat, hoping I don’t sound as alarmed as I feel.
He smirks. “That’s winter on the mountain.”
I wrap my blanket around myself like emotional armor. “I see that now.”
His gaze lingers on me for one breath—two—and I swear something warm sparks in his expression before he turns away.
“Coffee’s on the stove,” he says.
I cross the room, pour a mug, and take a sip. It tastes exactly like yesterday’s—strong enough to wake the dead but comforting enough to feel like a hug.
While I’m drinking, he moves into the kitchen with that steady, deliberate stride of his, rummaging in a drawer until he finds a pencil.
I raise an eyebrow. “Are we doing math problems this morning?”
“Tree math,” he corrects.
“Oh.” I perk up. “Tree math is my favorite kind of math. I want to know everything.”
He hands me a scrap of folded notebook paper with measurements scrawled on it—beams, wall height, floor clearance. Exactly the sort of information I needed but hadn’t gotten to yet.
“You did this?” I ask, flipping it over.
“You needed the numbers.”
“You measured before I woke up?”
His jaw ticks. “You needed the numbers.”
Translation: Yes, and don’t make a thing out of it.
My heart does a small, traitorous flutter anyway.
I clear my throat. “Well. Excellent teamwork. Now that we have dimensions, we can figure out?—”
A booming crash from outside interrupts me.
I flinch so violently my coffee nearly sloshes out of the mug.
Calder doesn’t flinch at all. “That’s the shed roof,” he says.
I glare at the window. “Your shed is trying to kill me.”
“It’s not,” he says quietly, amusement tugging at his mouth. “The snow’s just sliding.”
“Loudly.”
“Snow is heavy.”
“And here I was thinking your mountain was just being dramatic.”
He gives a low, genuine laugh, shocking us both. I try not to stare.
He moves toward the mudroom, grabbing his coat. “Come on. Roads might be clearer. We can check the jeep.”
