Tessa couldn’t hide her surprise. “Is that why she called this morning?”
Paul nodded. “She wanted to know if I’d forgiven her yet.” He refilled Tessa’s plastic cup with honeysuckle wine.
“Have you?”
“Mostly,” he said with a shrug. “It still gets under my skin sometimes.” Paul looked at Tessa. “She wants to try and work it out. She said she wants to beusagain.”
Tessa’s breath caught, and then she tried to release it in the calmest way possible. She didn’t want Paul to know how much his answer mattered to her. “What did you say?”
Paul looked at Tessa like he couldn’t believe she didn’t already know. “I said hell no. What did you think I said? I don’t want any part of that. I already tried it, and it didn’t work.”
Tessa’s lips twitched. “If you don’t have a job, do you have to leave tomorrow?”
Paul shook his head. “Not if you need me for something.”
Oh, I need you fora lotof things, she thought. But she said, “You know what I really need? An architect who can redesign this place the way it was when it was first built. Someone who can walk me through everything that needs to be done here to ensure it’s rehabbed correctly.”
Paul stared expressionless at Tessa until he smiled so widely that she chuckled.
“Why are you grinning like that? Should I be frightened?”
Paul laughed. “Are you offering me a job, Ms. Tessa?”
“Are you thinking of taking it?”
Paul gently tapped his cup of wine against Tessa’s. “I’m the best man for this undertaking.”
“Your humility astounds me.” She paused long enough to imagine seeing Paul every day and working on the house together. “Do you really want to help?”
“Without a doubt. But I have to know . . . what kind of benefits package do you offer?”
“Free camping whenever you need to leave the comforts of home,” she said, motioning to the space around them. “Free food and lodging, courtesy of your parents. Free use of the Great Pumpkin.”
“Until you threw in the Great Pumpkin, I wasn’t sure this was the right job for me, but who could turn down that classic ride? Do you have paper and a pen? I have some thoughts already.”
“I went by the library today. Emma, the librarian’s assistant, helped me find an old book of pictures of historical homes in Mystic Water. I photocopied all the ones of Honeysuckle Hollow. It hasn’t changed a lot, but the photographs might help with the interiors.” Tessa dug through her bags and found the papers. When she turned around, Paul was inside the tent, unzipping the sleeping bag. “What are you doing?”
“Making a pallet for us so we can stretch out.”
Tessa’s pulse thumped against her throat. The tent seemed to shrink in size so that she and Paul wouldn’t be able tostretch outwithout their arms touching. Paul opened the sleeping bag and placed two pillows near the tent opening. Then he patted one side of the sleeping bag. “Come on in,” he said.
Tessa hesitated, wondering what her mama would say.Tessa, you’re a grown woman. It doesn’t matter what your mama would say. She’s not here, is she? Should I ask Anna or Lily if this is okay? No! Just get in the tent. When is the last time a handsome man invited you into his tent? Did Greywolf’s sweetheart hesitate before crawling into his teepee?
“No,” she mumbled aloud.
Paul wrinkled his brow. “What?”
She shook her head and then crawled into the tent. The lack of usable space inside became obvious. What had seemed like a roomy area when she was alone now felt as though she and Paul had climbed into a potato sack together. Paul seemed unaffected. He flopped onto his stomach, propped his elbows on a pillow, and spread out the papers on the floor in front of him.
Tessa inhaled and then exhaled.You can do this.Then she laid down next to him, praying her heart didn’t beat right out of her chest and into the tent.
Paul tapped his drawings with the pen. During the past hour, Tessa’s head inched closer and closer to his shoulder. A sheet of paper wouldn’t have fit between their bodies.
“That’s all the ideas for the house,” he said as he slid the top sheet to the bottom of the stack. “And the backyard should be cleaned up to look like this, don’t you think?”
Tessa slid a couple of the black-and-white photographs toward Paul’s drawing. She pointed to the winding river and traced her finger along the curving lines. “Looks like the only thing Dr. Hamilton changed was the addition of the river, and we should keep that.”
Paul nodded. “We can restock the pond and tell Huck Finn to visit anytime.” When Paul turned to look at her, their faces were so close she could have bopped him on the nose with hers. “When I visit the Cook Islands for the article, you should come with me.”
