A house. Children.
I opened my mouth. Shut it. Joe was always so contained. Private. It felt like a betrayal of confidence to blurt out stuff he’d said to me, even over pizza with his friends.
“Another beer,” Joe said. An answer? A question? Or maybe just an attempt to change the subject.
“Thanks.” His shoulder brushed mine as he reached for the pitcher, and a shiver ran up my arm. “So,” I said to Elena in a chipper voice, like I was totally unaffected by his closeness. “Tell me how you two met. Is there some dating app for carpenters? Like, Tinder for Timber?”
“There should be!” Elena said. She deepened her voice and intoned, “When you’re looking for wood…”
James guffawed.
“Speaking of carpentry,” Kelsey said, “we got some really good stuff today—Douglas fir joists, maple flooring, all virgin hardwood. Cured, hardened, super durable.”
Impossible not to think…what I was thinking. Joe’s mouth quirked. I looked away to keep from laughing.
“Joe made a sofa table,” I said. “Out of barn wood. It’s beautiful.”
“He could do a lot more if he’d make it a priority.”
“Gallagher’s is my priority. My bread-and-butter business,” Joe said evenly, but something in his voice—a roughness, a snag—made me look at him again in sudden doubt.
“Isn’t your last name Gallagher?” Kelsey asked me.
I cleared my throat. “That’s right. Rob Gallagher was my father.”
“Really,” Elena said in an interested voice.
Kelsey frowned. “I keep telling Joe he needs to start doing things for himself. Invest more on the design side. But…” She shrugged. “You know Joe. He’s stubborn.”
I nodded. Stubborn sounded right.
Butknowhim? There was still so much that was a mystery to me. So much I wanted to learn.
—
“I like yourfriends,” I said when I finished brushing my teeth.
Kelsey had already disappeared into her bedroom, leaving Joe and me to take turns in the bathroom. It was weirdly intimate, this pseudo-domestic routine we’d fallen into. Like playing house.
He looked up from straightening the covers on the bed.Shoot.I should have made up the couch before I left the apartment.
“They liked you,” he said.
I felt my smile widen. “You think?”
“Anne.” His voice was patient. I tried not to notice how much I liked it, the sound of my name in his voice. “Everybody likes you.”
“Because I’m friendly.”
“Because you see the best in people.”
It was a compliment. A good one. I flushed with pleasure. “Thanks. But that’s not the same as having real, true friends. It’s different on Mackinac. I mean, when there are only four girls your age in the entire school, you kind ofhaveto be friends. It’s hard when you’re new on campus and you don’t know anybody and you have no practice making friends. Harder when you graduate and everybody you meet is working or paired up or both. My housemates live in Colorado now. My best friend at work totally let me down. If it wasn’t for Daanis…”
I choked. Bad enough he knew my bed-making skills sucked. I didn’t need to tell him what a mess I’d made of things with my best friend.
“If it wasn’t for Daanis…” he prompted.
I pulled out my phone to see if she’d responded to my dinner text. Had she thought of me at all? Had Chris? “Dang. My battery’s gone.”
