They hung up. Bree stood there a moment, phone slipping back into her pocket, listening to the building breathe.
Boot steps creaked on the stairs. Hank appeared in the doorway, the light behind him haloing his shoulders.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said. “They’re… adjusting. My mom’s picturing you and trying really hard not to ask if you have tattoos or a criminal record.”
He smiled. “Do you want to tell her the answer to one of those is yes?”
“Not yet,” she said. “I’ll let you scandalize her in person.”
He crossed the room and leaned his hip against the windowsill beside her. “Guy in the sedan,” he said quietly. “Anything feel off about him to you?”
“My stomach didn’t love it,” she admitted. “But that might’ve just been all the feelings.”
He nodded. “Could be nothing. Could be somebody curious about why four people are standing outside an old warehouse with blueprints. Either way, I got the plate. I’ll send it to Diaz.”
“Awareness, not paranoia,” she said.
“Exactly."
She looked at his profile, the way his jaw worked when he was thinking. “Do you ever get tired of feeling responsible for everything within a fifty-yard radius?”
“Constantly,” he said. “Doesn’t stop me.”
“I know,” she said. “I’m not asking you to change. Just… remember that I can also notice weird sedans.”
“I saw you clock him,” he said. “You went still without freezing. There’s a difference. I’m not trying to turn you into a porcelain doll I have to carry around.”
“Good,” she said. “Because I’d be terrible at that.”
His gaze dropped to her mouth; warmth flickered there, layered over the concern. “You’d be terrible at sitting still,” he agreed. “You did good with your parents.”
She let her head tip against his shoulder. “You did good with the mayor,” she said. “Very grown-up. There were terms and everything.”
He huffed a laugh. “Wait until you hear me talk depreciation schedules.”
“Sounds sexy,” she murmured.
He tilted her chin up with one knuckle. “Careful,” he said. “You keep saying things like that, I’m going to forget we’re standing in a room with broken boards and no curtains.”
She kissed him before she could talk herself out of it, slow and deliberate. Dust and light wrapped around them; the harbor scent drifted through the cracked glass.
“We should probably not christen the studio while your friends are downstairs,” she said against his mouth.
“Probably not,” he agreed. “But later…”
“Later,” she said.
They grabbed a late lunch at a little place on Main, then parted ways. Brian and Colby went back to the paddock to tie up loose ends with the team hauler. Hank and Bree returned to the hotel, the quiet of the hallway a strange contrast to the noise in her head.
Inside the room, Bree set her sketchbook on the small table by the window. Blank pages waited, daring her.
Hank tossed the folder onto the desk and sat heavily on the edge of the bed, scrubbing his hands over his face.
“You look like someone just made you run stairs,” she said.
“I’ve had easier briefings,” he replied. “Fewer zeroes.”
