I scream, throwing my hands up in the air, which makes the neighbor —Max— curse under his breath and reach in through the open driver’s side window, punching the button to turn my car off.
“Hey!” I turn, indignant, frowning at him… and frowning even more at the fact that he looks likethis. Rugged, his brow drawn down over dark eyes, a sharp face made softer by the beard that looks completely wild.
In a crazy, unexpected turn of fate, I want to run my hands over it. I haveneverbeen interested in a man’s beard before this exact moment. In fact, back in San Francisco, Vanessa and I have spent many hours trash-talking the guys at work with man buns and wispy facial hair.
But Max’s beard isn’t wispy. In fact, it gives the impression that he’s kind of forgotten it’s there, like other guys wouldn’t be dying for the ability to grow something like that.
“You took your hands off the wheel,” he says, pointing at the steering wheel, as though there will be evidence there of me being a reckless driver.
“You scared me,” I counter. I hadn’t even realized I was stuck outside his place. Without him standing in the front yard, it was kind of easy to miss, what with the drive nearly concealed by the thick brush and trees enveloping the property.
I peer over his shoulder, wondering if I might be able to make out his house through the trees.
“Youshould be aware of your surroundings while driving,” he says, leaning in closer to the window. “There are deer in these parts.”
I ignore how that sounds like a line out of a movie and throw my hands up again, exasperated with this man. “Seriously, do you have nothing better to do than stand outside your house and play traffic cop?”
“Yeah, I do actually, since someone wasted my time last night, all my wood went bad,” he says, swinging his arm in the direction of the lumber piled up in the yard, looking damp. Turning back to me, he refocuses. “Where are you going, anyway? Did you already give up?”
I bristle instantly at his tone — and at the fact that a second before this, I was wondering about how bad it would actually be to cut my losses and go back to San Francisco. Maybe I could hire someone to take care of the cabin or renovate it as they saw fit. Jasper could be pissed at me from heaven if he wanted. He probably already is.
“No,” I say, instead of admitting that’sexactlywhat I was thinking about doing. I cross my arms and nearly hit the horn on the steering wheel, which reminds me that for all his road safety talk, we are having this conversation in the middle of one, where my car is currently stuck. “For your information, I was going into town for supplies. It’s not my fault my car got stuck.”
“I’m shocked this thing made itupthe mountain,” he says, shaking his head, “and that you didn’t manage to go off the sideof it getting to this point. While you’re here, you should take Jasper’s 4Runner.”
I ignore the instant and reverberating pang of grief that rolls through my body at the sound of my uncle’s name, and shake my head, trying to keep my tone from showing how the mention of him affected me. “I don’t know how to drive a stick shift.”
Max blinks at me like,of course you don’t.
Then, with a monumental sigh that could probably blow my car off the road, he scrubs his hand over his hair and looks up to the sky, as though some god might smite him right now and save him from his misery.
“Fine,” he says, as though I was down on my knees and begging for his help, and now he’s finally giving in. “I’ll take you.”
I want to scoff, to tell him to buzz off, that I can handle it perfectly myself. That I’ll walk down the side of the mountain, if I have to.
But I want a shower. And cell service, and coffee, and something to eat. And, if I’m being honest with myself, even with how grumpy he is, there’s something appealing to me about Max.
Maybe it’s the fact that he knew Jasper, and specifically that he knew this version of my uncle — the guy who came out to the cabin on his own. Who was his happiest in nature. Who built an entire home with his own two hands.
So, I don’t tell him to buzz off. Instead, I smile up at him, grab my purse, and say with a winning smile my mother would have been proud of, “That would bewonderful.”
CHAPTER 6
MAX
Lacey reacts to the sight of Low Pines like it’s another planet, leaning forward in her seat until the belt locks, and gasping loudly. I instinctively start looking for deer on the side of the road, or anything that would warrant a sound like that.
“What?” I ask when I can’t make out the danger.
“Thistown,” she breathes, looking around. “It’sgorgeous.”
I blink and turn my attention back to Low Pines, which is sprawling out below us. Coming down the side of the mountain like this gives us something of a bird’s-eye view. There’s Main Street, which sports a variety of stores, stretching from here to the end of the road, where the church melts into a courtyard and pedestrian area, circling around a fountain.
When I first came out here to look at the land, the realtor had insisted on bringing me into town, thinking it would be a selling point for me. They were right in the fact that I like having the convenience of coming in to get my stuff, but wrong in the factthat I don’t really care what it looks like. And I don’t love the tourist attraction aspect, either.
I remember the realtor repeating, again and again, that the guy who designed the town was inspired by downtown designs in Europe. For a second, I think of telling Lacey that, of impressing her with my knowledge, but I don’t actually want to encourage more conversation between us.
It doesn’t matter that her reaction to Low Pines is making me feel a certain way. It doesn’t matter that there’s a part of me, no matter how small, that enjoys the feeling of having her in the seat next to me. Like it has, somehow, balanced out the cab of my truck.
