“Fuck, fuck,” I mutter, throwing open the door to the Jeep and racing up the front porch.
“Ow,” she says, bringing her hand to her head, and once I see that she’s alive, my mind races through what just happened.
“Were youdrilling blind into a wall?”
“I looked at it first!” she retorts, then, slightly confused from her place on the floor, “What are you doing here?”
“Where’s the breaker box?” I ask instead of answering that, because if she nicked a wire in the wall, we could be heading straight for an electrical fire.
“I already fixed it,” she says, crossing her arms but looking uncertain. “It’s behind the cabin?—”
I’m already moving, heading back outside and locating the breaker box, cutting the main power to the building and returning to her, finding her standing and holding onto the counter like she might fall down again.
“You drilled into an electrical wire,” I say, groaning when I see the spot she chose, “literallyright above an outlet. What were you thinking?”
“I was?—”
“You could have been electrocuted. You could have started a fire. Why didn’t you use a stud finder?”
Angrily, she says, “I don’t know what thatis. And I’m fine. What are you doing here?”
“You were supposed to get your car,” I say, breathing hard, trying to figure out when, exactly, I started to care so much about this infuriating woman. We stare at each other for a moment, and I realize for the first time that she must have showered this morning after fixing the electricity.
Her hair is still slightly damp, and she’s barefoot, in nothing but a pair of soft sweatpants and a tank top that clings to her.
She’s not wearing a bra.
As though just realizing that herself, a flush spreads over her cheeks and down her neck and she crosses her arms, which actually doesn’t do much to help the situation. I swallow and avert my eyes.
Despite the fact that I saved her from an electrical fire, I still feel like a creep for driving up here and ogling her.
“I’m sorry,” she says finally, clearing her throat. “I should have come for my car, like I said. I just— I got excited about the idea of getting stuff done. Time kind of got away from me.”
Lacey gestures to a notebook on the counter, and I cross to it, looking it over. The list is long. And based on the fact that she almost killed herself trying to mount a battery-operated light, I doubt she’s going to be able to survive the rest of the renovations she’s planning.
I turn to her, ready to tell her that if she’s really dead set on these renovations, she should hire someone. She clearly has the money to do it. Then she could go back to the city and put an end to this weird thing inside me that wants to pay attention to what she’s doing all the time.
What I want is to go back to a time before, when I could wake up in the morning andnotthink about her straight away. And it’s only been two days of her being around. I can’t even imagine what it will be like if she stays long enough to get all these renovations done.
“Jasper should be here,” she says quietly, laughing and pressing her fingers to her eyes. That simple sentence nearly knocks the air out of me, and then she follows it up with, “He could show me what to do. It— it would be easier if he was here.”
Fuck.
“I’ll show you what to do,” I say, feeling like I’m walking off the plank of a pirate ship. I just got done thinking that I don’t want to be around her.
But I know that look on her face. And I remember what it was like to go through it alone.
“Really?” she asks, lowering her hands from her eyes and looking at me, confusion evident in her expression.
I don’t really get it myself. I definitely don’t like her, but I also, in a way, understand her. I know what it’s like to feel out of your depth.
And I know what it’s like to lose someone.
“Yeah,” I say, but then I notice how she’s shivering and think about the fact that, if shewaselectrocuted, it could fuck up her heart. Adopting my best no-nonsense look, I cross my arms and say, “Right after we get you a checkup in town.”
CHAPTER 9
LACEY
