“You finished my deck? On your own?” I plaster my forehead to the glass and look left. Right. “Rose!”
“Not quite finished. I didn’t make it all the way to the end before my back wanted to kill me, and the wind gave me chapped lips. I could probably finish it tomorrow, but the last sections will need to be cut or there’ll be an overhang in some spots. Also, I dropped your drill into the section about…” Gritting her teeth, she points to a spot just off to the right of the door. “I swear I didn’t mean to. And I don’t remember doing it. But by the time I realized, I’d already covered that section. I could’ve undone the work and jumped in to get it, but I used yourHey Googleinside and asked how much they cost.”
“How much… the drill?”
“Yeah. And then I did the math and realized it would be cheaper to buy a new drill than to tear up the deck and risk splitting the wood.” Bright-eyed, she flips the lights out and drags me toward the table. Snatching up a sheet of paper, she whips it around and shows me a list. “I’m keeping a tally.”
“A tally of what?”Drill: $129.99. Coffee mug: $5.00. Loaf of bread: $4.00.Stunned, I bring my eyes back to hers. “What the hell?”
“I’m gonna replace everything I use. Everything I break. Everything I lose.” She blushes, warm and charmingly sweet. “Once I get my life straightened out, that is. And good news: I’m smart! Which probably means I have a decent-paying job to go back to eventually.”
“You’re not paying me back!” I scrunch the sheet and shove it into my pocket. “Absolutely not. I never asked you to keep a list, Rose.”
“And because I’m a genius, according to that TV show, I knew you would do that.” She digs her hand into her hoodie pocket and takes out another piece of paper, folded into a small square. “My instincts were right, and that list was nothing more than a decoy.” Playful, she spins on her socks and unfolds the non-decoy. “I’ve consumed five cups of coffee today. Added those to my list.”
“Fivecups? No shit. You’re practically bouncing off the walls.”
“The drill pushed me over the edge. A bologna sandwich felt a littlepetty to start a list over, but the drill…” She peeks over her shoulder, scrunching her nose. “That was bad. So since there is now, officially, a list, I’ve added everything. I had crackers and cheese around eight thirty, since it had already been three hours since breakfast, and every minute you were gone felt like a lifetime. Then, I started working on the deck. Made notonebologna sandwich for lunch. Buttwo. I’d worked up an appetite, and you’re always on me about eating, but then I felt bad when I couldn’t finish the second, which is entirely wasteful, by the way. So,” she taps the list. “I found cans of Coke in your fridge, and even though it's cold as balls out, I was working hard. So I ended up drinking two of those.”
“Oh, good. Five cups of coffeeandtwo cans of Coke. You’re probably smelling colors by now.”
She re-folds the list and turns, grinning impossibly wide. “I’m happy because you’re home. And I have energy because I’ve discovered something new about myself. This is a good day.”
“Seems that way.” I meander forward—I’ll steal and destroy the list soon enough—but for now, I flatten my palm over a wild, straight-standing chunk of hair and press it to her scalp. “I’m glad you’re happy. I worried the whole twelve hours I was gone.”
“How was your day?”
I drop my hands and carefully, so fucking sneakily, hold her hood pocket between my fingers. “It was busier than I expected it to be. Otherwise, I would’ve snuck out and checked on you. Delivered a baby.”
“Shut up!” Her jaw falls slack. “Seriously?”
“Seriously. Mom started about seven o’clock last night, but she held that baby in till I arrived this morning, ‘cos she didn’t want Dawes delivering her.”
She gives my chest a condescending pat. “Oh geez, Doctor Douchebag. I got knocked up nine months ago, hoping, begging,prayingit would be you staring at my vagina during the month of love.”
“You’re being obnoxious.”
“As are you.” She slaps my hand and twists away, stopping me from stealing her list, then she crosses to the fridge and yanks it open. “The women line up to see you, Doctor Darling. Is it a boy or a girl?”
“Girl. Nine pounds of double chins, chunky thighs, and arms. Mom and baby are fine, and her husband played chaperone the whole time we were together.” I cross to the counter and sit where she sat this morning. Her sketchbook remains open, pencils lying on top. But there are no shavings on the stone. No eraser marks. Not even an empty water glass… or Coke can. “Caroline, the mom, and her husband, Pete, went to high school with me and my friends, just so you know. She’s immune to my devilishly good looks and addictive charm. Exposure therapy got her there.”
“Kind of like what you’re doing with me.” She snags a plate of chicken breast from the middle shelf, then a stick of butter and a bottle of cream. “I watched a cooking show today, too.”
“You did a lot of things today.” I watch as she sets things down and heads to the pantry for pasta. “And still found time to build a deck.”
“I’ve added excess electricity costs to my list, too, since you wouldn’t typically have a television running all day.”
“Rose—”
“And I didn’tbuilda deck. You built it. I just added wood to the top and hammered some nails in.” She snags a chopping board from the cupboard and a clove of garlic from the pantry. “I saw this recipe today; it’s like a chicken bake thing. It looked amazing, and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since, so I went through your freezer searching for chicken breast, and your fridge had everything else.” She picks up the knife, almost fucking frenzied in her bright-eyed expression. “I’m starving.”
“And yet, you waited for me to get home.” Pushing up from the stool and leaving behind several drawings of that dude’s eyes—Smiling eyes. Narrowed eyes. Tired eyes. Happy eyes—I roll my sleeves up and come around to the sink to wash my hands. “You probably know how to cook safely, even if you don’t remember it from before, you saw that show today. And you’re hungry after hours of physical labor. And still…” I glance across and find her impossibly close. Her shoulder almost tucked under my arm, and her head tilted back, her eyes locked on to mine. I can’t help the way my gaze drops to her plump lips. How my brows pinch and my throat turns dry.
“And still?” she prompts. Fuck her for licking her lips. For smiling around her tongue.Don’t even think about it, Oliver. “Still what?”
“You respected my request to wait.” I draw a heavy breath and swing my gaze back to my task, scrubbing soap between my palms. My fingers. All the way up and over my wrists. “You drew more today.” I tilt my chin toward her book. “Did you remember more?”
“Nah.” She circles away to grab a pot for the pasta, then, handing me a towel, she hip-bumps me aside and uses the still-running water to fill the pot. “I don’t even know if I’m drawing from memory, or just…” She slaps the faucet off and spins, setting the pot on the stove. “If I’m making it up, ya know? Maybe I’m just drawing for the fun of it, and not because it’s a memory.”
