She backs toward the door. Her eyes are still on my eyes. Like she doesn’t want to break contact.
Her gaze drops to my mouth, comes back up to my eyes. I can see she is not indifferent to whatever this is. I take one step forward.
She turns and walks out.
The door swings shut.
I put both hands on the counter. Cold tile. The noise of the party through the wall. The world continues outside these walls
"What the fuck?!" I say to no one. I’m alone again.
21
SIENNA
I called Celia at seven this morning because today is a two-person job.
The irrigation system needs to go in all at once. The lines connect at a central manifold and the pressure distribution only works if the whole network goes in together. You can't start and pause and come back to it. I need someone who can read a technical blueprint without needing to be walked through it and who understands how a branched system behaves under load. Celia has worked with me on four projects. She has good hands, better instincts, and in all that time I've never had to tell her the same thing twice.
She arrives ten minutes early. I hand her the secondary blueprint.
"All the lines today," I say. "Rose bushes go in after, once the system's ok to go."
She turns the paper, looks at it intently. "We'll get it done."
No questions. No pushback on the timeline. She picks up her tools and starts. I've worked with enough people who need managing at every step to know what Celia is worth.
I get down on my knees and start on the first trench.
The Vale's grounds are quiet this early. Morning light comes in flat and gold across the hotel's east face, long shadows from the olive trees reaching across the grass. The soil here is dark and workable. It holds a tool cleanly and gives you a consistent depth without resistance. I've been on this site long enough to know its patterns. Where water pools after rain, where the roots compete underground, where the afternoon sun dries the topsoil before anything shallow can establish.
I focus on the trench. Depth, angle, spacing.
I hold that focus for about four minutes.
Then the repetitiveness of the task lets my thoughts wonder. To Adrian.
Something real happened at the beach house. I don’t know what label to stick on it, but it was there either way. Something opened between us that night. Something amazing and undeniable.
But, when morning came, the door closed. Gently, carefully and defined. He wasn't unkind about it. He was honest. He told me exactly what he is looking for, what he can offer. I heard him, and I understood every word. It still hurt. A lot.
The distance between how alive I'd felt the night before and the particular hollow of the next morning. Like something real was handed to me and then, not taken back exactly, but boxed. Here is this thing. It exists. But only this much.
I move to the next stake. Force my thoughts to focus on the task. I need to deliver a flawless project to MH Group. This can be the start of great things for Veridian. I can’t screw this up. No when the M of the group is just waiting for my downfall.
And just like that my traitor thoughts go to William. And to Charlie's kitchen. He kissed me like he needed it to keep alive. And I kissed him back. And I would make that choice again, which knowing all the factors involved is pure insanity.
I need to control my desire for William. There are secrets that are not mine to tell between us.
I check the trench depth. Adjust the angle. Keep moving. I look up to the sky and smile. Blue with small tattered clouds. Today is going to be a glorious day
If it’s anything like the other days I was here, soon someone from the staff will bring a basket with water, juice, fruit and small sandwiches. The first time it was delivered I asked why and the reply I got left me speechless, “Mr. Hill instructed us to make sure that you always have water and something to eat.” I blushed, thanked her and ever since that day I have been fantasizing that maybe some day it will be Carter that delivers the basket personally.
"Sienna." Celia is crouching over the third line junction. "Connector here needs the longer coupling. Spacing's wider than the blueprint."
I look where she's pointing. She's right. I reach into the open tool case to my left and hand her the coupling.
"Good catch," I say.
