24. Derrick
24
DERRICK
Spinning, Izzy takes in the newly renovated restaurant space. She’s been filming as we go, but a lot has changed at this jobsite since the last time she was here. It almost feels like she’s seeing it with new eyes—like I’m seeing it through new eyes, her eyes.
The restaurant is located about an hour and a half from Parkerville, tucked into the corner of a small inland town.
“I love that you kept these original stones exposed.” She taps them with the toe of her pink sneaker. “They’re incredible. They have to be really old.”
“This place was built in the 1700s.”
“Wow.” She looks around, lips parted in awe.
I might be in the business of building, but even I can admit things aren’t made with the kind of craftsmanship they once were. Back then, things were meant to last. Now, everything we touch seems designed to only function until the next trend comes along.
I trail behind her as she enters the party space we’ve sectioned off.
“If this place were mine, I’d paint the walls navy. Or maybe a burgundy. Ooh, I might even do black.” She spins in a circle, her hair flying behind her. “I’d want it to be moody, with a few large art pieces displayed as a nod to the 1700s.”
I lean against the wall, watching her, my chest swelling. God, she’s so damn beautiful and smart and talented.
“The owners mentioned needing help with design. Want me to tell them you’re interested in helping and see how it goes?”
She stops in front of me. Her eyes are wide and shimmering with gratitude. “You’d do that?”
Head tilted, I frown. “Why wouldn’t I?”
It’d be easy enough. I can’t guarantee they’ll take us up on the offer, but it’s worth asking.
Izzy closes the distance between us, and when she loops her arms around my neck, it’s like the rest of the world fades away.
Playing with the hair at the back of my neck, she murmurs, “Could you stop making it so easy?”
“What?” Confusion laces the word.
“To fall for you.”
Oh.
“Oh.”
Pulse fluttering in her throat, she backs away slowly, her gaze dropping like she’s scared of what she might see reflected in my eyes. If she did look, I have no doubt she’d see fear and excitement. Because I’m falling for her, too. Surely, she knows that. I wouldn’t have slept with her, told my kids about us, if I wasn’t. I haven’t had a real relationship since my wife passed. I wouldn’t have jumped into this without being absolutely sure of how I felt about her.
I show her around the rest of the restaurant, all the while replaying her words. My feelings for Izzy are strong and it terrifies me, because she is young, and I worry that she’ll decide I’m not who or what she wants. I’m not sure I can handle losing another person I care about, but here I am, risking it anyway.
“You want a slushie?” I ask when we get in my truck.
She adjusts the air vent, letting the AC hit her at full blast. “I feel like I should say no, but I can never turn them down.”
There’s a gas station at the end of the street, so thirty seconds later, we’re pulling in.
“I’ll grab them. Want to stay here so I can leave the truck running and the AC on?”
“Sure.” She nods and gives me a small smile.
Before we stopped in, I didn’t think about the lack of AC in the restaurant. I’m used to working in hot temperatures, but Izzy isn’t, and the last thing I want is for her to get overheated.
The gas station is even smaller than the one we normally go to, but that makes it easier to find the slushie machine. Though as I step up to it, my shoulders deflate.
There’s no blue raspberry.
Strawberry. Grape. Mountain Dew.
I’m not sure she’ll like any of these, but I get one of each anyway. If she doesn’t, we’ll stop at our usual place on our way home.
Izzy has her feet kicked up on the dashboard when I push my way outside, carefully cradling the three cups. Despite the glare on the windshield, I can see her arched brow through the glass .
As I approach her window, she drops her feet and pushes the button to lower it. “Couldn’t decide?” A tiny smile plays on her lips.
“They didn’t have blue raspberry.”
She scowls, though it’s pure tease. “Those bitches.” As she giggles at herself, she takes two of the cups from me.
I hop in on my side with the third cup in hand and pass her two of the straws. “Taste test?”
“I guess.” She frowns down at the cups. “But I don’t think anything can beat blue raspberry.”
I hold the first cup out to her, and when she closes her lips around the straw, keeping her eyes on me, I’m instantly hard, thinking about her mouth wrapped around other things.
She jerks back at the first taste and practically gags. “Oh my God, that’s awful . It tastes like medicine.”
“It’s grape,” I mutter, frowning at the cup. “It can’t be that bad.” With a smirk, I take a sip, expecting to prove her wrong. But no. It’s absolutely disgusting. “Fuck.” I choke back a cough. “What kind of monster would drink this?”
“The kind without taste buds,” she jokes, eyeing the cups in her hands. “Please, one of you be good.”
She sticks the Mountain Dew slushie in the drink holder and tests the strawberry one first. “Not bad.” She hands it to me for a taste.
I take a quick sip, watching her. “It’s okay.”
She tries the Mountain Dew one and instantly shakes her head. “You can have this one. Give me the strawberry back.”
With a chuckle, I exchange cups. It doesn’t matter whether I like it or not, as long as my girl is happy. Quickly, I hop out, hit with a blast of summer heat, and throw away the offending grape one. Then I head toward home .
When I turn off early, Izzy shifts in her seat. “Where are we going?”
I keep my focus trained on the road and say, “There’s something I want to show you.” It wasn’t until the street sign came into view that I decided I wanted to share this with her. It’s a place not even my kids know about.
“Let me guess, you’re not going to give me a hint.”
I bark out a laugh. “Nope. Not a chance.” With a grin at her, I turn down the bumpy driveway that’s more mud than gravel. As we roll slowly, nature closes in on us, the trees forming a canopy above. It takes a good five minutes before the land clears. When we pull out into an open area, I ease the truck to a stop and undo my seat belt.
The lake glimmers in the distance, sunshine reflecting off the surface, instantly soothing me like it does every time I see it.
“What is this place?” she asks, her eyes wide and filled with wonder.
Without answering her, I get out of the truck and go around to open her door. She takes my hand without hesitation, letting me guide her through the tall grass. I’ll have to check her for ticks later. Can’t say it’ll be a hardship.
“Where are we?” she breathes at my side, her head on a swivel as she takes it all in.
I stop when we get to the edge of the lake. It’s a decent size, but there are only a few other houses built around it.
“This is my land,” I finally answer, letting go of her hand so I can pick up a flat stone. I toss it and watch it skip three times over the surface before it sinks. “I bought it years ago.”
It went on the market about twelve years ago. Brooks mentioned it to me, knowing about my mostly secret dream of buying a piece of land and building my own home. I love my house, but I’ve wished for more space and for a home I could build from the ground up.
Despite having the perfect piece of property, my kids were young, and I was burning the candle at both ends, so I put it off.
And the longer I did that, the easier it became.
Last fall, Brooks convinced me it was time to start clearing the land, but that’s as much as I’ve done.
“Your land?” Izzy repeats, the breeze stirring her hair around her shoulders. “What are you going to do with it?”
“The plan has always been to build my dream house.”
“So”—she bends and picks up a rock for herself—“why haven’t you?” She tosses the rock and instead of skipping, it sinks with a plunk . “Dammit.”
“Try one like this.” I grab a round, smooth rock. “And flick your wrist like this.” I demonstrate and wait for her to mimic the movement. Then I put the rock in her open palm. “Go.”
She mimics the movement, and the stone skips twice. Her smile is infectious when she turns back to me. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed you’re avoiding my question.”
With a sigh, I scrub a hand over my jaw. “I guess I haven’t seen the point. It’s only me. My house is fine for a bachelor. A place like this… it deserves more than me.”
She turns to face me completely, sticking her hands in the back pockets of her shorts. It pushes her breasts out so they strain against the fabric of her white, ribbed tank top.
I have to look away. Otherwise I may maul her right here, out in the open.
“I don’t know why you think you don’t deserve things like that. You’re enough, you know?”
You’re enough .
My heart stutters, along with my breath .
The words are simple, but they feel like a lifeline.
“This is a beautiful spot to build a house,” she says, gently placing a hand on my forearm. “I hope you do it.”
Without letting go, she surveys the area. The trees, the water, the cleared land.
Does she see what I see? A Tudor style lake house with a wall of windows along the back, creating the most spectacular views of the lake? A dock for my boat? A yard with a playground for kids and?—
Kids.
I haven’t thought about the possibility of more children since my wife died. I was too busy raising Layla and Reid and working to think about what I might want if I met the right person.
A part of me feels too old to have more kids. I’ve already raised two. Would the age difference be strange? And what about Lili? She’d be older than an uncle or an aunt. Would that be frowned upon? Or does that even matter? I love kids, and I love being a dad. Before Izzy came along, I was lonely. The house felt too empty, too quiet.
“I can’t believe Layla and Reid haven’t talked you into building the house already. This place is magical.”
“Uh…” I rub at my nose, stalling. “They don’t know.”
Sucking in a breath, she cocks her head and assesses me. “They don’t know?”
“No.”
“Who does?”
“Only Brooks. He’s the one who found the land for me. And… now, you.”
Her dumbfounded expression has me looking at the ground, toeing the edge of my boot into the dirt.
“Derrick? ”
“Hmm?” I hum, still focused on the ground beneath me.
“Look at me.” It’s the pleading in her tone that has me looking up. “Why haven’t you told anyone else?”
I shove my hands into my pockets and find a coin I’d forgotten about in one. I rub my thumb and forefinger over the warm metal, grounding myself.
“It was easier to keep it a secret. That way, if I never moved forward with it, I wouldn’t let anyone down.”
Her feet crunch over the dead leaves littering the ground from winters gone by as she closes the small distance between us. She stands beside me now, looking out at the lake. “What do you think now?”
I envision myself pulling up the driveway to a finished house. A deck where I can sit and drink my morning coffee and converse with the squirrels. The lake to boat in. And maybe, if things go right, this woman at my side.
“I think it’s time.”