Chapter 10 #2
“I didn’t really have a niche at the time.
It was a mix of design work and projects.
I wanted to do it all,” she emphasizes with a bright smile, like she’s truly talking about something she loves.
“It took off like crazy. I started getting some brand deals with it, too. Turns out I liked the challenge of making something feel like home when it wasn’t yet. ”
“What made you stick with it?” I ask, adjusting the saw blade even though it doesn’t need it.
“I like proving people wrong.” She sighs, as if it hits too close to home for her. “And I like fixing things people give up on.”
I turn to face her. She’s still looking down at the boards.
“I like it,” I say.
She faces me, a hint of a smile on her lips. “What about you? Building houses isn’t easy either. How long have you been doing this?”
I stiffen, just a fraction, keeping my eyes on my hands as I slide the board through the saw. “A long time,” I say.
She waits for me to say more. I can feel her eyes boring into the side of my head, but I don’t elaborate.
“What got you into it?” she presses gently.
There it is. The question I always dodge. It’s not that I don’t want to talk about it—okay, I don’t want to talk about it. All it does is stir up old memories I don’t want coming to the surface. Old wounds that will never heal.
Just when I think about some bullshit excuse to say, the generator coughs, sputtering once before roaring back to life. I seize the moment and hold up a finger to Scottie before turning to Levi off to the side. “Levi, can you check that?”
“Yep,” he says, jogging to the generator.
I don’t turn back to Scottie as I bend down, resetting the saw and moving lumber around my work station. She doesn’t go back to the topic or press the issue, and I’m thankful. Some things stay buried not because they’re forgotten, but because digging them up would cost more than I’m ready to pay.
After a few minutes of silence, Scottie cuts through my thoughts. “So…how precise do you want these cuts?”
“Within an eighth of an inch.”
She looks at the measuring tape closely with narrowed eyes, and then at me. “I was thinking more like…a general vibe.”
I bark out a laugh. “A vibe? Are you planning to eyeball all the measurements?”
“Please, Tucker. That’s how I’ve always worked. All vibes.”
“Sounds chaotic.”
She sticks out her tongue playfully. “I call it art.”
I stare at her for a moment, before shaking my head and laughing. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”
The words are out before I can stop them.
The air around us goes quiet and Scottie freezes with the pencil in her hand, hovering over the board. She doesn’t look up, and her shoulders draw in a fraction. I should tack on a ‘kidding’ or ‘don’t read into that.’ But I don’t.
I let it sit there between us.
Cute is the safest word I could’ve chosen. Anything more honest would’ve cracked this thing wide open.
“What?” she says, barely above a whisper before looking up at me. “You said I’m cute?”
I tilt my head. “Did I say that?”
She nods. “Pretty sure that’s what I heard.”
Instead of saying anything more, I grab a stack of lumber I just cut and bring it over to the porch where we’ll use it. If I stay close to her, staring at her, I won’t stop.
Cute doesn’t fucking come close.
Cute is a lie I tell myself so I don’t say beautiful, or perfect.
When I come back for another pile, she’s still standing in the same spot with the pencil in her hand and looking like she’s deep in thought.
That’s when I know.
I didn’t just flirt with her, I shifted something between us.
“Babe,” I say like a fool but the word feels too natural in my mouth. She snaps her head in my direction. “Ready?”
“Yeah.” She snaps out of it. “I’m ready.” She moves quickly in a jog to catch up to where I stand. She quickly morphs into a ready stance, inhaling and exhaling a breath as she looks at the clean slate in front of us now that the old porch is gone.
She picks up a board, and I follow with another.
I don’t even know what her plan is here, or if she’s ever built a porch before, but I’m following her regardless.
“Can you pass me the drill?” she asks, holding her hand out without looking at me.
I hand her the drill and her fingers curl around the handle, and for a second we’re both holding it.
I pull my hand away. This is too much for one day.
She volleys it around in both of her hands, assessing it. “Thank you.”
“Do you need me to show you how to use it?”
She stands, turning around to face me and pops her hand on her hips. “If you even think about trying to mansplain a power tool to me, I will staple your mouth shut with the nail gun.”
I laugh. “At least I know you know how to use it.”
She narrows her eyes before walking away. I let my eyes trail her body. Even with the slightly oversized overalls, I can still make out the roundness of her ass with every step she takes. I have to force my head not to let my thoughts travel to the way it felt in my hands that night.
But it’s too late.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to do this?” I ask as she walks back. She has that sour candy in her hand, popping two in her mouth before crouching down to get started.
“Nope. Got it.”
“Don’t strip the nail, babe.”
Her head snaps to face me, and the moment she sees the amusement on my face, her eyes narrow.
But it only lasts a moment before a flicker of defeat flashes on her face.
If I blinked, I would have missed it. She squares her shoulders and looks around to see where the camera is, and the confident woman I know is back immediately.
She lines up the bit, presses the drill to the wood and squeezes the trigger.
The sound is wrong immediately. The metal shrieks and the screw spins uselessly.
“Dammit,” Scottie mutters under her breath.
I move before I can think.
Then I stop.
I pause just behind her—close enough to feel the hesitation ripple through her body and enough that if she says no, I’ll hear it.
“Easy,” I say quietly. “You’re forcing it.”
“I’m not. I’ve used a drill a million times before today.”
“I know. Just…hold on.”
I lift my hand slowly, not touching her yet. I give her the choice of accepting my help. When she doesn’t pull away, it’s all the permission I need. My hand settles over hers and her breath catches the instant our skin connects.
“You have to let it work for you. You need to add pressure, but not too much.”
My voice drops without permission and my body remembers things I shouldn’t be thinking of at the moment.
She swallows. “Is that supposed to sound dirty, Tucker?”
The air between us hummed louder than the commotion and generators around the property. I should step back, but I couldn’t seem to get myself to move.
“Did you want it to sound dirty, Scottie?”
She doesn’t answer. Instead, she clears her throat, adjusting her grip beneath mine. I guide her hand again as the drill hums without a shriek and the screw sinks perfectly into the wood.
“See?”
She exhales, turning her head to look at me over her shoulder. She sucks in a sharp breath at the proximity. My eyes trail to her lips. I’m so close that if I lean in just enough, I can taste the memory of the last time my lips were on hers and experience it all over again.
But she backs away, standing up and away from me. “Are you always this bossy?” she asks, running her hands down her overalls.
I wink. “Only when I’m right.”
“Well,” she says, taking the drill fully from my hands now to reclaim her space. “Don’t get used to it.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
The porch is finally starting to look like something worth standing on. We spent the entire day replacing every rotted board, rebuilding the steps, and framing out the new railing.
Unclipping my tool belt from my waist and tossing it into the passenger seat of my truck, I turn around and find Scottie staring at the house.
She has her arms crossed as her eyes roam over every inch of the work we’ve put in today.
The setting sun catches her hair at just the right angle, lighting the blonde to a gold, stopping me dead in my tracks.
I’m proud of the work she did today.
It’s not just about the porch and watching her get her hands dirty. It’s the way she held her ground when I fought her to gut the whole thing. The way she didn’t give up when the boards fought back. The way she listened, learned, and adjusted without giving up control of the vision.
She didn’t just imagine this place.
She’s building it.
And watching her do that does something dangerous to me.
I look down at my watch and wince. I’m now late for my shift at Seven Stools. I live on Griffin’s bad side, even though I know it’s all fun and games, he can never truly be mad at me.
“Do you have somewhere to be?” Scottie asks, and I snap my head up, not realizing she moved from where she was standing.
“Yeah.” I gesture toward the road. “My shift at the bar starts soon.”
“You have two jobs?”
I look toward my truck, hesitant to admit why I work so much. Saying it out loud would mean revealing my cracks, and I’m not sure I’m ready for that yet.
But maybe if I told her, she’d stop hiding behind that perfect smile for a second.
All day, I’ve caught myself wanting to ask questions I shouldn’t ask.
Why does she need this show so badly? Why does she put on that polished act for the camera, but when it’s off, she relaxes as if she’s been holding her breath the entire time we’re recording?
It doesn’t sit right with me. Not because I think she’s fake, but because I see the parts she’s trying to bury.
“Keeps me out of trouble,” I settle on, turning to face her with a smile on my face.
“You don’t strike me as the trouble type.”
“That’s because you haven’t spent enough time getting to know me.”
Her cheeks turn that perfect shade of pink as she averts her gaze to the ground.
There isn’t a single camera on us right now since they’re packed up and being put away.
She opens her mouth to speak, but stops herself.
She stares at me for a beat, and I’m frozen in place, waiting with bated breath for whatever she wants to say back to that.
Say something—anything that opens up to me, Scottie.
“You should go. I wouldn’t want you to get fired for helping me,” she says instead.
“I don’t get fired.” I toss her a wink. “I just show up late and work faster.”
“That doesn’t make any sense, but sounds very responsible for someone like you.”
“Someone like me?” I feign shock. “I’m a model citizen. You’re the one who wanted to flee the scene of the crime after exceeding the legal limit of laughing at the bar.”
She laughs and, for a moment, it feels like we’re inside a bubble no one else can reach. The memories of the night we shared, lingering between us. It’s an unfiltered laughter, the kind that doesn’t match the polished version of her that the world gets to see.
It’s a laugh so real that it knocks the air right out of me.
“Have a good night, Scottie,” I say, making my way to my truck.
Just as I open the door to jump in, she stops me. “Hey, Tucker?”
I turn around and see she’s exactly where I left her. “Yeah?”
“Thanks for…everything today.”
The corner of my mouth lifts, and there’s that grip in my chest again. “I told you I’ll be whatever you need, Scottie. I’m here to help you. I…want to help you.”
She grins and gives me a quick nod before turning back to the porch.
“And I’m sorry,” I add, forcing her to face me again.
“For what?”
“That we can’t do the swing on the porch you wanted.”
She waves me off. “I think it’s coming along perfectly. It would have been nice to have the hanging swing as a place to relax, but hey, that’s what they make rocking chairs for, right?” She smiles and it nearly takes me out, before facing the house again.
I stare at her for another moment, taking her in. I’d stand here all day just looking at her if I didn’t have a shift at the bar. I’ve been late to work plenty of times and walked away from plenty of things that mattered less.
This is the first time that walking away feels like the hard choice.