CHAPTER 14
Colt
◆
Rain came through the chapel vestibule like the roof had decided to give up on Della's wedding before anyone had said a vow.
Colt shouldered the side door open with his tool bag in one hand and a roll of patching membrane tucked under his arm.
Wind shoved in behind him, wet and hard, carrying the smell of soaked cedar and old stone.
Water ran down the limestone beside the inner arch in shining threads, cold drops flicking off the wall and striking his shirt at the shoulder seam.
He stopped just inside because Wren was already there.
She had one arm full of Paloma's wrapped flowers and the other hand hooked through a white bucket. Her hair had come loose, dark strands pasted to her cheek. Her hem was damp, her boots tracked mud across the tile, and she looked like she had counted damage in dollars before inconvenience.
"Tell me you brought something stronger than towels," she said.
"Roofing membrane. Flashing tape. Sealant."
"I could kiss a man for less."
The words hit him before she seemed to remember who she had said them to. Color moved up her throat. The rain hammered the chapel roof, giving them both a place to look that was not each other's mouths.
Colt set the tool bag on the driest strip of tile. "Where is it coming in?"
"Above the bell rope stair, I think. " She shifted the flowers higher against her chest. "The minister checked the main room before he left, and it was dry then.
Paloma dropped these off early because the storm was supposed to be worse later, and now the vestibule is trying to baptize every stem she couldn't afford to replace. "
He glanced past her. Buckets and roasting pans sat under three leaks, each catching water with a different hollow note.
A line of flowers waited on the second pew, wrapped in paper and plastic.
Pale blooms, dark leaves, ribbons Wren had probably trimmed herself because no one else would have bothered making a storm plan look pretty.
"Della know?"
"No. " Wren's answer came too fast. "She gets one night without somebody handing her another problem. I am keeping this between us unless the ceiling falls in."
"Ceiling won't fall in."
"You say that like you have a contract with it."
"I know old roofs."
"Good. I know panic."
He almost smiled. That quick edge in her voice had been there when she was nineteen, making lists in feed-receipt margins and arguing color like it could hold back weather. Sharper now, but still Wren.
Colt took the bucket from her. "Move the flowers to the main room, away from the wall. Then hold the light for me."
She narrowed her eyes. "That sounds like you giving orders."
"It is."
"I don't remember voting you foreman of the chapel."
"Roof's leaking."
"Annoyingly good point."
They worked without wasting talk. Wren carried the flowers deeper into the nave, along the front pew where the old limestone stayed dry and beeswax still lingered under the damp.
Colt shifted buckets and followed the water's path.
It slid from the ceiling line beside the bell rope door, down the stone, over the carved trim, and onto the tile.
The leak was higher than the main roof, where the little bell tower joined the vestibule. A seam had opened or flashing had lifted in the wind. He had patched worse with less, but old buildings had pride. They did not like being forced.
Wren came back with a lantern from the supply closet and a stack of towels pressed to her hip. "Tell me the answer does not involve climbing outside."
"Not in this wind."
"That is the first sensible thing I've heard all day."
"There's a stair?"
She pointed to a narrow plank door half-hidden behind the bell rope. "In there. It goes up to the bell frame. The minister said nobody uses it unless the rope tangles."
Colt opened the door and ducked under the low frame. Dust, old wood, wet limestone, and the sharp mineral smell of stray water closed around him. The stair was tight enough that his shoulders brushed both walls.
Behind him, Wren held the lantern high. "You fit?"
"Mostly."
"That's not comforting."
"Stay behind me. If a step gives, I don't want you under it."
"Colt."
He looked back. Lantern light caught in her eyes and made them warmer than the storm deserved. She was close enough that the next breath he took seemed to come through her first.
"I heard you," she said, softer. "I'll stay one step back."
One step back had been the story of them for longer than he cared to admit. Close enough to feel heat. Far enough for fear to pretend it was sense.
He turned before he did something foolish with his hands. "Pass me the tape when I ask."
"Foreman again."
"Assistant, then."
"Temporary consultant," she said.
The banter eased the first turn of the stairs, but not the second.
There the wall pinched in and the roof slope lowered.
Colt had to bend, one hand braced on the damp stone, the other holding the tool bag close against his thigh.
Rain beat overhead in a thousand small fists.
Water found a crack near the top and slid through, striking his shoulder again, colder this time, a steady line that sank through denim and cotton.
Wren made a small sound behind him. "You're getting soaked."
"Been wet before."
He reached the landing, which was hardly more than a square of boards under the bell frame. The bell rope ran through a guide above them, frayed in places but still sound. Wind drove rain through the louvers, and the whole little tower shuddered with each gust.
Colt crouched and angled the lantern toward the inside corner.
There it was. A strip of metal flashing had lifted where the tower joined the roofline, peeled back enough for water to run under it and down through the seam.
He could reach part of it from inside if he leaned across the landing and worked by feel.
It would hold until a proper dry-day repair.
Maybe longer, if the old wood took the screws.
"Membrane," he said.
Wren opened the bag. Her fingers moved fast over tools she understood by purpose instead of habit. She handed him the roll, then the tape, then the sealant without asking twice.
"You trust me with the sharp things?" she asked.
"You always were good with sharp things."
It came out lower than he meant.
She went still below him.
Colt set his jaw and focused on the seam. The last thing this chapel needed was his old wound bleeding into the rainwater. He cut the membrane, pressed it over the gap, and worked the tape along the edge. The wind tried to tear it loose. He held it with the heel of his hand until the adhesive bit.
"Screwdriver," he said.
She passed it up. Their fingers brushed. A small contact, hardly worth naming. His body named it anyway.
For eight years he had told himself wanting was something a man could outwork. Run enough fence. Move enough cattle. Rock a child through enough fevers. Stand beside a grave and keep standing. Want would dry down to something harmless if he gave it no air.
Then Wren Calloway put a screwdriver in his hand in the bell tower of a leaking chapel, and all that old wanting lifted its head like it had only been waiting out the weather.
He drove the first screw. The wood held. The second took more pressure, and Wren steadied herself by bracing one palm against his back. She meant balance. He knew that. The stair was narrow, the floor damp, and she was trying not to bump his elbow.
His breath still caught.
"Sorry," she said.
"You're fine."
"You say that like it costs money."
"Might."
She huffed a laugh, but her hand stayed where it was for one more second. Warm through the wet cloth. Careful. A question without words.
He drove the last screw and sealed the edge with a thick bead that would offend any roofer with time and daylight, but it would stop the water. He pressed the patch flat, waited through one hard gust, then another.
The steady stream down the inner stone slowed to a thread.
Wren leaned around him, close enough that her hair brushed his jaw. "Did it work?"
"For tonight."
"Tonight is all I can afford."
He looked at her then. It was the wrong place for it, hunched under a bell frame with rain blowing through the louvers and water soaking his shoulder. It was also the first honest thing she had said all evening.
"How tight is it?" he asked.
She looked away too fast. "The wedding?"
"Your money."
Her mouth pressed thin. "Colt."
"You said afford."
"People say that."
"You do when you mean it."
For a moment the only sound was rain on metal and the faint drip below where the buckets still caught what was left. Wren held the lantern between them. Its light shook because her hand shook, and that hit him harder than any answer.
"I'm working," she said. "Paloma is paying me. Junie offered account work. I'm not helpless."
"I didn't say you were."
"You looked like you were about to."
"Then I looked wrong."
Her eyes came back to his. The landing was too small for pride to move around in. It had to stand between them or step aside. Colt could see her choosing which, and he understood too well why neither choice came easy.
"I know how to be broke," he said.
Wren's expression shifted. "You don't have to say that to make me feel better."
"I'm saying it because I know the look."
"What look?"
"Counting what breaks before it breaks."
Her breath left her in a short, uneven sound.
She glanced up at the bell above them. "This was supposed to be Della's simple thing.
Old chapel. Flowers we could stretch. No hotel ballroom, no city bill, no mother turning every napkin into a judgment.
If this vestibule floods and Paloma loses half those flowers, Della will smile and cut something else she wanted. "
"We stopped the leak."
"You stopped it."
"You called."
"I also panicked with towels."
"Useful towels."
That got him the smallest curve of her mouth. It faded before he could keep it.
Thunder rolled low over the hill, close enough to make the bell frame hum. Wren looked toward the stair.
"Can we get down?"
"Careful."