Chapter 7 #2
He’d felt her come in just the instant before she’d spoken.
A chill of sheer pleasure danced up his spine any time she was nearby.
He cursed his luck yet again for being this attracted to a woman who was off-limits for a one-night-stand or a casual fling.
She was family. His cousin-in-law’s sister.
That might not be considered close in most families, but it was in his.
He didn’t turn, since she was moving up to stand beside him. “We have our work cut out for us, huh?”
He looked down at her then. She wore a denim shirt, unsnapped over a black tank-top, and jeans over heavy-duty work boots. A tool belt was buckled around her waist, he noticed, and he couldn’t hide his smile.
“Oh, you like that?” she asked, hooking her thumbs behind twin screwdrivers. A hammer hung at her hip like a six-shooter.
“You borrowed it from your dad,” he said.
“How do you know it’s not my own?”
“I can read you like a book.”
Lily fell silent, her eyes widening slowly.
Then he added, “And his initials are on the nail-apron.”
She looked down at her own front, where HH was the same upside down. “I should’ve remembered. I’m the one who got it for him. Father’s Day, five years ago, I think.”
“It’s worn well,” he said.
“Mainly, I wore it for the tape measure, and to carry my tablet around.” She pulled her iPad out of the apron’s nail pocket.
“And in case we decide to knock down a wall?” he asked, with a nod at the hammer.
“Well, yeah. Obviously.” She smiled brightly, then pointed to the table directly inside the door where she’d deposited a cardboard tray with a pair of extra-large coffees and a bag he hoped held donuts. “From the donut shop up the road,” she said.
He made growly sounds and headed for the table, taking the coffee with the E on the lid, and then peering into the bag. “Yes, raspberry jam, my favorite.”
“I know. I’ll take that glazed one, if you don’t mind.”
He plucked the donut and brought it to her along with both coffees.
“Thanks,” she said. She was surveying the room. “While the rest of us pigged out, last night, Dad jotted a few notes for the kitchen.”
“He did?”
“He’s not trying to butt in, just wants to be helpful. Says it’s just stuff he’d want if he were in charge of it.”
He crooked an eyebrow. “Does he want to be?”
“Want to be what?”
“In charge of it. Head chef.”
She caught her lower lip in her teeth. He’d noticed she did that when she was holding something back.
“He does, yes. I’m not sure he can handle it on his own, though.
If this place goes as big as I think it will…
but that’s another conversation. Let’s start in the basement and work our way up, all right? ”
Without waiting for a reply, she headed behind the bar and through the red doors into the kitchen. He caught up with her and asked, “What changes did Hyram ask for?”
“A second cook surface, to keep the meats separate from non-meat items. Reduces cross-contamination risk. He’d put a produce prep station over in this wasted space near the basement door.
” She opened said door as she spoke, felt around for a light switch and found one.
The steps were finished, not open, not rickety as he followed her down.
“Wow.” Lily was standing in the middle of the finished basement turning in a slow circle. One end held a furnace and large water heater. The rest was empty, aside from crates of booze, in stacks. The concrete block walls were painted white. “This is a lot of space.”
“Not good for much besides storage,” he said. “Too far from the rest. Good to have in case of a twister, though.”
“It’s a shame not to use it for something.” She set her coffee on the water tank, held her remaining half-donut in her teeth like a fat cigar, and tapped on her iPad with one finger, which she’d wiped on her jeans, making a note. “What about that recording studio idea?”
“I mean, it could work, sure, but…it’s a distraction. We should focus on the honky-tonk.”
She muttered something. The words “God forbid” and “time at home” in the mix, and maybe a cuss word, which was unlike her.
Or not.
Having looked his fill, Ethan made an “after you” gesture toward the stairs, and Lily started up.
“Second floor next, huh?” she asked. “I’ve never seen that part. Have you?”
“Never had call to be up there, no.” He followed her out of the kitchen, around the bar and just past it, and up the stairs. It was impossible not to notice how those jeans hugged her backside, since it was level with his face as she trotted ahead of him.
The entire second story was a big open space. It had windows on all four sides, and a support beam in the center. Aside from a few boxes stacked along two walls, and a whole lot of dust, it was empty.
“Office space,” Ethan said.
“For you or me?” she asked, moving to the back, where a picture window took up almost the entire rear wall. Wiping the dust way with her hand, she looked out.
“It’s big enough for both,” he said.
“Wall down the middle? Who gets the window with the view?”
“I’m okay without a wall if you are,” he said. “Keep it open.”
She grinned. “I like it. Okay, desks should be on that side, so we’re facing this amazing view.
No curtains, but maybe blinds, so we can block the sun when it’s too much.
” She pulled her tape measure off her tool belt and stretched it across the room.
He held the end for her as she made notes on the tablet.
“A private restroom would be nice, too,” she said.
“There’s plenty of room for one, and it would be better than sharing with the gen pop downstairs. ”
“If there’s room in the budget, I’m all for it.”
“There’s a budget?”
“Not yet, but it seems like there ought to be, doesn’t it?” He looked at her with one brow raised, half-kidding, but not really.
She nodded, biting her bottom lip.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“There’s something. Go ahead, ask. You want to know if I can afford it.”
She shrugged, lowered her eyes. “Yeah, I do. I mean it is just the one hit song.”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
“ De nada ,” she said. “We can get by up here with a fresh coat of paint. The floor is…” She bent to pull up the corner of old indoor-outdoor carpet. “Plank, probably original too. Look at that. Just needs to be sanded down and refinished. We can DIY this space, save us a bundle.”
“You really want that bathroom.”
She took a few more measurements, then ran back down the stairs, into the main room. “Down here, though, I think we need to consult with an expert,” she called.
He headed down to the ground floor too, and wondered how he’d keep up with her energy. “I agree. That could be a load-bearin’ wall, for all I know.”
She went to the wall in question, with the double glass doors in its center, nodding her head and examining it as if she knew more about construction than he did.
Maybe she did. She sure as hell knew more about running a business than he did.
“This doorway should be arched, out to the addition, don’t you think? ”
“More room if its squared-off.”
“More memorable arched. More beautiful.”
“More expensive?”
“Seriously, you have to tell me,” she said. “I feel like your family’s pretty wealthy, even though they don’t seem like rich people. You all get a cut from the ranch or something, don’t you?”
“It’s an ever-dwindling cut, but we’ve invested the profits in the past, and that part of it’s doing pretty well.”
“So between that and the hit song…?” She left the question hanging in the air.
“I’m going to take out a loan.”
She smiled at him, moving close enough to poke his chest with a forefinger. “Including enough for my salary,” she said. “I’m on the clock as we speak.”
So if he pulled her in for a kiss, it would officially be sexual harassment, Ethan thought.
He blinked the impulse away, kind of stunned by it. Then his phone went off and hers did, too. “It’s Orrin,” he said. Then he read the text on his screen aloud. “‘Video’s gone viral, just not the way we expected.’ There’s a link.” He held the phone low so she could see, too, and tapped the link.
The video of him talking last night was flirting with a million views. “That’s good, right?”
“Seems good, to me,” Lily said. “Look at the comments and see how it’s going over.”
He scrolled with his thumb, and there were several comments like, “love his music” and “good for him” and a few folks claiming their dads had murdered their moms, too, which just made him sad, and a handful of trolls calling him a washed-up wanna-be, which made him wonder if it was possible to be both.
But then came the most popular comment of all, the one that asked, “Who’s the girl?”
That comment had 1,207 replies, including, “He’s really got a death grip on her hand, doesn’t he?” and “check out the way he looks down at her at 3:47.” And “You can practically see the hearts in his eyes.” And “I feel a love song coming on.”
He couldn’t bring himself to look at Lily, so he had no idea what she was making of it all.
Just then another text came through with another link. He tapped that one, and it went to a truncated version of the original video that zoomed in on his and Lily’s clasped hands and then cut to him gazing down at her like he’d just crossed a desert and she was a popsicle.
They’d slowed that part down, into ultra slow-motion, and they’d put pulsing heart graphics over his head. His volume was up, so the swelling romantic music they’d inserted behind the clip played full blast.
He tapped and tapped to silence the dang thing, then glanced at Lily’s face. Expressionless. Too shocked to react?
Orrin was still texting screenshots of headlines. “Who’s the mystery woman healing Ethan Brand’s heart?” And “Ethan Brand’s Heartache Honey?”
That was downright insulting. Aloud, he said, “Lily, I’m so sorry. I never meant to drag you into my mess. Hell and damnation.”