CHAPTER TWELVE
The first green cabinet went in at eight forty Wednesday morning.
By eight fifty-two, Cedric had pulled it back out.
The panel itself was correct. The factory had drilled the hinge pattern for the wrong swing, which meant the door would open into the refrigerator panel instead of away from it.
A less experienced crew could have forced the hardware, called it an adjustment, and left Nadine with a door that fought her every morning.
Cedric marked the box, photographed the label, and sent the replacement request before I reached the kitchen.
“What the hell happened?” Milan asked from the temporary island.
“Wrong hinge pattern,” Cedric said.
“Replacement time?”
“Forty-eight hours. Manufacturer has one unpainted shell in stock. They’re finishing it today.”
Milan checked the elevation. “Can the pantry run continue without it?”
“Yes.”
“Then continue.”
No shouting. No men blaming a drawing. No cabinet installed wrong because the schedule mattered more than the house. I stood in the doorway long enough to make sure everybody had what they needed.
Milan looked over. “You’re not in charge of daily supervision anymore.”
“I’m aware.”
“Then why are you standing like an inspector?”
“I own the company.”
“And I designed the kitchen.”
Cedric picked up the cabinet box. “I can leave if this becomes a family meeting.”
“Work,” Milan and I said at the same time.
He laughed and carried the box out. Nadine had signed the reassignment amendment two nights earlier.
On paper, Cedric ran the site, Milan handled design approvals, and my involvement required no direct decision from her unless it affected corporate risk or warranty.
In practice, it meant I could walk into the townhouse that evening carrying dinner without hiding a date inside a site meeting. That mattered more than I expected.
At six fifteen, the crew shut down. The temporary support posts were gone.
The repaired rear beam had passed inspection, the wall was closed, and half the lower cabinets stood along the kitchen in deep green rows.
Nadine arrived as Cedric locked the rear entrance.
She wore a long camel coat over work clothes and carried her laptop bag on one shoulder.
Her face changed when she saw the cabinets. She stopped in the front room.
“Come look,” Milan called.
Nadine crossed the plastic-covered floor faster than dignity allowed. She entered the kitchen, touched the nearest cabinet front, and smiled in a way I had not seen before. No audience smile. No polite gratitude. She looked pleased with herself.
“That is green,” she said.
Milan folded her arms. “You sound surprised.”
“It looked smaller on the sample.”
“You still like it?” I asked.
Nadine turned toward me. “I love it.”
The word landed in my chest before I could remind myself she was discussing paint.
She moved down the run, opening drawers that were not yet connected and looking inside empty cabinet boxes.
Milan showed her where the skillet drawer would go and how the pantry doors would fold back.
Nadine listened, asked three questions, and caught the reversed hinge issue before anybody mentioned it.
“That door is missing,” she said.
“Wrong drill pattern,” Cedric answered. “Replacement Friday. No schedule impact.”
She looked at him, then at me.
“You didn’t try to make it fit?”
Cedric appeared offended. “No, ma’am.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“He takes bad hinges personally,” Milan said.
“I take bad work personally,” Cedric corrected.
Nadine smiled. “Good.”
The crew left one by one. Milan gathered her drawings and stopped beside me near the front door.
“You staying?” she asked.
“Yes.”
She looked at the paper bag in my hand. “That dinner?”
“Yes.”
“For the client?”
“Nadine has a first name.”
Milan’s face opened into a grin. “I remember.”
“Go home.”
“I am. I just wanted to hear you say it.”
She hugged Nadine before she left.
Nadine watched the door close behind her. “She likes making you uncomfortable.”
“She considers it community service.”
“You raised her.”
“Her mother contributed.”
I carried the food into the kitchen. The working sink had been reconnected, but the counters were still plywood and the stove had not arrived.
I brought food from a Caribbean place near my office: brown-stew chicken, rice and peas, cabbage, plantains, and enough sauce to make paper plates a bad decision.
Nadine opened the containers. “This is too much food.”
“You’ll have lunch tomorrow.”
“In the apartment with no containers that match?”
“I brought containers.”
She stared at me. I pulled two black meal-prep containers from the bag.
“Warren.”
“What?”
“You brought storage to a date.”
“I brought food that will need storing.”
“That is the least sexy thing I’ve seen this week.”
“You watched cabinet installers all day.”
“Cedric wore a tool belt. Don’t underestimate the category.”
I set the containers on the island. “Should I leave?”
“No. But put the lids away before you kill the mood.”
We ate on two folding chairs facing the cabinets. No plans. No invoices. I kept the agreement. Nadine told me Sunday’s dinner with Terrence and Asha was scheduled at a restaurant in Cherry Hill because Asha said neither parent should have home-court advantage.
“That was her phrase?” I asked.
“She’s taking a conflict-resolution class.”
“Useful.”
“Dangerous. She labels everything now.”
“What did she label the move?”
“Emotional avoidance with a signed lease.”
I nodded. “Accurate.”
Nadine pointed her fork at me. “Don’t encourage her.”
“She doesn’t need me.”
“That has never stopped a twenty-one-year-old.”
We moved away from family after that. She asked why my company was called Mercer Row when I had started in a warehouse, not a rowhouse.
“Because Mercer Construction sounded like a man with a pickup and a cousin,” I said.
“You did have a pickup.”
“I still do.”
“And Cedric?”
“Not my cousin.”
“Missed opportunity.”
I asked what she would have done if she had not gone into nonprofit work.
“Interior design,” she said.
“You would’ve been difficult.”
“I would’ve been excellent.”
“Both can be true.”
She smiled and took a plantain from my plate after finishing hers. The front camera chimed. Nadine reached for her phone, but the door opened before she could check it. Asha stepped inside carrying a medium cardboard box. She stopped when she saw us. I stood.
Nadine did too. “Baby, I thought you were at school.”
“My afternoon class got canceled.” Asha looked from the food to me. “I texted.”
“My phone is in my purse.”
“I used the emergency code.”
“That’s fine. What’s the box?”
“Dad told me to start taking things from the house before he packs.”
The answer changed Nadine’s face.
Asha noticed but looked at me instead. “Hi.”
“Hi, Asha.”
We had seen each other at the party, but that night had not been an introduction. I had been a man beneath a leaking ceiling. She had been a daughter trying to understand why people were cheering.
Nadine touched the back of the empty chair. “We were eating.”
“I can see that.”
“You want some?”
“No.”
Asha put the box on the floor near the stairs. The label read NADINE—KITCHEN.
“What is it?” Nadine asked.
“Your cookbooks. Grandma’s skillet lid. That green glass bowl you like.”
Nadine glanced toward the cabinets.
Asha followed her eyes. “Oh. They’re really green.”
“Your mother chose them,” I said.
Both women looked at me. I kept my expression neutral.
Asha stepped into the kitchen and touched one of the fronts. “They’re pretty.”
“Thank you,” Nadine said.
The tension did not leave, but it changed shape.
Asha looked at the extra food. “Is this a date?”
Nadine’s shoulders settled as if she had made a decision.
“Yes.”
The direct answer surprised Asha. It surprised me too.
She nodded once. “Okay.”
Nadine pulled out the third folding chair. “Sit down.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Then sit without eating.”
Asha remained standing. Her attention shifted to me. “Did you start dating my mother while you were still running her project?”
Nadine opened her mouth.
I answered first. “No.”
Asha waited.
“I was attracted to her,” I said. “She told me she wouldn’t date me while I controlled the contract. I transferred direct oversight to Cedric and Milan. The company attorney documented it.”
Her brows lifted. “You made paperwork?”
Nadine covered her mouth with one hand.
“Yes,” I said.
Asha looked at her mother. “And you liked that?”
“More than I should’ve.”
For the first time since she entered, Asha almost smiled.
Then it disappeared. “Are you goddamn serious about her?”
The question came to me. Nadine did not rescue me from it.
“We’re getting to know each other,” I said.
“That’s vague.”
“It’s honest.”
“Dad says men know right away.”
“Your father and I don’t use the same process.”
Nadine made a small sound that might have been a laugh or a warning.
Asha folded her arms. “I don’t want her hurt.”
“Neither do I.”
“You can’t promise that.”
“No.”
That answer made her eyes narrow.
I continued, “I can promise I won’t lie to get what I want. I won’t use the house or the project to pressure her. And if this stops being right, I won’t make her pay for it through my company.”
Asha looked at Nadine. “You believe him?”
“I’m learning him.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“It’s the answer I have.”
The two of them held each other’s gaze. I stayed out of it.
Asha picked up the box again. “I’m putting this upstairs.”
“The upstairs is still under construction,” Nadine said.
“I’ll leave it in the front room.”
She carried it away.
Nadine exhaled through her nose. “That went well.”
“She didn’t throw the food.”
“She’s not Portia.”
“Portia would’ve eaten first.”
Asha returned without the box. She zipped her coat.
“I’m going back to campus,” she said.
“You just got here.”
“I didn’t know you had plans.”
“You don’t have to leave because Warren is here.”
“I’m not leaving because he’s here.”
The sentence meant exactly that and more. Nadine did not force it.
“Call me when you get back,” she said.
“I will.”
Asha looked at me before opening the door. “The cabinets are nice.”
“Your mother was right about the color.”
“She usually is.”
Then she left. Nadine stood in the center of the living room, arms hanging at her sides.
“You okay?” I asked.
“She came to bring me pieces of my old kitchen and found me eating with a new man in the new one.”
I closed the food containers. “I can go.”
“No.”
“You don’t have to protect the date.”
“I’m not.”
She walked toward me. “I’m saying no because I want you to stay.”
I put the lid down. Nadine stopped close enough that her coat brushed my shirt.
“You told my daughter you couldn’t promise not to hurt me,” she said.
“It would’ve been a lie.”
“She liked the answer.”
“Did she?”
“No. But she respected it.”
Her hand came to the center of my chest. I did not move until she leaned in. The kiss started softer than the one in the garage. No cold concrete. No deadline waiting in the next car. Nadine slid her coat from her shoulders without breaking contact, and I caught it before it hit the dusty floor.
“That was smooth,” she whispered.
“It was practical.”
“You’re determined to ruin every compliment.”
I hung the coat over the back of a chair and pulled her toward me again. She laughed against my mouth, then the sound disappeared when my hand moved beneath the hem of her blouse and touched warm skin at her waist. Nadine went still. I stopped.
“Too much?”
“No.”
Her hand covered mine and held it there. The house was quiet around us. No crew. No music. Just the refrigerator humming through a temporary extension and the distant sound of traffic beyond the windows. I kissed the side of her neck. Her fingers tightened in my shirt.
“Warren.”
I lifted my head. She looked flushed and irritated with herself for it.
“I don’t want the first time I sleep with somebody after twenty-two years to happen beside insulation and a portable toilet.”
I looked toward the rear window. The portable toilet was visible at the edge of the yard.
“That’s fair.”
“Don’t laugh.”
“I’m not.”
“You want to.”
“A little.”
She pressed her forehead into my chest and laughed first. I held her there. No frustration. No negotiation. The moment did not become less intimate because it stopped before sex.
Nadine lifted her head. “You can still kiss me.”
“I planned to.”
“No plans.”
“Then I was hoping.”
“That sounds better.”
I kissed her until the food got cold and the green cabinets stopped feeling like part of my job.