Chapter 1
Leo
“It’s too deep,” a breathy female voice says, a low grunt follows as I question all my life choices until this moment.
“I told you it wouldn’t fit,” a deeper voice scoffs, huffing so heavily I can hear it from where I’m standing in the hallway of my best friend’s vacation home.
I know I’m early, but I hope no one thought they could sneak a quickie before I got here today.
I was supposed to consult on building kitchen cabinetry, but am I about to walk in on two people using this construction site for a little afternoon delight?
I hope not. I’ve seen a few strange things since moving to the Southern Shore of Nova Scotia a couple of months ago—I could have sworn there was a pig on the side of the road on the way here—but this would be too much.
“Pull back. Oh God, I can’t— No, wait. We can make it fit.” After another grunt, I spin on my heel. I’m out of here. Darcy will get a kick out of this, no doubt. The woman yelps, and a loud bang follows. Okay, that didn’t sound like the fun type of kinky.
And that’s how I find myself running toward a demolished kitchen to find a woman bent over with her hands on her knees.
A fully clothed woman, much to my surprise after everything I heard.
The place is gutted down to the studs, a few sheets of drywall lying flat on the exposed subfloor.
Not exactly a romantic setting, but who am I to judge?
Her back is to me as she stands quickly, pushing her hair up until it’s piled on top of her head.
With what must be well-practiced movements, she collects the chocolate-brown waves into something that a bird could easily lay eggs in.
Her off-white sweater rides up to reveal a black shirt underneath.
Her skin is glowing, flushed from her current activities, and there's a pleased smile on her face.
“What was that you were saying about it not fitting, Jonas?” Her tone is teasing as she talks to the man out of my line of sight.
She rests her hands on her hips. Her full, round hips that are covered in tight-fitting black denim.
My gaze travels lower, to where she’s wearing a brown pair of worn boots.
“Now get out of here before your kids come looking for you. I’ll get Billie to help me with this.
Tell those little monsters I love them.”
The man huffs a response and walks in the direction they must have come from to bring this armoire in. At least that keeps him from seeing me lurking in the shadows. Getting caught checking out a woman’s ass at a job site isn’t a good look, and as the new guy in town, even less so.
I’m curious about what the hell she is doing moving a piece of furniture into an unfinished house.
As I tiptoe back into the hallway, I take a moment to collect my thoughts.
Now that I know what was happening, I’m assuming this is the designer I’m supposed to be meeting.
I had been nervous about coming here today, and I’m honestly not sure if this whole situation made that better or worse.
Either way, she’s here and I’m here, which means I gotta go in.
I shuffle forward, calling out a hello as if I’d just walked in.
“In here,” the woman I thought was defiling a job site calls back.
As I re-enter the kitchen, she’s standing in front of me, adjusting a pair of clear glasses on her button nose.
Ruby-red lips are pulled into a small smile.
“Hi, you must be Leopold? Darcy’s told me a bit about you.
I’m Neve.” She stretches a hand out toward me, her back ramrod straight.
Her tone is polite and professional, which seems strange after I’ve heard her so casually speaking to someone else.
With my new knowledge of what noises she surely makes in the privacy of her bedroom, this version of her seems oddly… forced. Unnatural.
I definitely shouldn’t be thinking about that, though. What is wrong with me? At a job site?
“Leo.” That’s all I can say because I’m trying to push my thoughts far away from whatever version of this woman I thought I was going to meet a few minutes ago.
She cocks her head to the side, waiting for me to say something else. I don’t. Another beat passes, and her smile falters as we stand there, blinking at each other. I don’t even realize her hand is still outstretched until she clears her throat and lowers it. Shit. I didn’t shake her hand.
Social anxiety is such a bitch sometimes.
It’s why I enjoyed working in a shop where I could make things and not deal with clients.
That was going to be Helen’s role when I opened my own shop.
She was going to be the one schmoozing, selling, and working the showroom.
But those plans changed, and now it’s just me doing site visits.
I have to be the one shaking hands and smiling. That’s what I should do, anyway.
I’m about to apologize when she walks over to the oversized antique that her no more than 5’4” frame dragged in here with only one other person.
“Has Darcy sent you the plans for the house yet? I have an extra copy here if you’d like to take a look.
” She shuffles papers around, and before I can answer, she turns to me, her lips now pulled in a tight line.
She hands me the plans with a stiff arm, and I take them with a nod.
Not even a thanks. She obviously notices as her eyes narrow and her arms cross over her chest. I gotta get it together.
I let out a heavy breath, and when another voice comes from behind me, we both visibly relax as this new person eases the awkward tension in the room.
“Sorry I’m late.” I recognize that voice.
“Tammy got out and was blocking the road like the little asshole that she is, again. She wouldn’t move until I gave her half of my sandwich.
That fucking pig ate my lunch!” The tall, blonde woman I met recently walks past me and straight to Neve, wrapping her up in a hug.
“Hi, Billie. It’s fine. I haven’t been here long.” Neve's smile is warm as she untangles herself from Billie, the head contractor on this job. We’ve been at a couple of job sites together recently, so at least I can’t make another terrible first impression. Not today, at least.
“Hey, Leo. Nice to see you again. You’ve met Neve, then, the brilliant brains behind this project.
” She points between the two of us and focuses back on me.
“Heads up, watch out for a very large, very hungry pig who likes to break out of the farm, where she’s extremely well fed and taken care of, to terrorize the citizens of Balsam Bay.
” Okay, I guess I did see a pig earlier.
That’s good to know. And it seems Billie’s not done talking.
“I saw Jonas on my way in. What was he doing here?” Her glare drifts to the single piece of furniture in the completely gutted space.
“Oh shit, did he help you bring this in? I told you to call me. And why is it here and not at Leo’s shop?
” Billie talks a mile a minute, as if she processes every thought in her head out loud.
I can’t imagine what that’s like. I overanalyze everything.
Quietly.
In my head.
“Well, I didn’t know where to take it, and it had to be picked up today.
There’s no more room in my garage, as you know.
Plus, I kind of wanted to see it in the space.
You know, for scale and all that. But yeah, Jonas helped.
” She smiles openly at the hutch. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen someone smile at a hutch before.
“It was a tight one, though. He kept saying it wasn’t going to fit, but I said we’ll make it fit, and we did.
We got it all the way in. Felt good,” Neve answers with a sigh and a perfectly straight face.
Billie looks at me out of the corner of her eye and shakes her head, focusing back on her friend.
“You gotta stop saying shit like that on job sites. You know some of the other girls will be throwing, that’s what she said, jokes your way faster than you can finish saying, we’ll make it fit.
Jesus.” Billie shakes her head again, tightening her short blonde ponytail.
“Anyway, Leo, have you seen the plans? Neve here loves old shit, so she’s always giving us sad-looking, decrepit things to work with.
” The smirk on her face tells me this doesn’t actually bother her.
I take a second to catch up. We’ve gone from pigs to jokes to plans in a short amount of time.
“Uh, not yet, no.” I flip through the pages in my hand, noting the details already mentioned for door styles, hardware, and what’s going inside the cabinets.
Impressive. I’m used to getting a Pinterest board from a designer asking whether something is possible, but this one seems to have her shit together.
“Looks good,” I say, meeting Neve’s eyes.
They’re brown, like her hair, yet not at all like it.
Her hair is warm with a little red, like mahogany wood, while her eyes are cool and a little green, like poplar.
When Neve stays quiet, Billie clears her throat.
“Yeah, I’m excited to see this come together,” she chimes in after another awkward beat of silence.
“We thought it’d be good to get you in here so you can get a feel for the space, take a few measurements, whatever you need.
Drywall won’t be finished for another couple of weeks, but this should let you get started with planning a few more things and not only working off presumed measurements. ”
I give a single nod as she looks at Neve expectantly, not subtly asking her to say something since I’ve got all of eight words in my vocabulary today.
“My contact information is on the plans, so you can let me know if you have questions about them. I can come by your shop and we’ll take a closer look at everything.
Is between two and three on Thursday okay?
” Neve’s back straightens again, but this time, her shoulders also follow suit. I don’t think she likes me.
“Sure, Thursday’s fi—”
“Great. I’ll get the address from Billie. I need to ask her a few plumbing questions upstairs if that’s okay? We’ll get out of your hair.” Her lips pull down as she reaches for Billie’s hand, leaving the room without another word.
Well, I royally fucked that one up.
And with that thought, my phone vibrates in my pocket.
DARCY
Let me know how the meeting goes today with Neve. She’s the best, and I need her, so be nice. Try cracking a joke or maybe a smile? You can do this. I believe in you.
I’m glad my best friend is the optimistic one.
He wouldn’t be if he witnessed the last ten minutes.
Some days, it’s easy. Easy to carry a normal conversation and not feel overwhelmed by every what-if that pops into my head.
And other days… Well, other days are like today.
I’ll be overthinking this interaction for the foreseeable future and wishing like hell that I could get a do-over.
But that’s nothing new for me.