Chapter Nine
The annoying thing about manual labor was that it gave the brain plenty of time to stew.
By the time Jack cleared a path to his truck, gathered the random snacks that would constitute both his dinner and breakfast, and trudged back to the house, he was exhausted.
Being wrong really took it out of a guy.
“I owe you an apology,” Jack said after finding Ellie back at work in the study, reminding himself that a willingness to say sorry counted as a sign of maturity.
“Yeah, you do.” Ellie folded her arms, clearly not willing to let him off the hook so easily.
He’d be dead before admitting it, but he liked that about her. Respected it. “I panicked. Now that I have dogs, I make a point of getting home at a reasonable hour. And with Logan not right next door, I don’t have a built-in backup.”
Admitting the source of his freak-out made him feel foolish, but it was clearly the right card to play. Ellie’s features softened. “You’re allowed to worry about your babies.”
If a tiny part of him wanted to argue that descriptor, the rest of him knew it was one hundred percent true. “It doesn’t excuse my behavior, though.”
Ellie smiled. “No, but it makes me inclined to give you a pass. Were you able to arrange someone to take care of them? I’m sure Rhett wouldn’t mind.”
He’d considered that. Would have called her if he hadn’t been able to get ahold of Logan.
“I got through to my sister. It’s not quite as bad up in Bedlington yet, plus she volunteered to do the first round of plowing the family driveways.
She’s going to pick them up and take them back to her house. ”
A shadow of what looked like sadness passed through Ellie’s eyes, but it disappeared so fast, Jack wasn’t sure he hadn’t imagined it. “I’m glad.”
“Do you have siblings?” he asked before he could help himself.
Ellie shook her head. “Just me.”
“Are you close with your parents?” Maybe it was remorse loosening his lips, trying to compensate for being an ass with the social niceties normal people exchanged as a matter of politeness.
“My dad passed when I was fifteen. I’m kind of close to my mom, but it’s…” Ellie frowned. “It’s complicated.”
Since he typically went out of his way to avoid engaging in said niceties, the comment left him at a loss.
Was that code for “please ask me more” or “I don’t want to talk about it”?
Clover’s face appeared in his mind, like a little fairy of empathy and grace.
With it, one of her signature phrases for conundrums like this. “That sounds hard.”
Ellie shrugged with a smile that screamed “thanks but I really don’t want to talk about it.”
“So.” He might be able to read the cue, but it didn’t mean he knew where to go next.
“So.” Her smile became more of a smirk. “Does that mean you’re staying with me tonight?”
Jack blew out a breath—his own tell for wanting to change the subject. Even if it would be better to sort it out now instead of bedtime. “I don’t want to impose.”
“Well, since I have the only furniture, functioning bathroom, and semblance of a usable kitchen, I’m thinking you don’t have much of a choice.”
He’d barely wrapped his head around not being able to leave. No clean clothes and no toiletries landed hard. Not to mention nowhere to sleep. “Do you have furniture?”
“Only one bed, I’m afraid.”
“I can sleep on the floor,” he said way too quickly, though a rug would beat bare floor.
Her look told him she knew exactly where his mind had gone. “I have a comfy chair.” She lifted a finger. “Not ideal, but definitely better than the floor.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers, right?” He’d been going for funny but worried it came out snarky. “Kidding. I mean, kind of. I’m definitely a beggar in this situation.”
“Does that mean you are or aren’t a choosy one?” Ellie’s eyes danced with humor now.
Better to have her make fun of him than think he was an asshole. He’d already painted himself into that corner once today. “Not choosy at all. Grateful. I meant to say I’m grateful for anything that’s not a drop cloth in the middle of a construction zone.”
“That’s the spirit.” She gave him a friendly punch in the bicep. “Since you’re being such a good sport, I’ll even share my storm rations with you.”
“Storm rations?” When had she had the time to go out for storm rations?
“To be fair, I’ve been living mostly on low-maintenance nonperishables anyway. Not much of a kitchen. But I did stock up on wine and junk food. It feels mean to keep it all to myself.”
Not that every part of this didn’t suck, but the offer—and what it signified—might just qualify as a silver lining. “I’d be in your debt.”
Ellie made a show of looking him up and down. “I like the sound of that.”
Under other circumstances, he’d think Ellie was flirting with him.
He wasn’t great at reading things like that, but he’d accidentally led enough women on that he’d learned how to tune in and turn down the volume.
Because apparently some people were drawn to the strong and silent—or as Maddie so eloquently put it, sullen and surly—type.
But surely that wasn’t the case here. If anything, Ellie’s incessant cheerfulness seemed designed specifically to antagonize him. Maybe not at first, but certainly by now. And yet here they were, bantering in a way that would have his siblings teasing him had they had the ability to eavesdrop.
Ellie’s shoulders fell, but her expression remained playful. “Now I’m kidding. I’m not actually going to lord it over you.”
It bugged him that her assumption would be that he couldn’t take a joke. But perhaps he’d made that bed for himself. Either way, it was for the best. “You can. A little at least.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” She angled her head. “Are you going to work more, now that you’re stuck here?”
He didn’t feel especially compelled to, but if he didn’t, it meant an entire evening of hanging out with Ellie. He could barely fathom making dinner conversation, much less enough to pass however many hours they had until he could reasonably call it a night. “Yeah, maybe I will.”
“I thought you might.” She glanced at her watch. “Want to go until seven or so, then eat?”
He nodded, probably more eagerly than necessary. “That sounds great.”
“You get your choice of jarred marinara over angel hair or tomato soup from a carton with a grilled cheese. I’ll let you ponder while you work.”
Jack chuckled. “No thinking required. If grilled cheese is an option, it’s always the right answer.”
She gave him one of those looks again—up and down, real slow. Enough to make him fidget. “Look at that, we have something in common.”
He swallowed and ignored the very inconvenient way his hormones chose to interpret matters. “Look at that.”
* * *
Ellie stepped back to assess whether the colors that looked fantastic close up blended with the overall painting.
But instead of the perspective she’d been aiming for, she found herself plunged into darkness.
“What the?” Since the obvious answer was that it had something to do with Jack, she closed one eye and hollered, “What did you do?”
There was a crash from somewhere in the basement, followed by an expletive.
A moment of silence, another crash, then Jack’s footsteps on the stairs.
Footstomps? Was that a word? The flashlight from his phone appeared in the doorway a moment before his shadowy form.
“I didn’t do anything.” His emphasis on “I” implied it might have been her fault.
She gave him a withering look before gesturing with both her palette and brush. “Well, I sure as hell didn’t.”
Jack let out a sound that resembled a growl. “It’s probably the generator.”
She felt her eyes go wide, hated being the deer in the headlights, but she couldn’t seem to help it. “The generator?”
“It’s probably out of fuel. I’m sure no one checked it before hightailing it out of here.”
She hooked her paintbrush under the thumb poking through her palette and scrubbed her free hand over her face. “Fuck me.”
“No, thank you. At least not until we get the power resolved.”
Ellie blinked at him. “Did you seriously just say that?”
Jack shrugged. “You started it.”
She could get all huffy. But the comment was the closest she and Jack had come to a real moment of connection.
And damn it all if it wasn’t funny. Like, really funny.
So, she laughed. Laughed and laughed and laughed some more, until tears streamed down her face and it was all she could do to remain standing.
“I did,” she said when she could catch her breath enough to form words.
“I don’t feel great about going out in this weather with no light, but I think I should try.”
She sure as hell didn’t want to. But just about as low on the list was Jack venturing out on his own, because if he didn’t come back she’d have to go out looking for him and they’d both die of hypothermia. “Do you know how to restart a generator?”
He gave her a bland look, making her realize the borderline insulting nature of the question for someone in his line of work.
“Sorry.”
Jack shrugged. “I can’t promise that’s the problem, but it’s likely. And it’s going to get pretty damn cold in here without the furnace running.”
A zip of panic swelled in her chest. “Wait, I thought the furnace ran on gas.”
“It does. But these new models require electricity for the sensors and thermostat.”
Of course they did. “Fuck.”
“Me?” Jack arched a brow.
“No, thank you. At least not until we get the power resolved.” Not the truth for her, exactly, but it seemed like a better idea to be clever than admit wanting to jump his bones.
Jack smirked. An honest to God smirk. Fear of freezing to death took a back seat to delight, at least momentarily.
“Do you, um, need me to go out with you?” Ellie asked, tone not even a little bit convincing.
The smirk faded, and Jack lifted his chin ever so slightly. “I got it.”
Okay, so she might be imagining it, but she’d swear there was a trace of bravado there. But, like, chivalrous tough guy, not cantankerous. She swallowed, not wanting to admit how quickly that could get her into trouble. “I’d argue, but I’m pretty sure I’d be zero help.”
Jack nodded, full strong and silent mode engaged. She followed him to the back entry and experienced a moderate twinge of guilt as he pulled on his coat and hat once again.
“Please be careful.”
Another nod. He fished a headlamp from one of his pockets and slipped it on over the hat. If he wasn’t about to go out there and save her ass, she’d have teased him about hers being bigger. But since she didn’t know how he’d take it—plus that whole bit about saving her ass—she kept her mouth shut.
He disappeared into the darkness. Even the beam of light got swallowed up by the swirling snow.
Ellie closed the door to keep in the heat but hovered, figuring the least she could to was stand vigil.
When the dot of light reappeared a couple of minutes later, swaying back and forth with Jack’s stride, relief swept through her.
Until she realized how briefly he’d been gone.
And how quiet and dark the house remained.
She opened the door and Jack hurried in, stomping the snow from his boots. A blanket of white covered his hat and shoulders, and Ellie had to resist the urge to brush it away. “That was fast,” she said, trying to channel optimism.
“There’s no fuel.”
“What? How is that possible?”
Jack shrugged. “I’m guessing it’s someone on the crew’s job to take the cans to get filled, and that’s what they did.”
“And planned to bring them back full the next day.” It was a perfectly logical thing to do.
With her quarters running off the main power supply, the generator only needed to run when the crew was working.
Well, and to provide whatever electricity the furnace needed, but that probably wasn’t very much. Ellie shook her head. “What do we do?”
“We hunker and come up with a game plan in the morning. We should have a better sense of just how stuck we are by then, too. And how quickly we can get dug out.”
Just how stuck. She’d grown up in New England and still shuddered at the thought.
It was one thing to have a snow day because the roads were bad, and you had all the creature comforts of home with no responsibilities for the day.
This was definitely not that. And while they probably weren’t in any real danger, she didn’t like the idea of having limited resources and few options. “Yeah.”
Jack blew out a breath. “I guess that means grilled cheese is off the menu.”
They wouldn’t starve by any stretch of the imagination. But a cold cheese sandwich would certainly feel like roughing it. At least there was wine. “Unless you’re building us a fire.”
“I wish,” he said, rolling his eyes.
Reconstruction of the fireplaces and repointing the chimneys were on the docket, but they involved an expert who hadn’t been brought in yet. “Yeah.”
He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “I guess we’re done with work for the day.”
It was her turn to do the stoic nod.
“Do you need help cleaning anything up? I can hold a light while you wash your brushes or whatever.”
Of course he had to go and be thoughtful on top of everything else. “I can manage. You’re not the only one with a headlamp.”
“Handy little things, aren’t they?”
One more thing they had in common. “I’ll just be a few minutes. You’re welcome to head to my room if you want. There’s at least somewhere to sit. Though Emily Dickinson might help herself to your lap.”
“I’ll, uh, head down to the basement and make sure I left things okay there.”
The stilted delivery made her think it had less to do with tidying his work area than the prospect of going into her space alone. It seemed silly to her, but whatever. “Okay. I guess I’ll see you there in a little bit.”
He nodded and headed for the basement stairs like a man on a mission.
Once he’d gone, she shook her head. As much as she might have fantasized about spending the night with Jack, the reality of the situation landed like a fifty-pound sack of plaster.
Fantasy or no, something told her it was going to be a long night.