Chapter 24
Chapter twenty-four
Sam
"So," I say, wiping a smudge of grease off my thumb with a napkin. "You had an idea about the gallery submission?"
Tom doesn't answer immediately. We're sitting on a pair of overturned buckets at the site eating lunch. He's been turning his coffee cup between his hands for the last ten minutes. I've learned this means he's getting his nerve up to say something I may not like.
His hands are in his lap, and he's just looking at the Harbor District site footprint like he's already made peace with whatever he's about to say.
"Yeah." He doesn't look away from the site. "I've been thinking about it."
A beat.
"They want to see work similar to the Harbor images—urban transformation, documenting what changes and what stays. I do have a personal project that fits. But I'm not ready to show that yet."
I take another bite of my sandwich and wait.
"So I was thinking—what if I submitted the Harbor images? The early ones. The 'before' shots we took in the first few weeks."
My brow pulls together. "The current project? Isn't that a conflict of interest?"
"Not the marketing images." He looks at me now, direct, unhurried. "The documentation shots. The ones that show what was here before the transformation. It's about recording what's being lost. The gallery might actually love that angle. And it's good publicity for the Board if they approve it."
Professionally, he's not wrong. It's clean. Defensible. But it's safe in a way that Tom usually isn't.
"Don't you want to share a personal project?" I ask. "Something that's just yours?"
He holds my gaze for a long beat. No deflection, no small joke to dissolve the weight of the question.
"I do have personal work," he says. "But I like that this is ours."
Ours.
I wasn't ready for that word.
He doesn't reach for a hedge, doesn't soften it or follow it with a shrug.
I fold the edge of my napkin once, then again. "We'd need Board approval," I say, because it's the sensible thing to say.
"I know. I wanted to run it by you first."
I look at him—the set of his jaw, the way he's waiting without fidgeting. "Is this just an easier option?" I ask quietly. "Avoiding the personal project?"
The corner of his mouth moves. Not a deflective grin. More like he got caught and doesn't particularly mind. "Yeah. Maybe a little."
"I think it makes sense," I say slowly. "The 'before' images are strong. They tell a real story." My fingers flatten against the napkin. "But Tom—you don't have to hide the other work forever. Whatever it is."
He holds my gaze again. "I know," he says. "I'm just not there yet."
"Okay."
Wren warned me not to push.
Suddenly, Tom's phone begins to vibrate violently against the makeshift plywood table. The screen lights up with an incoming call. The name Marc flashes across the top. It's exactly 1:30 PM.
Tom's jaw tightens. He doesn't answer it. He doesn't even hesitate. He reaches out, hits the decline button, and flips the phone face down.
"Everything okay?" I ask.
"Fine." He reaches for his camera bag, his voice completely level. "Just an agent pitching something I'm not interested in. Should we get started? Light's going to be perfect in about an hour."
I nod and gather the empty containers, and we go back to work.
Outside the site office windows, the sun is gone. Inside, the world has shrunk down to four walls, the hum of the mini-fridge, and the harsh glare of the laptop screen.
We've been pushing the final presentation flow back and forth for twenty minutes.
I'm trying to walk him through why the design story needs to lead with community integration—not the structural hero shots—and he keeps circling back to the visual sequence like this is a photography problem instead of a stakeholder one.
"No," he says, tapping the screen. "If you start with the structural bones, you get the scale immediately—"
"But scale isn't what neighbors are going to feel first," I cut in. "They'll feel the path from their front door to the waterfront. That's the emotional anchor. If we don't open with that, the whole presentation reads like we're building a monument to ourselves."
I hear the edge in my own voice and dial it back.
"Sorry," I say. "I'm not explaining it right."
I scan the room for something to work with. Tape measure on the desk. Stack of crates in the corner. Folding chair against the wall.
"Here." I grab the tape measure. "Hold this end."
He takes it, confused. "What are we doing?"
"I need to show you the sightline." I drag the folding chair toward the crates. "If you hold that steady and I measure the angle from up there, you'll see exactly what residents will see looking toward the waterfront. That's why the connectivity shot has to lead."
"Sam—"
"I'm fine." I test the top crate with one boot. Solid. I step onto the chair, then onto the crate, and the tape measure pulls taut between us. "Okay. Hold it steady—"
The crate shifts. Not much. Enough.
Tom is already moving before I process the shift. No hesitation, no "careful"—just three fast steps and both hands are at my waist.
He lifts me down in one clean motion.
There isn't much space between the desk and the crates, and when my boots hit the floor, we're closer than we should be. His hands stay where they are. Mine land on his shoulders because there is nowhere else to put them.
Neither of us moves.
"Okay," I say. "Not my best plan."
"No." His grip doesn't loosen. His voice is easy but his eyes aren't.
"Did you at least see what I meant? About the angle?"
"No." A pause. "I was too busy watching you try to seriously injure yourself."
A laugh slips out. "I had it under control."
"You were standing on a folding chair on top of a crate."
"It was structural."
"It was cardboard."
"Reinforced cardboard."
He finally lets go and steps back toward the laptop. "Show me on the screen. No climbing required."
I follow him back to the desk.
The ghost of his hands is still warm against my sides, and I have no good reason to still be thinking about it.
I take a breath.
Then I pull my chair to the opposite side of the desk.
"Community integration slide," I say, opening the file. "I'll walk you through the revisions."
I sound like I'm presenting to the Board, not sitting in a construction trailer with a man who just had his hands on my waist.
We work like that for twenty minutes. Me on one side, him on the other.
It doesn't help.
Every time his hand moves near the center of the desk, I'm aware of exactly how many inches separate his fingers from mine.
This is ridiculous.
I've worked late with colleagues hundreds of times. I've shared tight spaces, missed dinners, collaborated under pressure. I don't lose focus because someone steadied me when I climbed on a crate.
Except I am losing focus.
We had to move back to the main monitor to review the final photo sequence in high resolution. Tom stands behind me, close enough that I can hear him breathing, one hand resting on the back of my chair.
The mini-fridge hums. Outside, the site has gone quiet. It's after nine.
It is a perfect, dangerous echo of the night we almost crossed this line weeks ago. The dark office, the glowing screen, the impossible proximity. But this time, there is no sudden interruption. This time, there's no excuse to step away.
It doesn't usually require this much concentration to ignore.
"This one," I say, pointing to the screen. "This is the hero shot."
"The connectivity sightline?"
"Yeah." I zoom in—the path, the water, the way the massing frames the view perfectly. "You saw something I missed. You've been doing that since day one."
He doesn't answer immediately. "You see plenty," he says, low and close to my ear. "You just don't give yourself credit."
I turn to look at him because it's a reflex and also a mistake.
He's right there. The laptop light catches the angle of his jaw, the steadiness in his expression. He doesn't look surprised to find me looking at him. He doesn't look away.
He leans in. His eyes drop to my mouth, then come back to mine, and he holds there for one beat. Giving me room to step back into the distance I built.
I don't take it.
His lips meet mine, careful at first, the pressure measured. He tilts my face up with two fingers beneath my jaw, the touch so gentle it makes everything else in the room recede.
I can smell his soap, feel the faint scratch of stubble at my chin. His thumb traces my cheekbone in one slow, steady stroke. I can't tell if my heart's racing or if it stopped.
My hand lifts to his chest, then slides up to his neck. My fingers find his hair and tighten as I pull him closer. My mouth softens against his.
The office, the project, the four-week timeline—all of it disappears.
He pulls back one inch. Maybe two.
We're both still.
I open my eyes. He's watching me.
"Shoot," I say.
His brows lift. "Shoot?"
The laugh that comes out of me is half nerves, half genuine. "Sorry. I was kind of hoping you'd be a terrible kisser. Would've made this a lot easier to file under 'overworked and tired.'"
"And?"
I stand up because my body needs something to do. I take three steps across the tiny office, then turn back. The room is too small for real pacing, but I do it anyway.
"You're not a bad kisser."
He leans against the desk and watches me, and he doesn't smile—not the full easy grin. Just a slight pull at the corner of his mouth. "Thank you. I think."
I drag a hand through my hair. "We have four weeks left on the Harbor project. Weekly Board presentations. Wednesday prep sessions." I turn to face him. "We're basically stuck working together."
"Is that a bad thing?"
"I don't know yet." I hold his gaze. "Ask me in four weeks."
His expression settles, softer. "Okay."
Silence. I've crossed my arms without thinking, pressing them against my ribs like I can hold the whole situation in place. He's watching me from across the narrow room and he isn't filling the quiet. Isn't making a joke. Isn't giving me an exit.
"This is a terrible idea," I say.
"Probably."
"We have four weeks of high-stakes presentations. If this goes wrong—if we can't stand to be in the same room, the Board will notice."
"I know."
"And I don't do casual. I don't do messy. I plan things."
He pushes off the desk. Takes one step toward me, then another. He stops close—not touching, but close enough that I would have to make a decision to step back.
"I know that too," he says.
His hand lifts, slow and deliberate, and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. His fingers settle at my jaw, thumb resting just below my ear, and he stays there—steady, unhurried, like he has nowhere else to be.
"I've wanted to kiss you all day," he says quietly. "Longer than that, actually."
The list starts forming in the back of my head—project timeline, board calendar, professional liability—and none of it makes it past my throat.
"Then maybe," I say, just above a whisper, "you should stop talking and do it again."
He doesn't rush it. His other hand finds my waist, draws me in, and when he kisses me this time there's no testing, no careful opening offer.
His hand at my jaw holds me steady, and I stop trying to stand at a sensible distance and fist my hands in his shirt instead, pulling him closer without planning to.
When we finally separate, he doesn't step back. He rests his forehead against mine, eyes closed, and stays there.
I'm still catching my breath.
"Okay," I say. "That was…"
"Yeah."
A beat of quiet.
"We're in trouble," I say, breathless.
"Yeah," he says quietly. "We really are."
He pulls back just enough to look at me, but he doesn't step away. One hand stays firm at my waist. The other lifts, his thumb brushing across my lower lip.
"I know we still have four weeks," he says quietly. "But I'm not pretending this didn't happen."
He doesn't wait for me to argue.
He just kisses me again.