Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
R eagan glanced down at her ringing cell phone while the bagger packed her groceries into two reusable totes. She had no idea how she’d spent over one hundred dollars on the meager lot, but that’s where the numbers on the screen seemed to be headed.
She debated answering for another ring before pressing Accept. “Hi, Jean.”
“Reagan! There’s an emergency.”
“That will be one-oh-four ninety-two,” the cashier said.
Reagan fed her debit card into the card reader in front of her and tried not to appear shell-shocked by the total.
“Nice try,” she told Jean as she pressed a button. She may be foolish enough to pay nearly five dollars for an avocado, but she would not be bamboozled by her former neighbor again. “I’ve already been to your house this week for an emergency . Spying on your new neighbor doesn’t qualify.”
The cashier offered a tiny smile in response.
“I am not spying. I’m…observing.” Jean’s latest emergency had been a supposed clogged sink. By the time Reagan had arrived, the pipe had mysteriously unclogged itself. Jean had offered up a plate of fudgy brownies, which of course Reagan had stayed to sample. Then Jean had delved into the real reason for her call: gossip. Apparently, “a young woman” had arrived and was staying in the house with Brody.
Reagan had been loath to admit that she’d been curious, but she would die before she’d cop to the pinch of jealousy she’d felt when she’d laid eyes on the attractive woman. She appeared younger than Reagan by a few years, her dark, almost black hair pulled into a ponytail alongside several beaded braids. She had been chatting on the phone while she paced the driveway, her long flowery kimono dusting the ankles of her designer jeans and heeled sandals. Her bohemian style was unique and interesting, unlike Reagan’s standard clearance-rack jeans and T-shirt.
“It’s a real emergency this time!” Jean squawked. “Where are you?”
“Have a nice day.” The cashier handed Reagan a two-foot-long receipt. “You saved twenty-eight fifty.”
“Wanna bet?” Reagan did her best to tack on a smile as she gathered her bagged groceries. To Jean she said, “I’m leaving Whole Foods and questioning my life choices.”
“You’re not far from here. You need to see what’s going on across the street.”
Well, at least she’d admitted the real reason for her call.
“Whatever Brody and his girlfriend are doing, I don’t want to know.”
“There’s a tree service truck parked by the curb, Ray. They’re eyeballing the maple in the back. The one your grandma Betty planted! I can’t read lips but by the gestures they’re making, I think he’s going to cut it down.”
Reagan’s blood ran cold. The grip she had on the grocery totes loosened so much, she nearly dropped one on the pavement. She double-timed it to her truck, heedless of smashing the loaf of bread sliding around in one of the bags.
Her cell phone switched to the truck’s speaker when she pressed a button to turn over the engine. “Jean? Are you there?”
“I’m here, honey.”
“I’ll be right over. Stall him if you can.”
“Will do,” Jean said, sounding dutybound about her mission. “See you in a bit.”
Reagan’s grandmother, Betty, had planted that maple tree the year she and Ike were married. She’d heard the story of the newly built house—the first on the block—and how the tree was not more than a twig a hundred times, and she had never tired of it. The tree represented permanence. Stability. And to a young girl who’d had so very little of either at the time, the story had sounded like a fairy tale.
Reagan’s mom had struggled with her finances for most of her life. Ronnie Palmer loved to gamble and had spent nearly every dime she made at the riverboat. As a result, Ronnie had leaned on her parents—Reagan’s grandparents—as babysitters in addition to moving in and out of their house repeatedly. Reagan had changed schools five times between kindergarten and third grade when Grandma Betty had finally put her foot down.
From then on, no matter where Ronnie lived, Reagan had called 388 Maplebrook home. After Reagan turned twelve, her mother’s visits had spaced out to once or twice a year at most. Reagan had asked Ike and Betty to adopt her. Some small part of her had expected a fight, but her mother had signed over custody without question.
On a good day, Reagan had compassion for her nomadic mother. On a bad one, she resented her for not loving her daughter enough. But not a day passed when she wasn’t eternally grateful for her grandparents. A stable home life had come later for her, and one hundred percent thanks to their selflessness.
She arrived at her former home now to find Brody in the front yard, his attention on the towering maple peeking over the roof from the back. Jean was standing nearby, her fists on her slight hips, head bobbing as she spoke.
Ho boy.
Since the tree truck was on the curb, Reagan parked her car in the driveway instead. When she climbed out, she had his full attention. He wore a quizzical look on his handsome face, a charcoal-gray T-shirt, and faded blue jeans. Unable to staunch the appreciation for his fine male form, she had to remind herself to stop staring at the potential tree murderer in front of her.
He greeted her with a gruff, “Hello.”
“H-hi. You live here.”
“I do.” His smile made its way slowly across his cheeks. It was as mesmerizing as watching the ripples on a pond’s surface.
“Right. I know.”
His eyebrows lowered, but his smile remained, giving him a rogue, curious expression that was even more handsome than the one before it.
How annoying.
“Why are you talking to that man?” She pointed at the service guy who had moved from his truck to Jean’s side yard where he appeared to be inspecting a small fruit tree.
“That is my tree guy. I have a tree that needs cutting down.”
“The maple in the backyard?”
“Yep. Bigger than shit, isn’t it?”
“Biggest one on the street.” She lifted her chin, proud.
“I’m guessing because everyone else cut theirs down. They had similar concerns to mine, I assume. It’s massive. One windstorm and I will find myself with a tree house in my bedroom.”
His bedroom. The master bedroom was formerly her bedroom. A dart of pain stabbed her rib cage at the thought of a stranger living in her house and making decisions about her grandmother’s tree.
“I can’t let you cut down that tree,” she snapped. “I love that tree.”
His smile fell, but he seemed more curious than angry.
She immediately wanted to Ctrl+Z her emotional outburst. It wasn’t like her not to be pragmatic. On the drive over, she’d concocted a perfectly sensible list of reasons to leave the tree as it stood. Now that she was standing in front of a broad set of shoulders, thick hair that begged for a woman’s fingers, and a pair of thighs she could bounce a quarter off of, well, she…what was she saying?
“Trees are helpful for the environment.” The words burst from her lips. She was grateful to have remembered at least one of her mental bullet points. “Oxygen production. Which we breathe.”
He took a step closer to her. At least he was listening.
“Did you know that trees communicate with their surrounding environments, including with one another? If you cut down that maple, there will be a break in the chain.”
“You sound like my sister. You two know each other?” He turned his head right, then left like he was suspicious. “Did she send you over here?”
“I don’t know your sister. But I can promise you that this tree is not going to fall down anytime soon. Five years ago, there was a torrential storm, and the winds reached upwards of eighty-nine miles an hour. That maple lost three larger branches, but its trunk didn’t so much as bend. She’s rooted deep.”
He folded his arms over his chest, skepticism lining his brow. “How do you know how many branches that maple tree lost? Kind of hard to tell from your vantage point, wasn’t it?”
“My vantage point?”
“Jean’s front window.” He gestured across the street to where Jean surreptitiously yanked the leaves off one of her fruit tree’s branches and threw them into a rose bush. When the tree guy turned around, she showed him the naked branch. “Is she related to you?”
Reagan understood why he’d think that. The only other time he’d seen her was when she’d stepped out of Jean’s house. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him that Ike was her grandfather, but she didn’t know if she could trust Brody Crane not to rat her out. The last thing Ike needed was to worry about Betty’s tree.
“She’s not a relative, but she is a friend. And a customer. I have a lot of friends who are customers on this street. I’m a repairwoman.”
“Really.” His eyes narrowed in apparent interest. “What do you repair?”
She lifted one shoulder into a shrug. “Pretty much anything, as long as it’s minor and doesn’t require a permit.”
“Leaks? Creaky floorboards?” He raised an eyebrow. “Kitchen sinks?”
A smile tickled the corner of her mouth as she recalled him tossing a kitchen sink onto his front yard. “All of those.”
“ Really ,” he repeated.
“I’ll swing back by, ma’am.” The tree guy waved to Jean with his clipboard and returned to Brody’s yard. The stitched name tag on his work shirt read Alberto . “Your neighbor’s something else,” he told Brody. “If you want to sign this, I can put you on the schedule for tree removal. Might not be until early next week, but we’ll fit you in.”
Reagan’s mind raced. There had to be another point she could make that would convince him not to?—
“Actually, I’ve decided to keep it.”
Alberto glanced at Reagan who offered an uncertain smile.
“She convinced me to keep it. What can I do?” Brody thrust both hands into the front pockets of his jeans and shrugged.
Alberto narrowed his eyes as if to say Cut it down, that’s what you can do. But instead, he said, “Is she opposed to me lopping off the dead branches?”
“You’ll have to ask her.” Brody turned to Reagan for an answer, and she grew warm under his full attention. Those golden-brown eyes that had captivated her in his headshot online were more captivating in person.
“Um, yeah. That would be fine.” When Alberto moved toward his truck, she quickly added, “As long as they’re small.”
“Small. Got it.” Alberto gave her a thumbs-up.
“Gate’s open,” Brody told him.
Alberto nodded and returned to his truck for a pair of loppers and an electric chainsaw. Then he walked down the driveway and disappeared into the backyard. Brody turned toward her expectantly.
“I assume I won’t have to give the tree three days’ notice for the branches being trimmed. Isn’t that more like a haircut?”
“I guess so,” she said slowly, not sure what he meant. “You didn’t need my permission, you know. It’s your house. Your tree. Out of curiosity, what changed your mind? The bit about how they communicate, or the oxygen thing?”
“You had me at ‘I love that tree.’”
She didn’t need a mirror to know she was grinning at him. He’d just referenced Jerry Maguire , one of her favorite movies. She might not live at 388 Maplebrook any longer, but at least her grandmother’s tree would live to see another spring. “Thank you. You’re very kind.”
“ Aaand ”—he drew out the word—“I won’t change my mind if you do me a favor.”
Her hope-in-humanity balloon popped. “Now you’re blackmailing me?”
“Not blackmailing you. I need advice on this house. It’s my first. Merriweather Springs popped my suburbia cherry.” His mouth pulled down as if he was rethinking that metaphor. She pressed her lips together to keep from laughing since it was actually sort of funny. “I’ll offer you a beer for your trouble.”
A beer? No way would she allow him to undercut her. Like Kelly said, she should overcharge him. He certainly had the means.
“You expect me to distill everything my grandfather taught me into layman’s terms and then take a beer as payment? My time is worth more than a can of Pbr.”
“I have light beer if you’re not a Pbr fan.”
“Good day, Mr. Crane.”
“You know my name.”
Oops. So much for keeping her cards close to the chest.
She turned around. “Jean mentioned it.”
“I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m happy to pay you to look around. Name your price. I’m a city guy in the suburbs. I’m kind of desperate.”
“That’s apparent.”
Unoffended, his smile only widened. “I don’t expect you to teach me a masterclass. All I need to know is what’s out of my scope to do myself. And anything I can’t handle, I will hire you to handle for me. As long as you let me watch.”
She opened her mouth to tell him where he could shove that weirdo fantasy.
“I didn’t mean that like it sounded.” He held up a hand as if he could keep her from leaving. “I’m eager to learn, but I don’t know what I don’t know. So if you could show me—or point me to the right YouTube video…”
Miraculously, he pulled another reluctant smile out of her.
“Seems to me we’ve answered each other’s prayers. I happen to need an expert on house repair, and you needed me to save your favorite tree from certain annihilation.”
She sort of hated how charming he could be after stealing her house out from under her. Granted, she was unfairly taking that part out on him. The affable way he was handling her mild temper was strangely inviting.
“Swear on your family crest that you will not chop down my maple tree—erm, that maple tree.” The electric chainsaw started up, and her body tensed.
“I swear I won’t have it cut down, and if Alberto takes so much as an inch more off that tree than is necessary, I’ll have his license.” He pursed his lips in thought. “Do tree guys have licenses?”
She bit her bottom lip, her resolve melting like the ice cream in the back of her truck. Crap. The ice cream. “I’ll have to come by later. I have groceries in the back of my truck. My ice cream is probably starting to melt.”
“What kind of ice cream?”
“Chocolate peanut butter.”
“We could have ice cream instead of beer.”
“No deal. It’s a pint. Serves one.”
“I respect that math. I have a freezer, you know.”
“A working one?”
That same grin from earlier was back, transforming Brody Crane from a mild pain in the ass to a knee-weakening rogue. “I’m no expert, but I have ice, so I think so.”
She inhaled deeply as she considered her options. If she took a look around, she could also make sure the tree guy didn’t get too chainsaw-happy.
“I happen to have an extra hour in my schedule today. Why not?”
“It’s a deal.” He offered his hand and she accepted. Warm fingers closed around hers. “You Reagan?” His eyes flicked over her shoulder to her truck where a sign on the door read Reagan’s Repairs .
“A lot of people call me Ray.”
“I’m not a lot of people, Reagan.” He gave her hand a final, gentle squeeze. “Grab that ice cream. I’ll show you around.”
When he’d seen Reagan from across the street the other day, he’d been distracted by the blond hair, full pink lips, and long legs. He’d thought about her a couple of times since then and had wondered what color her eyes were. Green, as it turned out.
She was tall. Not as tall as him, but close. She was dressed similarly to the first time he’d seen her, in jeans and a T-shirt, a pair of Converse, and the same leather jacket. He’d learned that along with being gorgeous, she was ballsy and unafraid to speak her mind.
Who had the nerve to storm up to someone they didn’t know and demand they didn’t cut down their own tree? Not that he’d complain about the fire in her eyes. Passion was a good look on her.
As he followed her through his newly purchased three-bedroom home, he also learned that a lot of know-how was packed inside that blond head of hers. Evidently, she’d been introduced into the world of fixing stuff through the grandfather she’d mentioned earlier. She had rattled off a list of necessary repairs he hadn’t noticed before she’d pointed them out. She had a good eye, that was for damn sure.
“Interesting vocation for a woman,” he said as they took the basement stairs to the lower level. He nearly crashed into her when she stopped on the bottom step to look up at him.
“Is it?”
He became momentarily distracted by her mouth—the perfect full bottom lip, the delicate cupid’s bow on the top. “A bulky guy named Tony shows up to repair whatever has busted in my penthouse.”
“Where’s your penthouse?”
“Manhattan.”
She hummed noncommittally and continued into the basement. He presumed that she presumed he had a lot of money. Maybe that was why she’d pointed out every minor thing needing fixing.
These light switches are installed backward. Up is off and down is on.
This ceiling fan takes a specialty bulb they don’t make any longer.
This vent grate is stuck. Replacing it would let in a lot more A/C in the summer.
She’d tapped the grate with the toe of one Converse, and he’d bent down to test it. It hadn’t budged. How had she known it was stuck just by looking?
As she’d continued down her list of things that could use some TLC, he’d grown more and more overwhelmed. He hadn’t intended on a full handyman schedule alongside the taxing work of drafting a book.
“You have concrete walls down here.” Reagan slapped a gray wall with the flat of one palm. “This basement is drafty in the winter. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to insulate and drywall.”
“Hopefully I won’t be here by then.” Brody scratched his cheek, wondering again if Reagan was arbitrarily running up the bill. “I’m writing a book. When it’s done, so am I.”
She didn’t appear surprised or impressed, which was usually one of the two reactions he received.
“Do you live nearby, Reagan of Reagan’s Repairs?” She had no problem prying into his life, so he saw no reason not to return the favor.
“I’m in between residences at the moment. I’m staying with a friend.”
Guy friend or girl friend, he immediately wondered. What was her story? He wasn’t typically this inquisitive upon first meeting a woman, but then again, the women he met were busy interviewing him. Not that he was famous, but at the upper-crust cocktail parties he attended, his agent swept him through the room on a wave of trumped-up introductions. Reagan didn’t seem impressed by him, which might have been what he liked most about her so far.
“If you decide to go with the drywall idea, you could split this space into bedrooms. That would make it more appealing for new buyers.” She rubbed the wall again, almost lost in thought when she said, “I always liked the idea of an office with an attached workshop down here.”
It wasn’t the first time she’d referred to his house like she’d been in it before. A detail he’d noticed in the short time they’d spent together.
She sucked in a breath that lifted small shoulders. His gaze ricocheted from her flooring green eyes to the fingertips gingerly touching her parted lips.
“So.” He snapped out of his stupor to ask, “How about that beer?