Chapter Ten Luke
Ten
Luke
Luke felt like a man facing execution as he stood outside Sophie’s boathouse the next day, toolbox in hand.
“It’s just renovation work,” he muttered to himself. “You’ve done this a thousand times.”
But not like this. Not with her.
A bang from inside the boathouse jerked him from his thoughts. Through the window, he could see Sophie attempting to move what looked like a large bookshelf herself, her face scrunched in determination as she pushed ineffectively against the heavy oak.
Luke didn’t bother knocking, just walked in before she caused herself some damage. “Need some help?”
Sophie yelped, spinning around with a hand pressed to her chest. “Bloody hell! A little warning would be nice. I thought you were going to knock like a normal human being.”
“I thought you were going to wait for help before trying to rearrange furniture that weighs more than you do,” Luke countered, setting his toolbox down with a clang.
“I wasn’t rearranging it,” Sophie said, brushing hair from her face, “I was just…nudging it. Slightly.”
“Nudging a solid oak bookshelf. By yourself.”
“I’m stronger than I look,” she said, lifting her chin in that way that somehow managed to be both infuriating and endearing. “Besides, I had a thought about the layout at approximately five forty-seven this morning and couldn’t go back to sleep until I tested it.”
Luke glanced around the boathouse’s main floor. Sophie had been busy. The place had been cleared out, the windows cleaned, all the junk hauled away. The old floorboards were beginning to show through, too—good bones, even with the wear.
Of course she’d found the old bookcase shoved behind the spiral stairs and gone and dragged it out, no hesitation.
Luke bit back a sigh. “Next time, wait for me.”
“I don’t need to wait for you to move a bookshelf six inches to the right,” Sophie replied, her British accent becoming more pronounced as she got more irritated.
“No, you need to wait for me so you don’t end up pinned under it when the rotten floorboard you’re standing on gives way,” Luke said, moving to the spot in question and stomping his boot down. The wood creaked ominously. “See that? This whole section needs to be replaced.”
Sophie’s eyes widened. “But I’ve already measured everything based on—”
“Reality trumps plans,” Luke said flatly, crouching to examine the damage. “This part of the floor won’t hold a heavy bookcase like that, no matter how neatly you’ve color-coded them.”
“I’m not changing my layout.”
“Then you’re welcome to redesign it from a hospital bed after the floor collapses.”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“I’m being realistic,” Luke countered, crossing his arms and noticing the way Sophie’s eyes tracked his muscles.
Good, the distraction tactic’s working. Will help with this argument.
“This boathouse stood for over a century before you started taping your little colored squares all over it. Show some respect for the structure. And what’s this?
” he said, noticing a sage-green paint on the wood panels.
“Don’t tell me you’re painting over the panels.
I thought you wanted to maintain the character? ”
“It’s dark and depressing,” Sophie said. “This green will brighten the space without sacrificing the rustic feel.”
“You newcomers are all the same. Can’t leave well enough alone.”
Sophie’s eyes narrowed. “What was that?”
“You heard me.”
“Oh, I definitely heard you. I just wanted to give you a chance to retract that incredibly condescending statement before I decide to test how well these paint samples blend with your flannel shirt.”
Luke stepped closer, towering over her. “All I’m saying is, this is a lakeside boathouse, not some trendy London café. It doesn’t need to be brightened.”
“And there it is again,” Sophie said, stepping even closer until they were nearly chest to chest. “The assumption that because I’m from a city, my ideas are somehow less valid than yours. That I couldn’t possibly understand what this place needs.”
“That’s not—”
“It is exactly what you’re saying,” she interrupted, jabbing a finger into his chest, which somehow turned him on.
“You’ve been saying it since the moment we met.
City girl, outsider, doesn’t belong. Well, newsflash, Rhodes: this is my boathouse now.
Mine. And I’m going to paint it whatever color I bloody well please! ”
They glared at each other and damn it, they were standing much closer than Luke had realized, close enough that he could see the tiny freckles across the bridge of Sophie’s nose and the slight tremble in her lower lip that might have been anger…or something else entirely.
He suddenly got an image of kissing her. Just one step forward, his hands finding her waist, pulling her against him until that indignant expression melted into something warmer.
He squeezed his eyes shut and stepped back. “Whatever, do what you want but we definitely need to replace the flooring here before we do anything else. I’ll make a materials list.”
Sophie exhaled, visibly gathering herself. “Fine. Make your list. But I’m not changing my floor plan.”
“We’ll see about that,” Luke muttered.
The rest of the day continued like that, Luke veering between wanting to storm out and wanting to kiss the woman. Clearly the desire to kiss her outweighed the storming out as he found himself returning every day that week. And each time, the anger rose, the frustration rose…the heat rose.
And yet somehow, work was getting done. Kyle had sorted the piping and replaced the shower and sinks.
The walls had been stripped of old paint and wallpaper.
The floorboards had been ordered. They’d even reached a compromise on the bookcase position that actually made sense, though Luke would rather haul boats in a hurricane than admit how impressed he was by Sophie’s reasoning.
The woman knew her interior design, he’d give her that much.
But this tension—it was getting worse. Like when she’d reached across him for a tape measure, her hair brushing his face, and he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move.
Something had to give. And soon. He just hoped it didn’t give at the Spring Awakening event that night.
—
An hour before the festival kicked off, Luke found himself making his way along the narrow trail toward the lighthouse.
The path wound close to the water, where the lake deepened and the air turned cooler, like it remembered it had once been part of the ocean.
Coral ranged ahead, tail wagging, nose buried in every mossy patch and half-buried pinecone like it was the most important mission she’d ever been on.
Unlike the weathered charm of the boathouses, the lighthouse was all about functionality, its white tower rising nearly eighty feet from a rocky outcrop. Iron stairs spiraled around the exterior, leading to the lantern room where Luke’s friend Ethan had set up what he called his “observation deck.”
Tourists liked to romanticize it, but that light served a real purpose.
Back when the logging boats ran after dark, it kept them from wrecking on the lake’s rocks.
These days, it was more for the night fishers and the odd rental boat that lost its way, but Luke liked knowing it was still doing its job.
Quiet, steady, reliable, just like Ethan.
Luke was using the need for extra wire for the festival to see his friend.
After five days in close proximity to Sophie Bennett, he needed a dose of Ethan realism.
Coral barked once, alerting their arrival.
A moment later, Ethan appeared at the top of the stairs, his lean frame silhouetted against the sky.
He’d let his light brown hair grow out a bit: wavy, always looking like he’d run a hand through it instead of a comb.
The beard was trimmed close, jaw tight beneath it, and those old wire-frame glasses still clung to his face like they’d been welded on.
Tall, lean build, all elbows and angles, but stronger than he looked.
Wore the same battered sweaters and worn boots he always had, like fashion was a concept that hadn’t reached the lighthouse yet.
“Luke,” Ethan called down, his voice carrying clearly across the still air. No greeting, no small talk. Just acknowledgment. One of the many reasons Luke tolerated Ethan’s company when most others exhausted him.
Luke raised a hand in response. “Got that wire?”
“Inside. Coffee’s still hot.”
Luke stepped into the lighthouse. The place hadn’t changed, still smelled faintly of the lake and books, like it had soaked up the past and decided to keep it.
Ethan Moore had lived in the lighthouse his whole life.
His parents, both lake-obsessed scientists with more brains than sense, had bought the place and raised him there like some wild lighthouse prince.
He grew up surrounded by depth maps, weather logs, and more telescopes than any lakefront home had a right to contain.
Most folks in town didn’t know what to make of Ethan.
Too quiet. Too private. But they kept forgetting what had happened to Ethan’s dad.
He’d drowned in the lake during a hell of a storm when the lighthouse beacon failed.
Ethan was only seventeen, just a kid really.
One minute his father was out there trying to guide boats to safety, next minute the light went dark and by morning they found his body washed up near Deadman’s Cove.
His mother never spoke again after that, not a word.
Just sat by the lighthouse window, staring out at the water like she was waiting for her husband to come back.
Ethan had to drop everything to take care of her.
Kid had dreams of studying English at some fancy university, was always scribbling in notebooks and reading books thicker than boat manuals.
Instead, he stayed, fed his mother, kept the lighthouse running, watching her waste away for three years until she finally joined his father.
Now it was just Ethan up there, writing articles for magazines when he needed grocery money. Didn’t ask for much, didn’t say much…not with the spoken word anyway. It was all on those notepads he kept.
That was the thing about Ethan. He never asked more than you could give. And that made him, in Luke’s book, a damn rare find.
Luke finally reached Ethan’s living area, all sharp edges and order.
Charts lined one wall and various sailing equipment was laid out like a surgeon’s tools.
The only hint of softness was the old leather chair by the stove, scuffed and sun-faded, angled just right to catch both the water and the heat.
Before it sat Ethan’s old-fashioned typewriter, a neatly stacked pile of pages next to it forming the novel he’d been working on for years and never talked about.
Ethan handed him a coffee wordlessly.
“So,” Luke said after taking a sip, knowing he’d have to be the one to bring it up, “turns out I have a new neighbor. City girl all the way from London.”
“Never good.”
“Nope.”
“Doesn’t mean she’s like the other one.”
Luke didn’t answer, just looked down into the dark surface of his coffee like it might show him something useful.
“Or maybe you want her to be like Claire,” Ethan said.
Luke shot his head up. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, maybe it’s a good excuse not to get too close. But you have to remember, the past is the past.”
“I know that.”
“Do you?” Ethan’s gaze was oddly perceptive for someone who found most human interaction baffling. “You’ve got that look. The one that says you’re building walls instead of bridges.”
“You charging by the hour for these insights?”
“Wouldn’t waste the breath if I didn’t think it mattered.”
Luke sighed. “True. So, about that wire.”
Ten minutes later, Luke was making his way back, wire under arm, as he chewed on Ethan’s words like grounds stuck in his teeth.
Maybe you want her to be like Claire.
Truth was, Claire had half broken him, leaving cracks that had only half-mended.
And Sophie, she felt like the same quiet storm, someone capable of unraveling what little he had stitched together.
And maybe that was what unsettled him most, because something was shifting.
Feelings he’d long packed away were stirring.
Her smile, all sunshine and softness, touched the fragile edges of his guarded heart, drawing open spaces he thought would be sealed forever.
By the time the boathouses came into view, the sun had started its slow surrender.
Through the trees, he spotted Sophie balanced on her porch railing, stretching to clear cobwebs from the exterior light.
Practical, methodical. Not afraid to get her hands dirty.
And that just made it worse. Claire was all style and not much substance, now he looked back with clearer eyes.
That wasn’t him being bitter. Just telling the truth.
But Sophie, she had a depth he wanted to plow right into.
God damn it. Stop it, Rhodes.
If he had any sense, he’d steer clear of the festival. Stay home, sand down that old hull in the workshop, keep his eyes and thoughts where they belonged. But he had jobs to do, people he couldn’t let down.
And the truth was, he couldn’t avoid Sophie Bennett, as much as he tried. She was a storm coming straight for him.