Caleb
Iwatch her walk away, and I can’t help but notice the sway of her hips that has nothing to do with seduction and everything to do with self-confidence.
My hands are still curled into fists at my sides from the adrenaline of watching one of my guys nearly go down.
Except my pulse isn't racing about the near miss anymore. If I’m truthful it hasn't been for a while.
This is a bad idea.
I know it the same way I know when a beam's under too much stress, when pressure's building somewhere invisible until something has to give.
I can read the signs. I've built my entire adult life on choosing the smart thing over the satisfying thing, on logic over want, and every instinct I've got is telling me the smart thing right now is distance.
I don't move toward distance. I go back to work instead, because that's the other thing I've built my life on, and work is at least something I know how to control.
"Everything okay, boss?" Tommy asks, jogging up as I head for the trailer. "Saw the whole thing. She moved fast."
"She did."
"You good?" There's something too knowing in the way he says it, like he clocked more than the slip.
"Get back to the mixer, Tommy."
He goes, grinning, and I let it go because I don't have the energy to pretend I don't know exactly what that grin means.
I spend the rest of the morning doing the thing I'm good at, which is running a site instead of thinking about the woman currently walking its perimeter with a clipboard and an unfair amount of composure for someone who just stopped a man from going into a trench.
Forms get checked. Rebar gets inspected.
I sign off on things I've already signed off on twice because apparently my brain's decided quality control is more interesting than whatever else it's supposed to be doing.
She's good. That's the problem. If she were sloppy, or slow, or another consultant who shows up at ten and rubber-stamps whatever's already planned, I could file this whole thing under inconvenient and move on.
Instead she caught the ground instability before I even walked the site myself, and she read that slip faster than anyone I've worked with in five years, and now I'm standing here with a weather report in one hand trying to figure out if I want an excuse to talk to her again or if I've already decided I don't need one.
Rain's coming back tomorrow night. If the ground softens further near the eastern edge, the pour schedule's going to need adjusting before we're stuck reacting instead of planning for it.
That's true. It's also convenient, and I know it the second I catch myself walking toward her truck with the schedule tucked under my arm instead of just sending it over with Tommy.
She's packing up equipment when I reach her, her clipboard already back under one arm as if it never left.
"You got a minute?" I ask. "I want your eyes on the pour schedule before I lock it in. The weather's shifting again."
Something flickers across her face, it’s there and gone fast enough that I almost miss it.
Interest, maybe. Or the same thing sitting in my chest, dressed up as professional obligation because that's easier to carry around in daylight, in front of a crew, on a job site where every decision I make gets watched.
"I've got a minute," she says.
"Trailer," I say, already walking, already telling myself this is about concrete and timing and nothing else.
I don't believe it for a second. Judging by the way she falls into step beside me, close enough that I catch that same clean, sharp scent from the diner, I don't think she believes it either.
Whatever this is, we're about to be alone in a very small room together.
That's either a mistake or the smartest thing I've done all day. I honestly can't tell which yet.