“I expected your dad.”

“He had other obligations. So I’m your man.”

In your dreams, buddy.

Although there was no reason, really, that being within fifty feet of the man should raise every hackle she possessed. Wasn’t as if there was any history between them, save for an ill-advised—and thankfully unrequited—crush her senior year of high school when grief had clearly addled her brain and Noah had been The Boy Every Girl Wanted. And, rumour had it, got more often than not. Well, except for Roxie.

Twelve years on, not a whole lot had changed, as far as she could tell. Not on Noah’s part, and—apparently—not on hers.

Which, on all counts, was too pathetic for words.

Dear Reader,

Anyone who’s ever had more than one child (or been part of a family with multiple siblings) will recognise Noah Garrett as The One Who Makes His Mother’s Heart Stop on a Regular Basis—the kid who fears nothing and nobody, the child most likely to come home bruised and bloody. Or with something gross or scary. And yet inside that daredevil kid often lurks a very sensitive soul, one that harbours doubts and fears he wouldn’t dream of confessing to anyone…or even to himself.

Like, for example, being scared to death of falling in love? Oh, yeah—even tough, cocky Noah has an Achilles’ heel, and her name is Roxie Ducharme…a gal who can definitely teach him a thing or two about overcoming adversity. And who, whether she means to or not, forces Noah to reassess everything he’s believed about himself up to this point.

Because only in the arms of a strong woman does a man become all he can be.

Enjoy!

Karen

About the Author

Since 1998, RITA® award-winner and Waldenbooks bestselling author KAREN TEMPLETON has written more than thirty books. A transplanted Easterner, she now lives in New Mexico with two hideously spoiled cats and whichever of her five sons happens to be in residence.

Husband Under
Construction

Karen Templeton

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To my guys

who’ve been there for me

literally and figuratively in every way that matters.

My gratitude for all of you knows no bounds.

Chapter One

If you asked Noah Garrett’s mama to describe her son in one word, she’d immediately say, “Daredevil,” accompanied by the heavy sigh of a woman who’d seen the inside of the E.R. far, far too often.

Even as an infant, the boisterous New Mexico thunderstorms that sent his older brothers diving into their parents’ bed made him coo in delight. While other toddlers howled in fright if a dog licked their faces, Noah would howl with glee. As he got older, no tree or roof was too high to climb—or jump off of—no bug too big or ugly to examine, no basement too creepy to explore, no night too dark to sneak out into when he was supposed to be asleep. And woe betide the erstwhile playground bully who dared mess with Noah. Or any of his brothers.

So the churning gut as Noah said, “I’ll do it,” while staring his father down across the banged up desk in the tiny, cluttered office was highly uncharacteristic.

Not to mention unsettling. Especially as that churning gut had nothing to do with his father, who, yes, made Noah crazy on a regular basis but did not frighten him in the slightest. Behind him, on the other side of the open door, power saws ripped and hammers pounded and a half dozen employees shouted to each other in Spanish over the constant noise, more secure in their jobs than they probably had any right to be. And aside from his father, nobody was more determined to give them reason for that security than Noah.

Even if it meant sacrificing his own in the process.

Rubbing his chest, Gene Garrett lowered his big-bellied self into the rickety, rolling chair behind the desk to wrestle open the perpetually stuck top drawer and rummage inside for heaven-knew-what.

“Good of you to offer,” he muttered as he searched, “but Charley’s my friend. He’ll expect me to do the estimate. Not you.”

“Except,” Noah said, “aside from the fact that Charley’s not even going to be there, I’m gathering this is going to involve a lot more than new cabinets. Not to mention you’re up to your eyeballs with that order you’re installing in Santa Fe next week—”

“And you’ve got the Jensen project,” Gene grunted out as he leaned sideways, the drawer swallowing up his bulky forearm.

“Finished that up two days ago. Next objection?”

His father looked up, his thick, dark brows bouncing over his gold-rimmed glasses like a pair of goosed caterpillars. “Could be a big job.”

“Not any bigger than the Cochrans’, I don’t imagine. And I handled that just fine.”

Gene again contorted himself to peer into the depths of the drawer, then reinserted his arm. “You and Eli handled it just fine. So no harm in waiting a week, until I’m free.”

Despite his determination not to let the old man get to him, annoyance zinged through Noah. “And you know full well it’s a miracle Roxie got Charley to even think about fixing up the place,” he said, over a zing of an entirely different nature. “So she probably wants to present him with the estimate as a done deal. Strike while the iron’s hot. You said yourself the house is in pretty bad shape—”

“Which is why,” Gene said, finally righting himself, a half-empty bottle of Tums clutched in one scarred, beefy hand, “I can’t let just anybody handle it.”

This honoring your father thing? Sometimes, not so easy. “I’m not ‘anybody,'“ Noah said patiently. “I’m your son.” Even when his father shot him a pained looked that said far more than Noah wanted to hear, he refrained from pointing out exactly whose idea it had been to begin with, to branch out from woodworking into full-scale remodeling services, anyway. Instead, he simply said, “Only trying to take the load off you.”

One paw straining to pry the childproof cap off the bottle, Gene flashed a frown in Noah’s direction. “Don’t need you or anybody else to take the load off. You still work for me, remember?”

“Like you’d ever let me forget. Give me that,” Noah said, leaning across the desk to snatch away the half-strangled bottle before his father hurt himself trying to get the damn thing open. “So let me put it another way—either let me run with this, now, or risk Charley’s changing his mind and we lose the job altogether.”

The bottle easily—and gratefully, Noah surmised—relinquished, Gene linked his hands over his belly. “And I don’t suppose Charley’s pretty niece has anything to do with you wanting this job?”

Focusing real hard on the bottle top, Noah snorted. “Roxie? Doubt she even likes me.” Which, judging from her reaction to him the few times they’d run into each other since her return to Tierra Rosa a few months back, probably wasn’t that far from the truth.

Never mind that the first time Noah’d clapped eyes on her he’d felt as if somebody’d clobbered him with a telephone pole. A reaction he’d never had to another female, ever. He didn’t understand it, he sure as hell didn’t like it, and no way was he about to admit that after a lifetime of rushing headlong into potential danger without a second thought—or, in most cases, any thought at all—the idea of working with Roxanne Ducharme made him break out in a cold sweat.

“There some reason you get up her nose?” Gene said, in the long-suffering way of a man whose sons had more than tested the concept of unconditional love.

“Not that I can recall.” Which was the truth. And you’d think her completely unexplained antipathy would at least somewhat mitigate the telephone-pole-upside-the-head thing. You’d be wrong.

“Not even back in high school?” said Mr. Dog-with-a-Bone across from him, and Noah thought, And you’re going down this road why? They were talking a dozen years ago, for cripes’ sake.

“She was only there for that one year. And ahead of me at that.”

“Never mind that you lived right across the street from each other.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Noah handed back the open bottle, thinking that even with his crazy schedule back then, working afternoons and weekends at the shop whenever he didn’t have practice or a game, he must have seen her at some point. But damned if he could remember. “I doubt we exchanged two dozen words the entire time. She’s a potential client,” he said, directly meeting his father’s eyes. “Nothing more.”

After an I-wasn’t-born-yesterday look, Gene tipped the bottle into his palm, shook out a couple of antacids. “Just remember—” he popped a pill into his mouth, crunched down on it “—the past always comes back to bite us in the butt.”

Meaning, Noah wearily assumed, the string of admittedly casual relationships which somehow translated in his father’s mind into Noah’s overall inability to commit to anything else. Like, say, the business. Noah’s knowing it backward and forward—having never worked at anything else from the time he was fourteen—apparently counted for squat.

Before he could point that out, however, Gene said, “Now, if you want to get Eli in on this one, too—”

“Forget it, Eli’s so sleep-deprived on account of the new baby he’s liable to pass out on Charley’s sofa. Dad, I can handle it. And hey—what’s up with popping those things like they’re candy? You okay?”

Rubbing his breastbone, Gene softly belched before palming the few valiant, light brown strands combed over an age-spotted scalp. “Other than having two weeks’ worth of work left on a project due in six days? Sure, couldn’t be better. That burrito I wolfed down an hour ago isn’t doing me any favors, either.” Then he sighed. “And your mother’s about to drive me nuts. And don’t you dare tell her I said that.”

Aside from the fact that his parents’ making each other nuts was probably the glue holding their marriage together, considering how aggravated Noah was with his father for refusing to admit he needed help, he could only imagine how his mother felt. Still, sometimes playing dumb was the smartest choice. “About what?” he asked mildly.

Gene pulled a face. “About taking some time off.” Releasing another belch, he rattled the Tums. “Days like this, a guy needs his buddies. But it’s not like this is the first tight deadline I’ve pulled off.”

“And if you don’t start taking better care of yourself it might be your last.”

“Oh, Lord, not you, too—”

“You even remember the last time you went on vacation?”

“Sure. When we went to visit your mother’s sister in Dallas. Couple years ago.”

“Five. And visiting family does not count. And you called home a dozen times a day to check up on things.”

“I did not—”

“Got the cell phone records to prove it. And anyway, whether you think you need down time or not, you ever stop to think maybe Mom might like to get away? With you? Alone?”

After giving Noah a “Who are you?” expression, Gene grunted. “Donna’s never said one word to me about wanting to go anywhere.”

“When does Mom ever ask for anything for herself?” Noah shot back, suddenly annoyed with both of them, for loving too much and asking too little and putting up with far more crap from their kids than any two parents should have to. At which point he wasn’t sure who he was, either. “Frankly, I don’t think she even remembers how. If she ever did.” Emotion clogged Noah’s throat. “Yeah, she’s worried about you. With good reason, apparently,” he said, nodding toward the Tums.

Father and son exchanged a long look before Gene said, “I had no idea you cared that much.”

Honest to God. “Maybe if you looked past your own issues with me every once in a while,” he said softly, “you would.”

Leaning back in his chair again, Gene regarded Noah with thoughtful eyes, as a light November snow began to halfheartedly graze the grimy office window. Then, on a punched-out breath, he said, “I just don’t understand—”

“I know you don’t. And sometimes I’m sorry for that, I really am. Other times…well. It’d be nice if you’d find it in yourself to accept that I’m not like you. Or the others. Now,” he slipped his hands into his front pockets, “what time’s that appointment? At Charley’s?”

After another long moment, his father said, “Two.”

Noah checked his watch, then snatched his worn leather jacket off the rack by the office door, grabbed a clipboard from the table under it. “Then I’d better get going.”

As he walked away, though, his father called behind him, “You call me if you’ve got any questions, any questions at all. You hear?”

Only, as he struck out for Charley’s house—barely two blocks from the shop—the glow from the small victory rapidly faded, eclipsed by the reality of what he’d “won.”

Lord, Roxie would probably laugh her head off—assuming she’d find humor in the situation at all, which was definitely not a given—if she knew Noah’s brain shorted out every time he saw her.

That his good sense had apparently gone rogue on him.

Not that Noah had anything against family, or kids, or even marriage, when it came down to it, he thought as he rounded the corner and headed up the hill he and his brothers had sledded down a million times as kids. For other people. If his brothers and parents were besotted with wedded bliss, cool for them. As for his nieces and nephews…okay, fine, so he’d kill for the little stinkers. But since, for one thing, he’d yet to meet a gal who’d hold his interest for longer than five minutes, and for another, he was perfectly okay with that, his reaction to Roxanne Ducharme was off-the-charts bizarre.

God knows, he had examples aplenty of healthy, long-term relationships. Knew, too, the patience, unselfishness, dogged commitment it took to keep a marriage afloat. Thing was though, the older he got, the more convinced he became he simply didn’t have it in him to do that.

To be that, he thought with another spurt of gut juice as he came to Charley’s dingy white, 1920s-era two-story house, perched some twenty feet or so above street level at the top of a narrow, erratically terraced front yard. In the fine snow frosting the winter-bleached grass and overgrown rosebushes, it looked like a lopsided Tim Burtonesque wedding cake. Even through the snow, the house showed signs of weary neglect—flaking paint, the occasional ripped screen, cement steps that looked like something big and mean and scary had used them as a chew toy.

He could only imagine what it looked like on the inside.

Let alone what the atmosphere was likely to be.

Noah sucked in a sharp, cold breath, his cheeks puffing as he exhaled. Maybe he should’ve given Roxie a heads-up, he thought as he shifted the clipboard to rummage in an inside pocket, hoping he’d remembered to replenish his stash. Yes. Although he’d quit smoking more than five years ago, there were still times when the urge to light up was almost unbearable. This was definitely one of those times.

Thinking, Never let ‘em see you sweat, he marched up to the front door, plastered on a grin and rang the bell.

Ding-dong.

Wrestling a dust bunny with a death grip from a particularly ornery curl, Roxie carefully set the tissue paper-smothered Lladro figurine on her uncle’s coffee table and went to answer the front door…only to groan at the sight of the slouching, distorted silhouette on the other side of the frosted glass panel.

Thinking, Road, hell, good intentions, right, Roxie yanked open the door, getting a face full of swirling snow for her efforts. And, yep, Noah Garrett’s up-to-no-good grin, glistening around flashes of what looked like a slowly-savored chocolate Tootsie Roll pop.

Eyes nearly the same color twinkled at her when Noah, a clipboard tucked under one arm, lowered the pop, oblivious to the sparkly ice bits in his short, thick hair. His dark lashes. The here-to-forever shoulders straining the black leather of his jacket—which coordinated nicely with the black Henley shirt underneath, the black cargo pants, the black work boots, sheesh—as he leaned against the door frame.

“Hey, Roxie,” he rumbled, grinning harder, adding creased cheeks to the mix and making Roxie wonder if dust bunnies could be trained to attack on command. “Dad said Charley needed some work done around the house?”

“Um…I expected your dad.”

A shrug preceded, “He had other obligations. So I’m your man.”

In your dreams, buddy.

Although there was no reason, really, why being within fifty feet of the man should raise every hackle she possessed. Wasn’t as if there was any history between them, save for an ill-advised—and thankfully unrequited—crush in her senior year of high school, when grief had clearly addled her brain and Noah had been The Boy Every Girl Wanted. And, rumor had it, got more often than not. Well, except for Roxie.

Twelve years on, not a whole lot had changed, far as she could tell. Not on Noah’s part, and—apparently—neither on hers.

Which, on all counts, was too pathetic for words.

“Kitchen first,” she muttered as she turned smartly on her slipper-socked foot, keeping barely ahead of the testosterone cloud as she led Noah through the maze of crumbling boxes, bulging black bags and mountains of ancient Good Housekeepings and Family Circles sardined into the already overdecorated living room.

“Um…cleaning?” she heard behind her.

“Aunt Mae’s…things,” she said over the pang, now understanding why it had taken her uncle more than a year to deal with her aunt’s vast collections. Even so, Roxie found the sorting and tossing and head shaking—i.e., a box marked “Pieces of string too small to use.” Really, Aunt Mae?—hugely cathartic, a way to hang on to what little mind she had left after this latest series of implosions.

Except divesting the garage—and attic, and spare room, and shed—of forty years’ worth of accumulated…stuff…also revealed the woebegone state of the house itself. Not to mention her uncle, nearly as forlorn as the threadbare, olive-green damask drapes weighing down the dining room windows. So Roxie suggested he spruce up the place before, you know, it collapsed around their heads. Amazingly, he’d agreed…to think about it.

Think about it, go for it…close enough.

However, while Roxie could wield a mean paint roller and was totally up for taking a sledgehammer to the kitchen cabinets—especially when she envisioned her ex-fiancé’s face in the light-sucking varnish, thus revealing a facet to her nature she found both disturbing and exhilarating—that’s as far as her refurbishing skills went. Hence, her giving Gene Garrett a jingle.

And hence, apparently, his sending the one person guaranteed to remind Roxie of her penchant for making Really Bad Decisions. Especially when she was vulnerable. And susceptible to…whatever it was Noah exuded. Which at the moment was a heady cocktail of old leather and raw wood and pine needles. And chocolate, God help her.

“Whoa,” Noah said, at his first glimpse of the kaleidoscope of burnt orange and lime green and cobalt blue, all suffused with the lingering, if imagined, scents of a thousand meatloafs and tuna casseroles and roast chickens. She adored her aunt and uncle, and Mae’s absence had gouged yet another hole in her heart; but to tell the truth the house’s décor was intertwined with way too many sketchy memories of other sad times, of other wounds. Far as Roxie was concerned, it couldn’t be banished fast enough.

“Yeah,” she said. “‘Some’ work might be an understatement.”

Just as this estimate couldn’t be done fast enough, and Charley would sign off on it, and Noah or Gene or whoever would send over their worker bees to make magic happen, and Roxie would get back to what passed for her life these days—and far away from all this glittery, wood-scented temptation—and all would be well.

Or at least bearable.

The Tootsie Roll pop—and Roxie—apparently forgotten, Noah gawked at the seventies-gone-very-wrong scene in front of him, clearly focused on the job at hand. And not even remotely on her.

Well…good.

“And this is just for starters,” Roxie said, and he positively glowed, and she thought, Eyes on the prize, cupcake.

And Noah Garrett was definitely not it.

Despite the stern talking-to Noah’d given himself as he hiked up all those steps about how Roxie was no different from any other female, that he’d never not been in total control of his feelings and no way in hell was he going to start now—The second she opened the door, all dusty and smudgy and glowering and hot, all he knew was if the Tootsie Roll pop hadn’t been attached to a stick he would’ve choked on the blasted thing.

Noah’d stopped questioning a long time ago whatever it was that seemed to draw females to him like ants to sugar, it being much easier to simply accept the blessing. So if he was smart, he mused as he pretended to inspect the butt-ugly cabinets, he’d do well to consider Roxie’s apparent immunity to his charm, or whatever the hell it was, a blessing of another sort. Because if she actually gave him the time of day he’d be toast.

While he was pondering all this, she’d made herself busy sorting through a couple of battered boxes on the dining table on the other side of the open kitchen—more of her aunt’s stuff, he surmised—affording him ample opportunity to slide a glance in her direction now and then. Maybe the more he got used to seeing her, the sooner this craziness would wear off. Back off. Something.

Long shot though that might be.

So he looked, taking in a cobweb freeloading a ride in a cloud of soft, dark curls that were cute as all hell. The way her forehead pinched in concentration—and consternation, he was guessing—as she unloaded whatever was in those boxes. The curves barely visible underneath the baggy purple K-State sweatshirt. Then she turned her back to him, giving him a nice view of an even nicer butt, all round and womanly beneath a pair of raggedy jeans pockets.

She jerked around, as if she could read his mind, her wide eyes the prettiest shade of light green he’d ever seen, her cheeks all pink, and for a second Noah thought—hoped—the world had righted itself again. As in, pretty gal, horny guy, what’s to understand? Not that he’d necessarily act on it—one-sided lust was a bummer—but at least he felt as if he’d landed back in his world, where everything was sane and familiar and logical.

Except then she picked something off the table and walked back into the kitchen. “Here, I made a list of what needs doing so I wouldn’t forget,” she said, handing him a sheet of lined paper and avoiding eye contact as if she’d go blind if she didn’t, and suddenly her attitude bugged like an itch you can’t reach.

As Noah scanned the list—written in a neat, Sharpie print that was somehow still girly, with lots of question marks and underlinings—bits and pieces of overhead conversations and whispered musings, previously ignored, suddenly popped into thought. Something about losing her job in Kansas City. And being dumped, although nobody seemed clear on the details. With that, Noah realized that grinding in his head was the sound of gears shifting, slowly but with decided purpose, shoving curiosity and a determination to get at the truth to the front of his brain…and shoving lust, if not to the back, at least off to one side.

“This goes way beyond the kitchen,” he said, and she curtly nodded. And stepped away. This time Noah didn’t bother hiding the sigh. She wanted to hate him? Fine. He could live with that. Heck, he’d be happy with that, given the situation. Just not without reason.

Roxie’s brows dipped. “What?”

“There some unfinished business between us I’m not remembering?”

The pink turned scarlet. Huh. “Not really. Anyway,” she said with a pained little smile, “the kitchen is the worst. But the whole house—”

“Not really?”

If those cheeks got any redder, the gal was gonna spontaneously combust. “Figure of speech. Of course there’s nothing between us, unfinished or otherwise. Why—?”

“Because it’s kind of annoying being the target for somebody else.”

Dude. You had to go there.

Roxie’s jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”

Noah crossed his arms, the list dangling from his fingers, his common sense clearly hightailing it for parts unknown. “God knows, there’s women with cause to give me dirty looks. If not want my head on a platter.” At her incredulous expression, he shrugged. “Misunderstandings happen, what can I say?” Then his voice softened. “And rumor has it you’ve got cause to be pissed. But not at me. So maybe I don’t appreciate being the stand-in, you know?”

After a moment, she stomped back to the dining room to dig deep into one of the boxes, muttering, “Now I remember why I left. The way everybody’s always up in everybody else’s business.”

“Yeah. I think that’s called caring,” Noah said, surprised at his own defensiveness. Even more surprised when Roxie’s gaze plowed into his, followed—eventually—by another tiny smile, and he felt as if his soul had been plugged into an electrical outlet. Damn.

“No, I think that’s called being nosy,” she said, and Noah chuckled over the zzzzzt.

“Around here? Same difference.”

The smile stretched maybe a millimeter or two before she dropped onto a high-backed dining chair with a prissy, pressed-wood pattern along the top. “It’s a bit more complicated than that, but…you’re right. And I apologize. For real this time. It’s not you, it’s…”

She rammed a hand through her curls, grimacing when she snagged the cobweb. “This hasn’t been one of my better days,” she sighed, trying to disengage the clumped web from her fingers. “Sorting through my aunt’s stuff and getting nowhere in my job search and thinking about…my ex—and trust me, it’s not his head I want on a platter—” A short, hard breath left her lungs. “I feel like somebody’s weed-whacked my brain. Not your fault you’re the weed-whacker.”

“I’d ask you to explain, but I’m thinking I don’t really want to know.”

“No. You don’t.” Once more on her feet, Roxie returned to the kitchen, leaning over the counter to scratch at something on the metallic, blue-and-green floral wallpaper over the backsplash. “I promise I’ll be good from now on.”

“That mean I have to be good, too?”

“Goes without saying,” Roxie said, after a pause that was a hair too long, before her gaze latched onto his Tootsie Roll pop. “Got another one of those?”

Lord above. Noah had gotten tangled up with some dingbats in his time, but this one took the cake. Not even the cute butt could make up for that. Even so, this could shape up—heh—to be a pretty decent job, so he supposed he’d best be about humoring the dingbat.

“Uh…yeah. Sure.” He dug a couple extras out of his pocket. “Cherry or grape?”

“Cherry,” Roxie said, holding out her hand, not speaking again until it was unwrapped and in her mouth, her eyes fluttering closed for a moment in apparent ecstasy. Then, opening her eyes, she grinned sheepishly around the pop. Mumbling something that might have been “Cheap thrill,” she slowly removed it, her tongue lingering on the candy’s underside, her gaze unfocused as she dreamily contemplated the glistening, ruby-red candy on the end of the stick, which she gently twirled back and forth between her fingers. “Can’t remember the last time I had one of these,” she sighed out, then looked at him again, her pupils gradually returning to normal. “Well. Ready to see the rest of the house?”

Holy crap.

Lust run amok Noah could handle. Electric jolts he could ignore, if he really put his mind to it. But the two of them together?

This went way beyond unfamiliar territory. This, boys and girls, was an alternate universe. One he had no idea if he’d ever get out of alive.

If he even got out at all.

Chapter Two

The longer Roxie trailed Noah through the house, batting away the pheromones like vines in a jungle, the easier it became to see why the man had to fight ‘em off with sticks. Not that he’d ever seemed to fight too hard. His reputation was well documented. But holy moly, the dude exuded sexual confidence by the truckload. As opposed to, say, herself, who did well to summon up enough to fill a Red Rider Wagon. On a good day.

Then she mentally smacked herself for giving in to the woe-is-me’s, because nobody knew better than she that the road to hell was paved in self-pity. And, um, yearnings. Reciprocated or otherwise. Especially for a man she’d likened to gardening equipment.

Anyway.

“Wow. You weren’t whistling Dixie about the condition,” Noah said, practically leering at the peeling wallpaper. The worn wood floor. The disintegrating window sills—ohmigod, the dude looked practically preorgasmic as he fished a penknife out of his back pocket and tested a weak spot in a sill in the living room. Years of neglect eventually took their toll.

In more ways than one, Roxie thought, savoring the last bit of her cherry-chocolate pop as she tossed the bare stick in a nearby trash can. “How bad is it?”

Noah flashed her a brief smile probably meant to be reassuring. “Fortunately, most of the it seems to be more cosmetic than structural.” Now frowning at the sill, he gouged a little deeper. “I mean, this is pretty much rotted out, but…no signs of termites. Not yet, at least.” A stiff breeze elbowed inside the leaking windows, nudging the ugly, heavy drapes. “Windows really need to replaced, though.”

“You can do that?”

“Yep. Anything except electrical and plumbing. That, we hire out.” He glanced around, frowning. “Sad, though. Charley letting the house get this bad.”

Out of the blue, a sledgehammer of emotions threatened to demolish the “everything’s okay” veneer she so carefully maintained. “He didn’t mean to. Basically, he’s fine, of course, but his arthritis gets to him more often than he’d like to admit. Then Mae got sick and he became her caregiver….” First one, then another, renegade tear slipped out, making her mad.

“He could’ve asked for help anytime,” Noah said quietly, discreetly looking elsewhere as he snapped shut the knife and slipped it back into his pocket. “My folks, especially—they’d've been more than happy to lend a hand. If they’d known.”

Swiping at her cheeks, Roxanne snorted. “Considering neither Charley nor Mae said anything to me, this is not a surprise.”

Noah’s gaze swung back to hers. “You didn’t know your aunt was sick?”

“Not for a long time, no. Although, maybe if I’d shown my face, or even called more often, I might have.”

“You think they would’ve told you if you had?”

Her mouth pulled tight. “Doubtful.”

“Then stop beating yourself up,” he said, and she thought, And you, stop being nice. A brief shadow darkened his eyes. “My folks don’t tell us squat, either. And all four of us are right here in town. In fact, a few years back my brothers and I figured out they were in the middle of a financial crisis they didn’t want to ‘burden’ us about. Had to read ‘em the riot act before they finally fessed up.” He half smiled. “Keeping the truth from the ‘kids’ is what adults do.”

A bit more of the veneer curled away, letting in a surprisingly refreshing breeze. “I guess.” She sighed out. “I mean, even when I came home for Thanksgiving a couple of years ago and could sense something was off, that Charley was being more solicitous toward Mae than usual—and that was going some—they both denied it. I finally browbeat him into telling me what was really going on—” she swallowed back another threat of tears “—but whenever I suggested taking a leave of absence, or even coming for the weekends to help out, he refused.” A humorless laugh pushed from her throat. “Very emphatically.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way…but Dad says Charley’s known for being a little, ah, on the stubborn side.”

“A little?” She chuckled. “Why do you think it took so long before he’d let me go through Mae’s things? Or even think about fixing up the house? Although, considering it had only been the two of them for so much of their marriage, I honestly think they simply didn’t want anything or anybody coming between them, even at the end. Especially at the end.”

After a moment’s unsettling scrutiny, Noah squatted in front of a worn spot on the flooring. “And that made you feel useless as hell, right?”

“Pretty much, yeah. But how—?”

“Like I said, I’ve been there.” He stood, his fingers crammed into his front pockets, watching her, like…like he got her. And how ridiculous was that? He didn’t even know her, for heaven’s sake. The logic of which didn’t even slow down the tremor zapping right through her. Well, hell.

“Maybe I should’ve been pushier, too,” Roxie said, thinking she’d take remorse over this tremor business any day. “By the time your mother called me, Mae was nearly gone. And even then, even though Charley obviously couldn’t handle things by himself that last week, I still felt in the way.” She backed out of Noah’s path as he moved into the dining room, rapping his knuckles once on Mae’s prized cherrywood dining table before crossing to the bay window, a DIY project that hadn’t exactly stood the test of time. “Like I was infringing on their privacy.”

“Must be scary, loving somebody that much,” he said to the window, and she had the eerie feeling hers wasn’t the only veneer peeling away that day.

“Yes, it is,” she said carefully, although her younger self probably wouldn’t have agreed with him, when she still clung to the delusion that bad things happened to other people. “Then again, maybe some people find it comforting. Knowing someone’s there for you, no matter what? A lot less scary than the alternative, I’d say.”

Noah craned his neck to look up at her, a frown pushing together his brows.

“Sorry,” she muttered, feeling her face heat. Again. “Not sure how things got so serious. Especially for your average estimate walk-through.”

Getting to his feet, Noah’s crooked grin banished the heaviness in the room like the sun burning off a fog, sending Roxie’s heart careening into her rib cage. “Oh, I think average went out the window right around the time you compared me to a weed-whacker. Besides…this is a small town. And your aunt and uncle were friends with my folks for years. So no way is this going to be your standard contractor/client relationship.” He paused, looking as if he was trying to decide what to say next. “Mom and Dad’ve mentioned more than once how concerned they are about Charley.”

Roxie smirked. “That he’s turned into a hermit since Mae’s death, you mean?”

“‘Closed off’ was the term I believe Mom used.”

“Whatever. Again, I wasn’t around to see what was happening. Not that I could have been.” She sighed. “Or he would have let me. He tolerated my presence for a week after the funeral, before basically telling me my ‘hovering’ was about to push him over the edge.”

“And now you’re back.”

“A turn of events neither one of us is particularly thrilled about.”

“You think your uncle doesn’t want you here?”

Once more rattled by that dark, penetrating gaze, Roxie sidled over to a freestanding hutch, picking up, then turning over, one of her aunt’s many demitasse cups.

“I think…he wants to wallow,” she said, shakily replacing the cup on its saucer. “To curl up with the past and never come out. I’m not exactly down with that idea. Frankly, I think the only reason he finally agreed to let me start sorting through Mae’s things was to get me off his case.”

“And you’re not happy because…?”

Roxie could practically hear the heavy doors groaning shut inside her head. Talking about her uncle was one thing. But herself? No. Not in any detail, at least. Especially with a stranger. Which, let’s face it, Noah was.

“Several reasons. All of them personal.”

His eyes dimmed in response, as though the door-shutting had cut off the light between them. What little of it there’d been, that is.

“So is it working?” he asked after a moment, his voice cool. “You trying to get your uncle out of his funk?”

“I have no idea. Opening up to others isn’t exactly his strong suit.”

A far-too-knowing smile flickered around Noah’s mouth before he glanced down at the notes, then back at her. “To be honest…this is shaping up to be kinda pricey, even though I can guarantee Dad’ll cut Charley a pretty sweet deal. And I haven’t even seen the upstairs yet. I mean, yeah, we could paint and patch—and we’ll do that, if that’s what you want—but I’m not sure there’d be much point if it means having to do it all over again five years from now. But the windows should really be replaced. And the cabinets and laminate in the kitchen. We can refinish the wood floors, probably—”

“Oh, I don’t think money’s an issue,” Roxie said, immensely grateful to get the conversation back on track. “Not that much anyway. I gather his work at Los Alamos paid very well. And he and Mae lived fairly simply. And there was her life insurance….” Another stab of pain preceded, “Anyway. Wait until you get a load of the bathroom….”

Feeling as if he’d gotten stuck in a weird dream, Noah followed Roxie up the stairs, the walls littered with dozens of framed photos on peeling, mustard-striped wallpaper. Mostly of Roxie as a baby, a kid, a teenager. A skinny, bright-eyed, bushy-haired teenager with braces peeking through a broad smile. Funny-looking kid, but happy.

Open.

Then her senior portrait, the bushiness tamed into recognizable curls, the teeth perfectly straight, her eyes huge and sad and damned beautiful. Almost like the ones he’d been looking at for the past half hour, except with a good dose of mess-with-me-and-you’re-dead tossed into the mix.

A warning he’d do well to heed.

This was just a job, he reminded himself. And she was just a client. A pretty client with big, sad eyes. And clearly more issues than probably his past six girlfriends—although he used the term loosely—combined.

Then they reached the landing, where, on a wall facing the stairs, Roxie and her parents—she must have been eleven or twelve—smiled out at him from what he guessed was an enlarged snapshot, taken at some beach or other. Her mother had been a knockout, her bright blue eyes sparkling underneath masses of dark, wavy hair. “You look like your mom.”

Roxie hmmphed through her nose. “Suck-up.”

“Not at all. You’ve got the same cheekbones.” He squinted at the fragrant cloud of curls a foot from his nose, and a series of little pings exploded in his brain. Like Pop Rocks. “And hair.”

“Unfortunately.”

“What’s wrong with your hair?”

“You could hide a family of prairie dogs in it?”

If he lived to be a hundred he’d never understand what was up with women and their hair. Although then she added, “But at least I have no issues with my breasts. Or butt. I like them just fine,” and the little pop-pop-pops become BOOM-BOOM-BOOMS.

Before the fireworks inside his head settled down, however, she said, “Mae and Charley really were like second parents to me. Even before…the accident. If it hadn’t been for them I honestly don’t know how I would’ve made it through that last year of school. All I wanted to do was hole myself up in my bedroom and never come out. Until Aunt Mae—she was Mom’s older sister—threatened to pry me out with the Jaws of Life. So I figure the least I can do for Charley is return the favor.”

“Whether he likes it or not,” Noah said, even as he thought, How do you live with that brain and not get dizzy? Because he sure as hell was.

“As I said. And the bathroom’s the second door on the right.”

To get there Noah had to pass a small extra bedroom that, while tidy to a fault, still bore the hallmarks of a room done up for a teenage girl, and a prissy one at that—purple walls, floral bedspread, a stenciled border of roses meandering at the top of wall. None of which jibed with the woman standing five feet away. Except the room made him slightly woozy, too.

“You like purple?”

She snorted. “Aunt Mae wanted pink. I wanted black. Purple was our compromise. Didn’t have the energy to fight about the roses.”

“Somehow not picturing you as a Goth chick.”

A humorless smile stretched across her mouth. “Honey, back then I made Marilyn Manson look like Shirley Temple. But…guess you didn’t notice, huh?”

A long-submerged memory smacked him between the eyes, of him and his friends making fun of the clot of inky-haired, funereal girls with their raccoon eyes and chewed, black fingernails, floating somberly through the school halls like a toxic cloud. One in particular, her pale green eyes startling, furious, against her pale skin, all that black.

“Holy crap—that was you?”

To his relief, Roxie laughed. “‘Twas a short-lived phase. In fact, I refuse to wear black now. Not even shoes.” Grimacing, Roxie walked to her bedroom doorway, her arms crossed. “I put poor Mae and Charley through an awful lot,” she said softly, looking inside. “I even covered up the roses with black construction paper. Mae never said a word. In fact, all she did was hug me. Can you imagine?”

His own childhood had been idyllic in comparison, Noah thought as a wave of shame washed over him. Man, had he been a butthead, or what? “What I can’t imagine, is what hell that must’ve been for you. I’m sorry. For what you went through, for…all of it.”

“Thanks,” she said after a too-long pause.

“So you gonna paint in there or what?” Noah said, after another one.

Roxie turned, bemusement and caution tangling in her eyes. “Why? Not gonna be around long enough for it to matter, God willing. So. The bathroom?”

Yeah, about that. Nestled in a bed of yellowed, crumbling grout, the shell-pink tiles were so far out of date they were practically in again. As were the dingy hexagonal floor tiles. And way too many vigorous scrubbings had taken their toll on the almost classic pedestal sink, the standard-issue tub bearing the telltale smudges where a temporary bar had been installed. And removed.

There was way too much pain in this house, like a fungus that had settled into the rotting wood, lurking behind the peeling wallpaper, between the loose tiles. Noah pressed two fingers into one pink square; it gave way—probably far more easily than the bad vibes clinging to the house’s inhabitants.

At least he could fix the house. The other…not his area of expertise.

“Since the tile’s crap, anyway—” He flicked another one off. “Why don’t we do one of those all-in-one tub surrounds? Although it wouldn’t be pink.”

Roxie leaned against the doorjamb. “I sincerely doubt Charley would miss the pink. Although…could we install grab bars at the same time?”

Noah got the message. “They’re code now, so no problem.”

“Oh. Good.” Roxie sighed. “Charley’s far from decrepit, heaven knows, but I know he wants to live on his own, in his own house, as long as possible. So I’d like to make sure he can do that.”

Noah looked at her. “Because you won’t be around.”

A dry laugh escaped her lips. “To be honest, when I was eighteen and stuck here…oh, Lord. I thought I’d been consigned to hell. It was one thing to come for vacations, but I couldn’t wait to get back to the city. I love the energy, the way there’s always something going on, the choices. Heck, I even like the noise. So no, I can’t see myself calling Tierra Rosa home for the long haul. Besides, I have to go where the work is. Work in my field, I mean. And so far, I haven’t even been able to find anything close by—”

“Roxie? You up there?”

Blanching, she whispered, “Crap. He wasn’t supposed to be back for another hour!”

“Should I hide in the closet?”

“Believe me, it’s tempting,” she muttered, then pushed past Noah to call from the landing, “Up here, Charley. With…Noah Garrett.”

“Noah? What the Sam Hill’s he doing here?” Charley said, huffing a little as he climbed the stairs, only to release a sigh when he saw the clipboard in Noah’s hand. “Ah.” A bundle of bones underneath badly fitting khaki coveralls and a navy peacoat probably older than Roxie, the older man turned his narrowed gaze on his niece. “Thought you’d pull a fast one on me, eh? Guess I fooled you. No offense, Noah. But it appears the gal was getting a little ahead of herself—”

“But you agreed to let me get an estimate—”

“I said I’d think about it. Honestly.” Again, his gaze swung to Noah, as if he expected to find an ally. “What is it with women always being in such a rush?” He glared at his niece. “Bad enough you act like you can’t get rid of Mae’s things fast enough, now you want to change everything in the house, too? And what’s up with you being here and not your daddy?” he said to Noah, who was beginning to feel as if he was watching a tennis match. “You sniffing around Roxie, like you do every other female in the county?”

“For heaven’s sake, Charley—!”

“I’m only here on business,” Noah said, getting a real clear picture of what Roxie must be going through, dealing with her uncle every day. If it was him he’d be looking for out-of-town jobs, too. At the same time the near panic in the old man’s eyes was so much like what he saw in his father’s—that threat of losing control, of everything changing on you whether you want it to or not—he couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for the guy. “Because Dad’s tied up. And Roxie only has your best interests at heart, sir. To be honest, I’m seeing a lot of safety issues here. And the longer you put off fixing them, the worse they’re going to get. And more expensive.”

“Well, of course you’d say that, wouldn’t you? Since it’s you standing to make money off me—”

“Charley,” Roxie said in a low voice, gripping his arm until, mouth agape, he swung his pale blue eyes to hers. “Listen to the man. The house needs work. A lot of work. And if you don’t take care of it you’re not going to be able to stay here.”

Her uncle slammed his hand against the banister railing. Which was missing a couple of stiles, Noah noticed. “I’m not leaving my house, dammit! And you can’t make me!”

“Then let’s get it fixed,” she said gently but firmly, “or you may not have any choice in the matter, because no way am I letting you stay in a pit—”

“Choice?” Her uncle yanked off his snow-frosted knit cap and slammed it to the floor, freeing a forest of thick, white hair. “What kind of choice,” he said, wetness sheening his eyes, “is railroading me into something before I’m r-ready?”

“Oh, Charley…” On a soft moan, she wrapped her arms around him, her tenderness in the face of his cantankerousness making Noah’s breath hitch. Then she let go and said, “I know this is hard. And you know I know how hard.” She ducked slightly to peer up into his averted face, thin lips set in a creased pout. “But sticking your head in the sand isn’t going to solve the problem. And we can’t put it off much longer, since I have no idea when a job offer’s going to come through. I’m trying to help, Charley. We all are.”

Several beats passed before her uncle finally swung his gaze back to Noah. “It’s really that bad?”

Catching Roxie’s exhausted sigh, Noah said, “Yes, sir. It is.”

Charley held Noah’s gaze for another moment or two before shuffling over to a small bench on the landing, dropping onto it like his spirit had been plumb sucked right out of him—a phenomenon he’d seen before in older clients, his own grandparents. As somebody who wasn’t crazy about people telling him what to do, either, he empathized with the old man a lot more than he might’ve expected.

“So what’s this all gonna cost me?”

Noah walked over to crouch in front of him. “Until I run the figures, I can’t give you an exact estimate. But to be honest, it’s not gonna be cheap.” When Charley’s mouth pulled down at the corners, Noah laid a hand on his forearm. “Tell you what—how about I prioritize what should be done first, and what can maybe wait for a bit? Your niece is right, a lot of this really shouldn’t be put off much longer. But nobody’s trying to push you into doing anything you’re not ready to do. Right, Roxie?”

When he looked at her, though, she had the oddest expression on her face. Not scared, exactly, but…shook up. Like she’d seen a ghost. At her uncle’s, “What do you think, Rox?” she forced her gaze from Noah’s to give Charley a shaky smile.

“Sounds more than fair to me.”

Nodding, Charley hoisted himself to his feet again and crossed the few steps to the bathroom, while Noah tried to snag Roxie’s attention again, hoping she’d give him a clue as to what was going on. No such luck.

“Mae picked out that tile when we moved in,” Charley said, then gave a little laugh. “Said the pink was kind to her complexion…” He grasped the door frame, clearly trying to pull himself together. “She would’ve been beside herself, though, that I’d let the place slide so much, and that’s the truth of it. Should’ve seen to at least some of it long ago. But…”

Noah came up behind him to clamp a hand on Charley’s shoulder. “But change is scary, I know. Sometimes even when you want it—”

“Charley?”

Both men turned to look at Roxie, whose smile seemed a little too bright. “What’s Mae saying about this?”

Charley sighed. “That I’m being a damn fool.”

“And…?” Roxie prompted.

Flummoxed, Noah watched Charley tilt his head, his eyes closed for several seconds before he opened them again. “She says to tell Noah to get going on that estimate. So I guess, since I never refused my wife anything while she was alive, no sense in starting now.”

Dear Lord.

Roxie walked Noah downstairs and to the front door, her arms crossed like she was deep in thought.

“Hey. You okay?”

“What? Oh. Yes.” Finally her eyes lifted to his, but almost as if she was afraid of what she’d see there. “Thank you.”

“For what?”

She smiled slightly. “For blowing my preconceived notions all to hell.”

Noah mulled that over for a second or two, then said, “I guess I’ll get back to you in a few days, then.”

“Sounds good,” she said, opening the front door to a landscape a whole lot whiter than it’d been a half hour ago. Noah stopped, shoving his hands in his pockets. “I take it you humor the old man about hearing his wife?”

That got a light laugh and a shrug. “Who am I to decide what he does and doesn’t hear?” Stuffing her fists in her sweatshirt’s front pouch, she squinted at the snow. “Be careful, it looks pretty slippery out there.”

The door closing behind him, Noah tromped down the steps, thinking the pair of them were crazy as loons, and that was the God’s honest truth.

Through the leaky window, Charley watched until Noah was out of sight before turning to face his niece, up to her elbows in one of the moving boxes they’d hauled out of the garage he hadn’t been able to park in since 1987. The way Mae’s “collections” had clearly gotten out of hand was pretty hard to swallow. That he’d become an ornery old coot who’d hung on to his wife’s stuff every bit as tenaciously as she had, just because, was even harder.

However, Noah’s eyeing Roxie as if she was a new item on the menu at Chili’s and he hadn’t eaten in a week? That was seriously annoying him. Whether she returned his interest he couldn’t tell—the girl never had been inclined to share her feelings with Charley, anyway, which he’d been more than okay with until now. But as close as he was to the boy’s folks, and as much as he thought the world of Gene’s and Donna’s other boys, his Roxie deserved far better than Noah Garrett.

“I don’t imagine I have to tell you to watch out for that one.”

Seated on the brick-colored, velvet sofa—definitely Mae’s doing—Roxie glanced up, the space between her brows knotted. “That one?”

“Noah.”

With a dry, almost sad laugh, she shook her head and dived back into the box. “No, you certainly don’t.”

“Because you know he’s—”

“Not my type.”

“Well. Yeah. Exactly.”

She straightened, a tissue paper-wrapped lump in each hand and a weird half smile on her face. Her let’s-pretend-everything’s-fine-okay? look. “So, nothing to worry about, right?”

Charley yanked his sleeve hems down over his knuckles, the icy draft hiking up his back reminding him how much weight he’d lost this past year. Even he knew he looked like an underfed vulture, bony and stooped and sunken-cheeked. That seriously annoyed him, too.

“Glad we’re on the same page, then,” he muttered, winding his way through the obstacle course into the kitchen for a cup of tea—what did he care if the color scheme was “outdated,” whatever the heck that meant?—thinking maybe he should get a cat or something. Or a dog, he thought, waiting for the microwave to ding. Lot to be said for a companion who didn’t talk back. Besides, he’d read somewhere that pets were good for your blood pressure.

As opposed to busybody nieces, who most likely weren’t.

Dunking his twice-used tea bag in the hot water, Charley watched her from the kitchen door. He loved the girl with all this heart, he really did, but being around her made him feel as if he was constantly treading in a stew of conflicting emotions. Some days, when the loneliness nearly choked him, he was actually grateful for her company; other days her energy and pushiness made him crazed.

More than that, though, he simply didn’t know what to say to her, how to ease her pain while his own was still sharp enough to scrape. That’d been Mae’s job, to soothe and heal. To act as a buffer between them. Not that Rox was a moper, thank goodness, but every time he looked at her, there it was, his own hurt mirrored in eyes nearly the same weird green as Mae’s. And at this point the helplessness that came with that had about rubbed his nerves raw.

Especially compounded with her being constantly on his back to clear out Mae’s stuff, to “move on” with his life. As if he had someplace to go. Even as a kid, Charley had never liked being told what to do, whether it was in his best interests or not. Like now. Because, truthfully? What earthly use did he have for all of Mae’s collections? Yet part of him couldn’t quite let go of the idea that getting rid of it all would be like saying the past forty years had never happened.

He turned back to the counter to dump three teaspoons of sugar in his tea, a squirt of juice from the plastic lemon in the fridge. Then, the mug cupped in his hands, he meandered back into the living room, where the glass-topped coffee table was practically buried underneath probably two dozen of those anemic-looking ceramic figurines Mae’d loved so much. Things looked like ghosts, if you asked him. “What’d you say that stuff was again?”

“Lladro,” Roxie said, gently setting another piece on table, next to a half dozen others. “From Spain. Mostly from the sixties and seventies.” She sat back, giving him a bemused look, the spunk in those grass-colored eyes at such odds with the sadness. “Let me guess—you don’t recognize them.”

“Sure I do,” he lied, sighing at his niece’s chuckle. “I was putting in long hours at work back then, I didn’t really pay much attention.”

“There’s probably a hundred pieces altogether.”

He’d had no idea. “You’re kidding?”

Her curls shivered when she shook her head. “Even though the market’s pretty saturated with Lladro right now, some of the pieces could still bring a nice chunk of change from the right buyer. Mae collected some good stuff here.”

“And some not so good stuff?”

She pushed a short laugh through her nose. “True. Not sure what the demand is for four decades’ worth of TV Guide covers, or all those boxes of buttons—although some crafter might want them. Or the Happy Meal toys. But this—” She held up another unwrapped piece. “This I know. This we can sell.”

Over the pang brought on by that word “sell,” Charley felt a spurt of pride, too. Maybe the girl drove him bonkers, but she was damn smart. And knowledgeable, like one of those appraisers on Antiques Roadshow, which Charley realized he hadn’t watched since Mae’s passing. And for sure, Roxie’s talents were wasted in some fly speck of a village in northern New Mexico. Child needed to be someplace where she could put all that education and experience to good use.

Then he could get back to living on his own, which he’d barely gotten used to when Roxie returned and tossed everything ass over teakettle.

He leaned over and picked up one of the pieces, the flawless surface smooth and cool against his hand. “Getting any messages from Mae?” Roxie asked, a smile in her voice.

Charley set the piece back down, then took a long swallow of his tea. “Do whatever you think best,” he said, feeling a little piece of himself break off, like a melting iceberg.

Although the fact was, Mae had told him before she died to sell the whole shebang, put the money into an annuity. It was him who was resisting, not Mae. Who didn’t really speak to him, of course. Even if he sometimes wished she did. Lord, what he’d give to hear her laughter again.

The pretense hadn’t even been a conscious decision, really. Just kind of happened one day when Roxie had been bugging him about packing up Mae’s clothes, and Charley, growing increasingly irritated, heard himself say, “Mae wouldn’t want me to do that,” and Roxie’d said, “What?” and he said, “She told me not to get rid of her things yet,” and Roxie had backed right off, much to Charley’s surprise.

Charley supposed it was his subconscious stumbling upon a way to make Mae the buffer again. Not that he was entirely proud of using his dead wife in this manner, but if it got Roxie off his case? Whatever worked. And that way it wasn’t him changing his mind, it was Mae.

Long as he didn’t carry things too far. Dotty was one thing, incompetent another. Fortunately the hospice social worker—who Roxie’d contacted without his say-so—had reassured her it wasn’t uncommon for the surviving spouse to imagine conversations with the one who’d gone on, it was simply part of the grieving process for some people, it would eventually run its course and she shouldn’t become overly concerned.

So it would. Run its course. Soon as “hearing” Mae no longer served his purpose, he’d “realize” he no longer did.

Two more pieces unwrapped and noted in that spiral notebook she carried everywhere with her, Roxie glanced up. “You okay? You’re awfully quiet.”

He decided not to point out he could say the same about her. And he was guessing Noah Garrett had something to do with that.

“Nothing to say, I suppose,” he said as the powerless feelings once again threatened to drown him. “Need some help unwrapping?”

“Only if you want to.”

He didn’t. Outside, the wind picked up, the wet snow slapping against the bay window, slithering down the single-paned glass behind the flimsy plastic panels he popped into their frames every year. Simply watching the plastic “breathe” as it fought valiantly but inefficiently against the onslaught made him shiver. Roxie glanced over, then reached behind her for one of the new plush throws she’d bought at Sam’s Club to replace the sorry, tattered things that had been around since the dawn of time, wordlessly handing it to him.

Charley didn’t argue. Instead, he tucked it around his knees. “New windows included in that estimate Noah’s gonna give us?”

Shoving a pencil into her curls, Roxie smiled. “What’s Mae say about it?”

“Mae’s not the one freezing her behind off,” Charley snapped. “So. Am I getting new windows or not?”

Rolling her eyes, Roxie pulled her cell phone and what Charley assumed was the shop’s card out of her sweatshirt’s pocket and punched in a number. While she waited for somebody to pick up, she glanced over, a tiny smile on her lips. “Mae would be very proud of you, you know.”

Charley grunted—only to nearly jump out of his skin when he heard, clear as day, You want me to be proud? Fix Roxie. Then we’ll talk.

Chapter Three

“This is still way over Charley’s budget, Dad,” Noah said, frowning past his oldest brother, Silas’s shoulder at the computer screen as the accountant ran the figures for the third time.

“Then we’ll simply have to shave off some more,” his father said. Silas quietly swore, then sighed.

Even though Gene insisted they’d do the work for practically cost, no matter how much they whittled, the estimate still stubbornly hovered around twice what Charley could afford, according to the figure Noah’d finally wormed out of him when he’d gone back to shore up his figures the following day. Oh, there was enough for the repairs, to get the guy some new double panes, but the bright blue daisies had probably been given a reprieve. And Roxie was not gonna like that, boy.

Not that Noah should care. It wasn’t her house, and she wasn’t Noah’s…anything. In fact, after that little exchange between Roxie and her uncle about hearing Mae’s voice…

Yeah. That he would do well to remember. Also, the woman’s pain-in-the-butt potential was through the roof. And did he need that in his life?

He did not.

Speaking of butts…Noah pulled his head out of his when Benito, the shop foreman, called Gene out of the office and Silas pushed away from the computer with a noisy sigh, crossing his hands behind his head. Silas’s involvement in the family business was limited to number crunching and filing taxes, but since the bottom line was what made the difference between success and a whole bunch of people starving to death, his input was crucial.

And now his short dark brown hair was a mess from his repeatedly ramming his hand through it over the past hour. “And you’re sure Charley wasn’t lowballing his figure?”

“Since I’m not privy to the man’s bank account, I have no idea. But he’s only going to spend what he’s going to spend.”

One side of Silas’s mouth hiked up before he removed his wire-rimmed glasses to rub his eyes. “True,” he said, shoving the glasses back on. “But even if you do the absolute minimum, Dad’s cutting this way too close for comfort. My comfort, at least.”

Straightening, Noah crammed his hands in his back pockets, frowning at the figures on the screen as if he could will them to change. “There’s really no wiggle room at all, is there?”

“Nope. Meaning he’ll have to eat any cost overruns.”

“Then I’ll just have to make sure there aren’t any.”

Silas snorted, then leaned forward again, apparently unaware of the SpongeBob sticker clinging to the back of his navy sweatshirt.

“I know this is your project—”

Noah snorted.

“—but can I make a suggestion?”

“Sure.”

“Let’s tack on another five percent to cover our backsides, in case lumber prices go up or something. Because you know what’ll happen—things’ll get tight, and Dad will get stressed—”

“And Mom will be all over us about how we let things get out of hand. Yeah, I know. And I would’ve suggested it if you hadn’t. Except…” He cuffed the back of his neck, glowering at the screen. Or rather, the image of Roxie’s sad, mad green eyes. “Adding five percent to our price isn’t going to add it to his budget.”

“And sometimes,” Silas said quietly, “that’s not our problem.”

Silas was right, Noah knew he was, but…He walked around the desk to sink onto the old, dusty futon on the other side. “I did warn Roxie this might be a bigger project than she anticipated. But she’s going to be pretty disappointed.” A half laugh pushed through Noah’s nose. “Probably more than Charley, to tell the truth. And you know Dad, he’s liable to go over there himself and do it all for free if we’re not careful. And then we’re right back where we started. Having Mom mad at him. And us.”

“So basically we’re screwed.”

“Exactly.”

Silas leaned back again, taking a swig from a can of soda as he stared thoughtfully at the screen. “I suppose I could pitch in on the weekends, maybe. We could ask Jesse, too.” He grinned. “Make baby brother earn his keep for once.”

Noah chuckled. “Baby” brother, in charge of the business’s promotion and advertising, earned his keep fine. However, homeboy was also built like an ox and not incompetent with a power saw.

“That might work—”

“Get Roxie in on the action herself, too. Why not?” Silas said to Noah’s frozen expression. “No reason why she couldn’t do a lot of the demo, whatever doesn’t require a whole lot of expertise, save the crew for the stuff that matters.” He flicked his index finger at the screen. “With enough sweat equity you might squeeze by. Think she’ll go for that?”

Noah unlocked his face muscles enough to get out, “I have no idea.”

“Well, I’m in,” Silas said, oblivious to his brother’s paralysis. “And I’m sure we can strong-arm Jesse. Might want to leave Eli out of it, though. Sleep deprivation and power tools are not a good mix.”

His arms crossed, Noah grunted. “And you guys wonder why I’m perfectly happy leaving the kid raising to you.”

“Uh-huh. And I suppose Jewel had to twist your arm to build that tree house for my boys?”

“And miss an opportunity to watch your brain explode? No damn way.” And before Silas could pursue the topic, Noah stood, checking his watch. “I told Roxie I’d swing by with the estimate before lunch. You mind printing it out for me?”

“See that little printer icon right there?” Silas said, rising as well to slip on his denim jacket. “Click it and watch magic happen.”

“Jerk,” Noah muttered, plunking his butt behind the computer and hitting Print.

“By the way,” Silas said, as the ancient gray monstrosity on the dinged metal table beside the desk wheezed to life. “Jewel and I set a date. April fifth.”

This said with the slightly nauseating smirk of the head-over-heels. in love. Not that Noah didn’t like the eccentric little midwife who’d snagged his brother’s—and his two awesome little boys'—hearts. But that left Noah the last brother standing. Alone. Meaning his mother could, and undoubtedly would, now focus all her matchmaking energies on him, bless her heart. Not.

Waiting for the printer to cough up the estimates, Noah let out an exaggerated sigh. “So you’re actually going through with it?”

“You know,” Silas said after a moment’s silence, “maybe the idea of being ‘stuck’ with somebody for the rest of your life gives you the heebie-jeebies, but in case you haven’t noticed, not everybody sees it that way.”

“Sorry,” Noah mumbled, his face warming as he turned back to the printer. Silas’s first marriage had sunk like a stone, followed by his ex’s death in a car crash when the boys were still babies. For so long, and whether it was right or not, Silas had felt like a failure, Noah knew. So why was he taking potshots at his brother’s well-deserved happiness?

Fortunately single fatherhood had turned Silas—who God knew had taken inordinate pleasure in torturing his younger brothers when they were kids—into a model of forbearance.

“Oh, you’ll get yours someday,” he said, cuffing Noah lightly on the back of his skull before heading out the door.

When hell freezes over, he thought as he yanked on his own jacket and scooped up the estimate, then hotfooted it out of there before his father had a chance to check the new figures.

Or before Noah could think too hard about what he was about to ask of Roxie Ducharme.

For three days, between temping as a receptionist for the town’s only family practitioner, continuing to pound the virtual pavement looking for a “real” job and the unending task of sorting through her aunt’s things, Roxie had kept herself so busy she’d begun to think she’d imagined the close-to-knee-buckling jolt at the end of Noah’s visit earlier in the week.

Except now he was here, his forehead creased as he gently explained to her uncle why his budget was too small by half, and there was the jolt again, stronger this time, undeniable, and she found herself nearly overcome with a sudden urge to bop the man upside the head with the kitchen towel in her hand.

Or herself.

“Well. That’s that, girl,” Charley said, sounding almost…disappointed. Weird. “Can’t afford to do all this. So let’s go with the new windows and let the rest of it ride—”

“Hold on, I’m not finished,” Noah said, and Roxie’s eyes flashed to his. Right there in front of her, not quite the same brown, but definitely the same kindness. The same…genuineness. That it had taken her so long to see the resemblance only proved how prejudiced she’d been. How much she’d been determined to see only what she’d wanted to see.

Her breath hitching painfully in her chest, she propelled herself out of the chair and over to the fridge to pull out stuff for lunch. Cheese. Ham. Lettuce. Leftover spaghetti sauce. Cottage cheese.

“Roxie?” she heard over the roaring inside her head. “You listening?”

Sucking in a breath, Roxie shoved the streak of wetness off her cheek and turned. Both men were frowning at her.

“I’m—” She cleared her throat. Sniffed. “Sorry.”

“You okay?” Noah asked, simply being nice again, and more memories surged to the surface, memories she’d assumed the spectacular implosion with Jeff had wiped out for good.

Silly her.

“Yes, fine,” she said, snatching the three-page estimate off the table and leafing through it. Forcing herself to focus. Holy moly. “I’m sorry,” she repeated. “If I’d realized…” Letting the papers flutter back onto the kitchen table, she crossed her arms against the sick, you-screwed-up-again feeling roiling in the pit of her stomach. It wasn’t as if Noah hadn’t warned her, warned both of them, how costly the project might be. But this was…

Wow.

Roxie never begged or bargained or haggled. Ever. So even though embarrassment seared her cheeks, she said, “I d-don’t suppose there’s any way to, um, bring down the prices…?”

“Not without jeopardizing our payroll,” Noah said, his eyes even more apologetic than his voice. “But—”

“Then…I guess we’ll have to stick with the windows. And maybe the front porch—?”

He chuckled. “You weren’t listening, were you?”

“Um…I thought I was—”

Charley slapped the table in front of him, making both the sugar bowl and Roxie jump. “Man says if enough people pitch in to help—you know, do some of the easier stuff—Noah and his crew can handle the rest and we might be able to get everything done for the same price.”

Roxie felt her forehead pinch. “I don’t understand.”

“Silas offered to help since things are slow, taxwise, right now,” Noah said. “Maybe Jesse, too.” Noah glanced down, then back up at her with a little-boy grin. “And we figure there’s a lot you could do, too. If you’re amenable.”

She wasn’t sure what was making her heart beat faster—the grin, the eyes or the proposal. To gather her thoughts—and break the mesmeric hold Noah had on her gaze—Roxie frowned at her uncle.

“And you’re okay with this?”

“Heck, yeah.”

“Even though three days ago you were ready to throttle me for even thinking of changing anything in the house…oh.” She sighed. “Mae?”

Her uncle’s smile faltered for a second before he gave a vigorous nod. “It’ll be like an old-fashioned barn raising! Or one of those HGTV shows! So whaddya say, Rox? You up for ripping off some wallpaper? Slapping on some paint?”

Roxie sighed. On the face of it, it was a brilliant plan. In some ways it could even be fun. But…working alongside Noah? Hot, sweaty, sexy, gentle-to-old-men, major player Noah?

Who strangely reminded her of someone who’d broken her heart ten times more than sorry-assed Jeff could even dream about?

“It won’t work without you,” Noah said, sounding even more reluctant about the whole idea than she. If that was possible.

Oh, boy. Part of her would rather dance naked with African bees. But as much as her uncle and she got on each other’s nerves, she loved the old grouch. And she really did worry about the house falling down around his ears. So…if she sucked it up now, she could leave later with a clear conscience. Right?

Not only that, but considering what she’d put him and Mae through after her parents died? She supposed she could deal with Noah’s hotness for a few weeks.

“I’d have to see what I can work out with the clinic,” she said. “But sure, why not?”

Charley let out a whoop and clapped his hands, his wide grin warming her heart—even as Noah’s twisted it like a wrung-out washcloth.

Family dinner nights at Noah’s parents’ were not for the faint of heart. Especially as his brothers’ broods grew and the noise level increased exponentially. However, unless somebody’s wife was giving birth or there were flu germs involved, there was no “will not be attending” option.

So here Noah slouched on the scuffed-up old leather sectional in the relatively quiet family room, his belly full of his mother’s pot roast and his head full of Roxie—even though he had a date later that evening with some chick he met while working on a project in Chama—all by his lonesome. Well, except for his father’s old heeler seeking refuge from way too many shrill little voices and eager little hands, and Eli’s sacked-out, newborn son hunched underneath his chin.

That he was even thinking of canceling only went to show how messed up he was. Wasn’t as if he’d never had more than one woman on the brain at once, for heaven’s sake. Not that he’d ever two-timed anybody, exactly—he was capable of monogamy, especially once getting naked was involved, and as long as nobody was talking long-term. Except, truth be told, things went down that road a lot less often than people assumed. Having a few laughs, kicking up his heels on the dance floor, simply enjoying a pretty gal’s company…that’s about as far as the vast majority of his dates went. And sometimes, when things were totally casual…his mind wandered.

Or, he thought morosely as the baby squirmed and gurgled softly in his sleep—and Blue lifted his head to make sure The New One was okay—got stuck someplace it shouldn’t. Tonight, much to his consternation, he couldn’t blast Roxie out of his head.

“Aw—don’t you two look adorable?” his sister-in-law Tess whispered, still cute as all get-out despite the bags under her deep brown eyes. He supposed she and his next older brother, Eli, qualified as high school sweethearts, despite the ten years of Tess’s subsequent marriage to, and two children by, someone else. But now here they were, together again and blissfully adding to the world population. Somebody shoot him now.

At the sound of his mama’s voice little Brady let out a “feed me” squawk. Smiling, the brunette carefully peeled the kid and receiving blanket off Noah’s shoulder. “You’re such a good uncle.”

“And don’t you forget it,” he said, telling himself he didn’t miss the warmth, the slight weight. The trust. Knowing he didn’t miss the responsibility at all.

No sooner had Tess left, however, than his dad came in, dropping with a satisfied groan into the brown La-Z-Boy recliner that had been around longer than Noah.

“Your mother will be the death of me one of these days,” Gene said, his hands clamped over his stomach, “but damn, she can cook.”

Noah regarded his father for a moment, thinking about how tangled his and his father’s relationship was, that they could be so close and yet butt heads so often. And so hard. “I take it your stomach’s okay then?”

“What? Oh. Yeah, yeah, fine. Couldn’t be better.”

“Glad to hear it,” Noah said, leaning forward to push himself off the sofa. But his father’s hand shot out.

“Hang on a minute, I want to talk to you.” Grunting, he curled over the arm of the chair to dig the remote out of the pocket. The clicker found, he aimed it at the flat-screen TV, talking to the screen instead of Noah. “Why’d you jack up the figures for Charley’s job?”

Sneaking a glance at his watch—it was too late to cancel now without looking like a sleazeball—Noah lowered himself again to the edge of the sofa, his hands linked between his knees. “Because you’d cut them too close,” he said over some crime show he never watched. “If any of our supply prices had gone up, you’d've been screwed. And Silas agreed with me,” he added before his father could protest.

“Damn repeats,” his father muttered, clicking the TV off again before meeting Noah’s gaze. “Except Charley doesn’t have that kind of money.”

“I understand that. Since I was the one who discussed the budget with him. So we all came up with a solution.”

“We all?”

“Silas and me, mostly. But Roxie, too. That if a lot of the demo work got done for free, Charley’s contribution would still cover materials and the crew’s wages. There’s like zip profit margin, but it won’t take you under, either.”

His father looked at him steadily for several seconds. “What about your salary?”

“I’m good for a couple of weeks. Shouldn’t take any longer than that.”

More staring. “Why?”

Noah knew what he was asking. “Because I know how much Charley means to you.”

His father broke the connection first, shifting in his chair and turning the TV back on. “Roxie know you’re doing the project gratis?”

“No. Why should she?”

The uncomfortable silence that followed was broken by Donna Garrett’s hearty laugh from the dining room, where she was supervising dessert for a batch of grandchildren. “Guess that could work.”

Noah knew the grudging acknowledgement was as close to a thumbs-up as Gene was going to give under the circumstances. Before he could reply, however, his father said, “I’ve been thinking about what you said. About how I should spend some time with your mother.” He drummed his fingers on the arm of the chair. “Get away.”

“Oh?”

“Except…what if I did want to go traipsing around Europe or take your mother on a cruise or something? Who’d handle things while I was gone?”

And here we go again. “Actually…probably the same people who handle things now.” When his father frowned at him, Noah said, “Dad. Everybody knows you worked your butt off all those years when we were little. And that the business wouldn’t be what it is today if you hadn’t. But it also wouldn’t be what it is if it wasn’t for all of us. You gotta admit, you haven’t run it on your own for some time.” And it occurred to Noah that he wasn’t asking for a go-ahead to take on more responsibility as much as an acknowledgement that he, and his brothers, already had.

Gene met his gaze dead on. “You telling me I’m no longer necessary?”

“Didn’t say that. But it’s been a long time since you were the sole decision maker—”

“Maybe so. But you all, you’re…” His father made a circle with one hand, like he was searching for the right word. “Spokes of the same wheel. And a wheel’s nothing without an axle.”

Smiling slightly, Noah got to his feet, checking to be sure his phone was in his jeans pocket before grabbing his jacket off the seat beside him. “Axle’s kind of pointless without the wheel, too, you know. This family, it’s a team. We got the whole working-together-for-the-common-good thing down. Nobody’s trying to put you out to pasture, okay? But I think, between us, we can keep things going for a couple of weeks while you take Mom on a second honeymoon.”

“The cabinetry, though—that’s still the core of the business. The biggest moneymaker. Who’s gonna oversee that?”

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