LITMIR.BIZ

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tipped back his baseball cap as he approached, holding on to the bill as he said, “Ma’am. Your neighbor didn’t tell you we were beginning construction today?”

      “Neighbor? What neighbor? I—” she gestured rather wildly toward the building “—I own this place.”

      This was Chessie Burton? For the next four weeks or so, he could come to the job site and she’d be here? Every day? And who said the gods weren’t kind?

      “So you’re Chessie Burton? Marylou’s business partner?”

      “No. Marylou is my business partner. I’m the senior part—Oh, who cares? I live here. You should have checked with me before you started playing the “Anvil Chorus” on the back of my house.”

      He could kiss her. Right here, right now, for no good reason he could think of, Jace really wanted to kiss her. She was so damned cute …

      “What’s the matter? Why are you grinning like that? And another thing—who the hell are you? Do you know it’s only seven freaking o’clock in the morning? What do you do for an encore—march a brass band through here? Maybe some elephants bringing up the rear?”

      “Name’s Jace. Jace Edwards. Elephants? Let me guess. Not a morning person, are you?” Jace asked, doing his best not to laugh. God, she was magnificent. A little on the wacko side of normal, maybe, but he hadn’t seen anything this good in the morning—or at any time, come to think of it—in a long, long time. Maybe never.

      She rolled those big blue eyes. “Oh, he made a funny. Ha. Ha.”

      The sound of industrious hammering and ripping of siding quickly followed. Clearly, Carl and the crew had heard enough.

      She waved the TV remote in Jace’s face, then seemed to realize she was holding what might be construed as a weapon, and lowered her arm. “Make … them … stop.”

      “You don’t want the addition?” He was being mean to a clearly upset woman, but he couldn’t help himself.

      “No—yes! Yes, I want the addition. I just don’t want it at seven o’clock in the morning. I don’t want anything at seven o’clock in the morning, at least not until I’ve had my coffee, damn it! And stop grinning at me like that. What did you say your name was again?”

      “Jace,” he told her, this time leaving off the Edwards as he held out his hand to her. “And you’re Chessie Burton. I think Marylou and I had some miscommunication when we met here two weeks ago to plan out the job. In a couple of ways.”

      “Uh-huh,” Chessie said, holding out her own hand, and then quickly transferring the remote to her left palm before she shook hands with him. “I was working a wedding and couldn’t be here. Look, I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot here, and I’m sure you and Marylou will work together just fine, but one minute I was asleep, and the next I thought the world was about to end. I’m not usually so … so fierce.”

      “Apology accepted, Ms. Burton.”

      “That wasn’t an apology, it was an explanation,” she said, turning mulish again.

      “Okay. And while you’re explaining—what’s with the TV remote?”

      “I fell asleep on the couch last night,” she said quietly, her freckled cheeks blushing a pretty pink. “I don’t know why I’m holding the stupid thing. Are you going to start every morning at seven?”

      “I’ll talk with the guys. Maybe they’ll want to go eight to six instead of seven to five. Of course, then Carl over there won’t be able to pick up his grandson from his day care, and Jimmy’s a newlywed, and you know how new brides are. Oh, and George has to get home because his wife works part-time at—”

      “All right, all right, I get it. You start at seven. At least now I’ll be prepared.”

      “But hopefully not armed,” Jace said, actually feeling a little sorry for her. Nobody liked to wake up thinking the world was about to end. But not sorry enough to keep him from beginning to unbutton his shirt, because he wasn’t blind, and he’d noticed how she’d been looking at him. Faintly mad … but at least marginally interested. Which was good, because he was feeling pretty interested himself. It was a good enough reason for making a jerk of himself, if he were still in high school. But what the hell. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, Ms. Burton, I’ve got to get to work.”

      Chessie’s eyes widened slightly as she watched him strip out of his shirt and toss it over an azalea bush that was still blooming. Smiling, he grabbed a short pry-bar from Jimmy’s tool belt and headed for the rear of the house even as she was making a pretty fast retreat back down the path to the side door leading into the Victorian.

      Safety glasses in place, he inserted the pry-bar and began stripping off a length of siding, the morning sun feeling good against his bare back.

      “I thought Bob was going to be on-site. You working this job yourself, Jace?” Carl asked in confusion.

      “I am now. Bob can take over for me at the Carter house. If that’s all right with you, of course.”

      “She is cute, I’ll give you that,” Carl said, getting back to business. “I just didn’t think you’d noticed.”

      “Oh, I noticed,” Jace said, giving the siding another rip.

      “A four-man crew?” Carl persisted. “We’ll get done faster than we thought. The boys and I were hoping for a full month’s work on this one.”

      “Do I look like a man in a hurry to you, Carl?”

      The older man laughed and slapped Jace on the back. “Why, you dog, you. You really did notice.”

      Chessie held the phone to her ear, listening to the rings. “Pick up. Pick up, pick up. Pick-up-pick-up-pick—Marylou! Why didn’t you tell me?”

      “Chessie? Is that you?” Marylou asked, her voice gravelly with sleep.

      “Yes, it’s me. Why didn’t you tell me construction started today? At the crack of dawn! And that man, that Jace something-or-other? Why didn’t you tell me about him?”

      “Jace Edwards? What about him? Wait. Hold on a sec while I get up, go in the other room. No, Ted, nothing’s wrong. It’s just Chessie. Go back to sleep, darling. Okay, now I’m in the hall and he’s already snoring again. That man sleeps with the easy innocence of a baby, I swear it. Only louder. Now, what about Jace Edwards?”

      “Oh, come on, Marylou. I wasn’t born yesterday. That wavy black hair you’d love to run your fingers through, those light gray eyes that have those sexy smile crinkles around them. That tan. That tall Greek-god body—he stripped to his waist, Marylou. Right in front of me! Shoulders that go from here to there, a waist without a single inch-to-pinch of fat hanging over his belt. Washboard abs, isn’t that what they’re called?”

      “I guess so. He didn’t strip for me, darn it, but your mental picture is almost as good. The man is a hunk. So where’s the problem?”

      “The problem, Marylou-the-matchmaker, depends on whether or not you checked out his real credentials. The ones that matter. You know, the ones where we find out if he’s any good at his job. This is my house he’s tearing into. I want to know if he knows how to hammer a nail into a stud, not that he is a stud. Oh, God, that’s sounds bad, even for me. But you know what I mean.”

      “Jace comes very highly recommended, Chessie. And I am not matchmaking. I gave up on that long ago. I had some success with Claire and Nick, but you’re a hard case. I’ve taken the pledge, no more trying to set up Chessie, okay? I want to keep my success ratio high.”

      Chessie finally subsided onto one of the stools at the breakfast bar that made up one side of her kitchen. “I overreacted,” she said, lowering her head into her hand. “Made an idiot of myself. I’m sorry.”

      She

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