It didn’t take Calvin long to realize Liam was on to him and catch up. “I’ll be sure to let the Bindermans—they’re the family that’s moving in, after hopping from one rental to another for the last eight years—know you think their home is derivative.”
“I’m really looking forward to seeing little Julia’s face when she gets a look at the backyard,” Liam responded, skimming the article in front of him for any more tidbits. “We’re building a play structure for her, right?”
“I’m not sure it’s in the plans, but maybe there’ll be some extra materials… now if only we knew an architect who could draw something up.”
Taybec Briggs, eat your heart out. No time for your three-hundred-million-dollar project… I’m designing play structures now!
The whole thing was ridiculous. Liam shouldn’t give in to Calvin’s nonsense, shouldn’t even consider making the drive up to North Falls, absolutely couldn’t afford to take time off from the firm right then, not even on a weekend. No. It couldn’t happen. No way.
“I won’t be there until after dinner,” he heard himself say. “I might be fairly late. Eleven or so?” That would give him time to take the staff out for a round or two of drinks to celebrate the new management at the firm. He needed to make sure they were all firmly on his side before Tristan came back early next week. That was important. This project in the Falls? It wasn’t something he could allow to distract him. “And are you sure it’s okay for me to sleep at your place? I could call the B&B again, but I didn’t really get the impression they were the type to appreciate late arrivals.”
“I’ll be up. Or if you’re really late, you can just let yourself in. You know where the room is.”
They said goodbye and Liam was left staring at his phone in bemusement. Yeah, he knew where Ben’s old room was. He knew the room far too well. It was where he and Ben had spent so much time, through so many stages of their young lives. Innocent childhood games, Seth often included, and different kinds of games later, ones Seth was definitely not part of.
Ben and Liam had snuck in and out of that room through the door, down the hallway right past Calvin’s room; or through the window, hanging and dropping or clambering up the wall using the window sills as roosting points. None of it had been necessary—Calvin hadn’t been the curfew type and had been more likely to make fun of misbehavior rather than punishing for it, but sneaking had been part of the fun.
Part of it. But being with Ben had been the main draw. And Liam had thrown it all away.
Now he was going back to wallow in it all.
No, he was going back to help build a damn house for a family struggling with poverty.
It made almost less sense, really, but it was what he’d agreed to. Well, what he’d failed to not agree to, at least.
Stupid decision. Absolutely the wrong time for it, from Liam’s perspective. And from Ben’s? Because, of course, that was what this was really all about. It would have been easy to say “no” to Calvin if this had just been one of the old guy’s crazy projects. But it was a crazy project with the likelihood of Ben time, so weak, stupid Liam had been powerless to resist. Now that he was off the phone, though, now that the first burst of excitement had started to fade, he remembered Ben’s distinct lack of enthusiasm at Liam’s last visit. There was absolutely no reason to think Ben was looking for a repeat performance.
But Ben hadn’t been the one to invite him. Ben might not even be at the project. Just because he was Ben the Kind, Ben the Generous, Ben the People Person, Ben who probably started the damn Community Circle? None of that meant Ben would be at this particular event. Calvin hadn’t mentioned him, Liam hadn’t mentioned him, and it wasn’t like North Falls wasn’t Liam’s hometown at least as much as it was Ben’s.
Liam was really looking forward to helping out and giving back. He was excited about little—he took a quick peek at the online article—little Julia Bindermans’s new home. Nothing to do with Ben. Just being a good guy and helping out.
Liam clicked his laptop lid down and pushed away from the table where he’d been working. He needed to get some sleep, needed to make sure he was well rested. He had a big day ahead of him, and a big weekend after that.
He headed for the bathroom to clean up, then to bed, and he thought about North Falls all the way. The project, and who he might see there, and no, of course, no expectations, but, still, if they were spending time together….
Just harmless daydreams. That was all.
Liam let himself fall asleep with thoughts of Ben and North Falls dancing through his head instead of the work-related ideas that had been occupying him all week, and his sleep was long and peaceful.
BEN HAD always liked building things, and building a home for a student at his school was even more satisfying than regular projects. And, if he was being honest with himself, it was nice to have a distraction from all the thoughts of Liam and all the speculation about what might have been, if things had been only a little bit different. If they’d been more mature, more able to handle a relationship back in college. If Liam hadn’t been such a cheating bastard. If—and this one was tougher to think about, but also more intriguing—if Liam hadn’t had to leave the week before. If he’d stayed, if he and Ben had talked, if they’d both said all the right things at all the right times? What would have happened?
Maybe nothing. Maybe seeing each other again, clearing the air, and moving on had been the best resolution to it all. But what if… oh, damn, what if….
“You’re looking bright and cheerful,” Dinah said from the big chair on her front porch. She must have been watching him as he walked down the street and he’d been too involved in his thoughts to even notice. Damn, had he been making faces? He was pretty sure he hadn’t actually wrapped his arms around himself and started rubbing while he smooched the air, so things weren’t as bad as they could have been.
He pulled himself together enough to respond. “It’s a beautiful day, I’m going to be with beautiful people, and we’re going to do a beautiful thing. How could I not be cheerful?”
“Beautiful people?” she said. “Does that mean Calvin told you? When I heard, I was worried he hadn’t.”
“Told me what? Heard what?”
“About Liam? Seth just called from the site—I’m surprised he didn’t sleep over there, he’s so wrapped up in all this. If I wasn’t pregnant, he probably would have—and he said Calvin showed up with Liam. And—you didn’t know he was there. He wasn’t who you meant by ‘beautiful people.’” Dinah clearly saw the confusion on Ben’s face and was generous enough to give him a little time to recover. “So you must have meant me as the beautiful people! You must have noticed my glow! Yes, some people would say it’s just gestational hypertension, but you and I know the truth, right?”
“You always look beautiful,” Ben said absently. Then, “Why would Liam come to this?”
“I can only imagine,” Dinah said, her tone dry.
Ben squinted at her. What was she trying to say? “He’s here already? From the city?”
“Came up last night, apparently. Stayed at Calvin’s.”
Calvin. Of course. After all these years, Ben should have learned. At the first sign of anything confusing or hard to explain, he should just assume Uncle Calvin had caused it and move on with his life. Bermuda Triangle, crop circles, weeping statues—Uncle Calvin’s work, all of it. Liam coming back to North Falls? Maybe Uncle Calvin hadn’t been responsible for the first visit (or for all the unnoticed visits that had apparently come before, if they were even real) but Calvin had definitely been doing everything he could to get Liam back ever since. And he was Uncle Calvin, so he succeeded in causing mischief where a mere mortal would have failed and surrendered the effort.
“He’s going to help?” Ben asked. “With the house? That’s why he’s here?”
“Apparently,” Dinah said.
Well, it was pretty hard for Ben to object to a certified architect taking part in a charitable building project.
And pretty hard for Ben to withdraw his own participation, considering he was the one who’d brought the Bindermans’s plight to the Community Circle’s attention. Which meant he’d better start getting his game face on: more Liam time was imminent.
“Seth said he was helpful with the raspberries,” Dinah said. She set down the book she’d been reading and pulled herself upright. She and Ben had arranged to walk over to the work site together, but Ben wondered if there was a way he could suggest they drive. He actually wondered if there was a way he could suggest that Dinah stay home with her feet up; she wasn’t hugely pregnant yet and she was good with tools, but, really, she was pregnant enough, and there were lots of people who’d promised to help out. Was there really any need for Dinah’s body to do more work than it already was?
But Dinah was the best judge of that, of course. And Seth would have already brought the topic up, surely. So….
“You ready?” Ben asked.
Dinah held her arms out to her sides as if to display that she was, indeed, prepared, and they started walking.
“Why would he come?” Ben asked.
“Liam?”
Yes, obviously Liam, but possibly Dinah’s mind wasn’t quite one-track enough to have picked up on Ben’s obsession. So he tried to keep his nod polite rather than sarcastic.
“I guess he’s just a good guy?” Dinah suggested. Her voice was suspiciously innocent when she added, “Unless you think there’s something else going on?”
“Like what? He’s got his big important life in the city, after all. No reason for him to be back here, not that I can think of.”
“Really? You don’t think maybe he’s… interested?”
Ben was tempted to push it a little further. Could he keep pretending he didn’t know what she was talking about long enough that she gave up? Maybe—she was pretty generous about stuff like that. But he didn’t really want her to give up. He wanted to talk about this. Not that he had anything at all coherent to say. He made a sort of Wookie noise that he hoped conveyed his frustration, confusion, and ignorance, and waited to see Dinah’s reaction.
She raised an eyebrow and didn’t seem too impressed with the nonverbal approach. “We never got around to Liam the other day in our what-if game, did we?”
She knew damn well they hadn’t. Now, on this sunny morning, on the way to their good deed, a good deed at which Ben would be seeing Liam again… what if?
Was Ben brave enough to even let himself ask that question?
He couldn’t get into the mechanics of it, didn’t want to think about how it might have happened, but… what if he and Liam had stayed together?
But the game didn’t work if he didn’t think about the “how.” “Are we saying he never cheated on me? Or he cheated on me but we got past it, somehow? Oh, God, we’d better not be saying I just kept ignoring it! I didn’t just put up with it, did I?”
“Kept ignoring it?”
Yeah, of course Dinah would pick up on that. But Ben had wanted to talk about this, hadn’t he? He took a deep breath. “We’d better not be saying I stayed that insecure and scared. Better not be saying I was always so afraid of losing him that I kept on ignoring the problem instead of dealing with it.”
“And suddenly I’m a little less favorably disposed toward Liam Marshall. This was an ongoing thing, and you knew about it, and you thought he’d dump you if you called him on it?”
“I think—I’m pretty sure he wanted me to dump him. That way he wouldn’t have to do it himself, you know? He wouldn’t have to be the one to pull the plug.”
“What a weenie.”
“Yeah, but I was a weenie too, right? He should have had the guts to dump me, and I should have had the guts to dump him.”
“So you weren’t really a good couple? The way Seth talks makes it sound like you were meant for each other.”
Difficult question. Impossible question, probably. But Ben needed this conversation, so he tried. “We were each other’s first and only boyfriends. I know that works for some people—they marry their high school sweethearts and are never even tempted to look at anyone else. But I don’t think it would have worked for Liam and me. We both wanted—experiences. Adventures. We wanted to learn things firsthand.”
“And you got to learn about broken hearts, firsthand.”
“I did. I don’t know about Liam.”
She didn’t say anything in reply, which was just as well because they were getting close to the building site and Ben needed a little time to regain his composure. But as they approached the gravel driveway and raised their arms to wave at the people already assembled, Dinah turned to face Ben and said, “Do you want Seth and me to run interference today? Keep him away from you?”
“No. I’m—I was going to say ‘fine,’ but I think ‘okay’ might be better. I’m stable. And I don’t want to hide from him.”
“We could arrange a power-tool accident, if you thought it was justified. I don’t think we should kill him, but a nail gun aimed at extremities would probably get him off the site for the day.”
Right. Hiding wasn’t really in Dinah’s vocabulary, not if attacking was a remotely viable option. “No, it’ll be fine.”
Ben turned toward the site and saw Liam already standing there beside Uncle Calvin, the two of them intently examining a stack of blueprints stretched out on a makeshift table. Liam was an architect; his dream had come true, and now he was using his hard-won knowledge to help others. He was a good guy. He’d screwed up, sure, but—a good guy, deep down. His extremities should remain unblemished by nail guns; Ben could give him that much.
“Let me know if you change your mind,” Dinah said. Then she stomped up the driveway, her work boots a strange complement to her pregnant belly, and Ben followed in her wake.
Chapter Twelve
CALVIN HAD somehow taken control of the job assignments. Liam wasn’t sure it made sense; the old man really didn’t have any experience in construction or management. But nobody seemed to want to argue with him, and since Liam, Ben, and Seth all ended up on the same crew, Liam didn’t have any reason to object either.
“Is Dinah going to be pissed she’s not with us?” Ben asked Seth.
Liam looked around; he was pretty sure he’d seen a pregnant woman earlier, presumably Seth’s wife, but he wasn’t sure where she’d gotten off to.
“Nah,” Seth said. “She’s pretty good at making friends. And really, she knows all the people on her crew anyway.”
“But Uncle Calvin assigned Julia Bindermans to the same group,” Ben said. “A child. So clearly they’ll be doing less demanding work. Aren’t you worried Dinah’s going to think he’s sheltering her because she’s pregnant? Like she can’t decide for herself what’s safe?”
“Why are you trying to make trouble? Why do you want to ruin my marriage?”
“You think that’s exactly what Calvin did, and you’re glad he did it, because you’d be worried about her otherwise, but you know Dinah won’t like it?” The affectionate teasing in Ben’s voice made Liam’s chest ache. There’d been a time when he’d been the one to make Ben sound like that.
“I’m very busy with the tasks I’ve been assigned,” Seth said. “And I’m afraid I just didn’t notice anything about Julia Bindermans. I absolutely wasn’t monitoring the jobs my wife was assigned, because why would I? She’s an adult and can take care of herself and doesn’t need me hanging over her shoulder and worrying about her all the time.”
“That’s good,” Ben admitted. “She might actually let you get away with that.”
“I’ve been married for a while. Learned some tricks.”
Then they both turned to Liam and seemed ready to get the conversation back to business. “Have you done this before?” Seth asked. “Framing? I know you’re an architect, but—hands-on?”
It was tempting to build himself up, but Liam opted for honesty instead. “I’ve never even supervised this kind of construction. Most of my projects are—well, bigger. Steel and
concrete and glass. Not nearly as much wood. I’m an absolute amateur.”
“But you can use a hammer,” Ben put in. Was Liam imagining it, or did Ben sound almost defensive, as if he didn’t want Liam to denigrate himself too much?
“Yeah, I can use a hammer,” Liam agreed cautiously. “Haven’t for quite a while—the last thing I built was probably that deck for your uncle. But it’s not a really sophisticated skill.”
“Okay, then,” Seth said. “We’re on.” And he took charge of their little group, apparently able to exercise his tradesman’s authority over the white-collar types even when the job at hand had nothing at all to do with his actual trade.
They didn’t talk much, not about anything more intense than moving a two-by-four a shade in one direction or the other, but it all felt totally comfortable. When Seth grumbled about the sun being too hot, Ben shot an amused look in Liam’s direction and mouthed the words “delicate redhead,” and it was like the heat of the day had melted the years away, as if the three of them were back to who they’d been so long ago, when they’d been perfect.
But they weren’t perfect anymore, and Liam’s shoulders started aching far too early. He worked out regularly, but of course trips to the gym weren’t quite the same as actual physical labor. He hadn’t even known a muscle existed in that particular spot between his shoulder blades and couldn’t quite figure out what job it performed or why it was complaining so much about its current exertions, but he managed to work through it.
Still, he wasn’t sorry when they took a midmorning break. He and Ben had been doing similar work, and they both ended up stretching their arms and backs in almost exactly the same way when they got a chance. If Liam took the three steps to stand behind Ben, he’d know exactly where to press his thumbs, exactly how to ease them apart and stretch the pain away.
It was an excuse, of course, but it might be one he could get away with. If he was providing a service, touching would be okay, wouldn’t it? A friend was in pain. What kind of asshole wouldn’t do what he could to ease the discomfort? What kind of loser wouldn’t walk over, lean in, let himself feel the sweat-dampened fabric and beneath it the warm, living muscle of a body that used to be so familiar, so treasured—
All That Glitters Page 11