“Because M.Z. was dating some other guy at the time.” And Gabe had already carved a similar message with half a dozen girls on trees all over town. Joe stood and tested the kitchen door. It and the windows there were all closed up tight.
“What’s that over there?” Sam pointed to the large barn beyond the backyard.
“That’s where we stored our family vehicles—cars, trucks, motorcycles. Vince built his race car there, too.”
“Cool. Is anything left inside?”
“I don’t think so.”
They walked through the tall grass. When they reached the barn, they stopped and stared. The building was nearly one and a half stories high, but blackberry vines had ascended to the roof. There was a latch beneath the vines somewhere, but Joe couldn’t see it.
“That was the front door?” Sam kicked at the ground. “There’s no driveway.”
“It had a gravel driveway.” Some days, they’d raced home on their motorcycles, skidding to a stop just inside the open doors. “Turo poured concrete inside.”
They strolled around the perimeter. The vines had claimed nearly everything, but they looked diseased on the south side of the barn. The leaves there weren’t as thick as the others. The vines weren’t as firmly attached to the wall.
“Did you see that?” Sam ran forward, bending her knees and pointing under the vine. “Something ran in there. I think it was a cat.”
“More likely a rat.” Joe bent to look, but couldn’t see a thing.
“What if there’s a hole?”
“What if there isn’t?”
“Dad. Get your chain saw and cut the vines back.”
“Sam.” He didn’t relish cutting down the vines out here. His arms still had scratches from helping Brittany cut down the vines by the river. Besides, everything was locked up tight. “That’ll take time. We need to put in our hours on the mayor’s bus.”
She frowned. “You can’t sign my paper for the sheriff unless we know for sure.”
“I tell you what. When we get paid for fixing the party bus, I’ll buy more gas for the chain saw and cut down the vines out here.”
Sam stared at the vines at the base of the wall and nodded.
* * *
THE TEMPERATURES SATURDAY night had slipped below fifty degrees. That made the fog roll into Harmony Valley and linger like whiffs of perfume in the cosmetics department.
Brit pulled her truck off the highway and parked near the bridge. She hadn’t given Sam a time to help her other than “early.” For a kid, early could mean 9:00 a.m. That was still hours off. But Sam came running across the field, surprising her.
For once, Sam’s short hair wasn’t hidden beneath a baseball cap. It looked choppy, as if Joe had given her a home cut. She sported the smile of the enthused. When she reached Brit, she had no qualms about looking inside the cab of the truck. “I’m ready to help. Did you bring the curlers?”
“I did.” Hot rollers, styling product and a flat iron. She’d decided not to go old-school on Sam’s hair.
“Sam, calm down.” It was Joe, halfway to them.
Brit wasn’t the type to dwell on romantic notions. She hadn’t been the girl who’d doodled hearts in the margin of her history notes or practiced writing her name over and over in her English notebook as Mrs. I’ve-Got-a-Crush-on-Him. But in this moment, with the knee-high grass still green and fog-kissed, with rays of soft golden light edging over the treetops, her heart pounded and her knees went weak at the sight of the man striding purposefully toward her.
He wasn’t charging to her on his hulking black warhorse. He didn’t ride to pick her up on a big Harley. But he came toward her with the same sense of determination and purpose. As if he was claiming her. As if he and Sam and Brit all belonged together.
Mine. Heart and soul. Forever.
She felt warm and cold, heavy and light. She wanted to laugh and cry, to shout and whisper, to hold on to this new feeling, the one where she wasn’t the overlooked wallflower. The one where she was the bright and beautiful rose.
Brit shifted her feet, trying to find steadier ground.
She found a gopher hole.
Her booted foot sank. Her stomach lurched. And her sense of the romantic evaporated like a wisp of elusive fog.
“You okay?” Joe was by her side, a steady hand on her arm.
She stared into his eyes, looking for hearts and flowers, the intent to claim. Heck, she’d settle for a warm grin that said he didn’t loathe her.
“Are you all right?” he asked, not a grin in sight.
“No, I...I mean yes, I...” She stepped back, extricating her arm, trying to remember why she’d come.
“Are we working on the Volkswagen?” Sam was a bundle of energy. She climbed on the rear bumper of Brit’s pickup and examined the contents of the bed. “Are we making mermaids? Why did you bring a sledgehammer?”
“One question at a time.” Joe thrust his hands in his jacket pockets.
“You sound like my teacher.” Sam perched on top of the tailgate.
“What’s the plan?” Joe peered at a still shell-shocked Brit. When she didn’t immediately answer, he added, “You said you wanted Sam’s help.”
The plan. Her project. It all steamrollered back over Brit.
“Mayor Larry has given me permission to establish a semipermanent art display on his strip of land here, one that will attract tourists.”
“Yay!” Sam leaped to the ground. “Mermaids!”
Fear tried to elbow its way into Brit’s chest. “The first piece is going to be the Volkswagen.” She pulled her sketchbook from the truck’s passenger seat and flipped to a page with her vision. “The car, as your father so eloquently put it the other day, is roached. But that’s perfect for what I want to do with it. I’m going to attempt to take one car and make it into two.”
Joe and Sam both looked at the Volkswagen and then back at Brit. She could tell by their expressions that they were stumped. So much for feeling confident.
She showed them the first few sketches. “I’m going to separate the upper body from the heavy undercarriage. And then use supports to make the rusted metal body appear like it’s floating above the grass.” She’d taken the idea from the dragons they used in the Chinese New Year parades through San Francisco.
“Cool,” Sam said.
Brit flipped to a page with multiple sketches. “And then I’ll build a skeleton of the Bug on the chassis and cover it with—”
“Are those rocks?” Joe leaned in closer. “And concrete?”
“Yes. I plan to build a set of bumpers from those pieces of concrete over there. And then cover everything but the windshields and windows with river rock. I got the idea from Sam’s brontosauruses.”
“The weight of the stone will collapse whatever you build the frame with,” Joe said, sounding skeptical.
I will not doubt.
“That’s why I need to reinforce it. The chassis is already sitting flush to the ground. The concrete adds a solid foundation. I’ll find materials to make the body able to support a layer of rock.”
“We’re doing all that today?” Sam sounded like she’d just been assigned a ten-page paper due tomorrow. “I thought you were going to do my hair.”
“This is a long-term project. Today, you two can help me take measurements, break up some concrete into two-foot chunks and collect fourteen river stones each.” Before they could ask, she explained the law and the daily per-person quota for river stone.
“What about inside the cars?” Mollified, Sam climbed into the truck bed and wrestled the sledgehammer up and over, letting it fall to the ground. “I think there should be mermaids driving them.”
“But it’s dry land,” Brit protested.
“You found a bike under the water. I found you un
derwater. Who’s to say what else is below the surface.” Joe helped Sam down.
“Oh, my gosh.” Sam grabbed Brit’s hand and tugged her closer to the Volkswagen. “This could be a whole bunch of stuff that pretends to be below the river.”
Brit, who’d been about to pooh-pooh anything to do with mermaids, was momentarily rendered speechless by Sam’s enthusiasm. “What a great idea.”
She could see the panorama—the original Volkswagen body floating to one side, the rock bug, a mermaid on a bicycle, perhaps one driving the car.
If only she was up to the creative task.
* * *
IT WAS A good thing Brittany wasn’t a taskmaster, because being an artist was harder than Joe expected.
They’d taken turns swinging the sledgehammer at the concrete after she’d told them of her vision. Sam had been unable to do more than lift the sledge a few inches. Brittany had raised the tool to her shoulders and dropped it on the slabs, barely cracking the surface. It was Joe who’d done the real destruction. After five minutes, he was spent.
Perhaps recognizing this, Brittany had suggested they go over to the car, where Joe and Sam had held the tape measure and called out measurements to Brittany, who scribbled them on her pad.
“At fourteen rocks a day times three people—” Joe handed Brittany the tape measure “—you’ll have enough rocks to make a Volkswagen...”
“Math was never my forte.” Brittany put her nose in the air in a way that made Sam giggle and Joe want to smile. “It’ll be done when it’s done. But speaking of rocks...”
She led them down the bank to the river’s edge. Brittany had brought a backpack. First she loaded it with fourteen stones and allowed Joe to lug it to the top. He’d filled the backpack next. Finally, it was Sam’s turn.
“I want to find pretty ones.” Sam splashed along the edge, having more fun getting her boots wet than paying attention to the task at hand.
“The longer it takes you, the longer you have to wait for those curlers you haven’t stopped talking about.” Joe may sound like he wanted Sam to hurry, but he was enjoying the camaraderie too much to insist she quit.
The sun was slanting off the water, chasing away the last of the fog. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. It was shaping up to be the kind of day where you were grateful for what you had in life, little though that might be. And right now, Joe was lucky enough to be in the presence of two pretty special ladies.
“Let her have some fun.” Brittany brushed the hair from Joe’s eyes.
Her touch reminded Joe he was lonely more than an empty bed ever could. He stared into Brittany’s brown eyes, wishing—
“Oh, my gosh.” Sam rushed into ankle-deep water. “Here’s a perfect one for the headlights.”
Brittany broke off their connection, smiling. “Those boots are going to take forever to dry.”
“I don’t care.” Sam bent, wrestling with something underwater. And then she lost her balance and tumbled backward. Almost immediately, she leaped to her feet, but she was drenched. Her coveralls already clinging to her slight frame.
She slogged to shore. “It’s so cold.”
“Are you all right?” Joe asked, but he was trying not to laugh. She was clearly fine.
And then Sam shrieked and crossed her arms over her chest. “Don’t look at me.”
“Why not?” He shrugged out of his jacket and went to wrap it around her. “It’s not like I haven’t seen you wet before.”
“Not like this.” Sam turned pleading, pained eyes toward Brittany.
“Sam, I... Can you tell us what’s wrong?” Brittany asked unhelpfully.
“Come here.” Joe lifted the jacket toward Sam again.
“Dad, don’t.” Sam snatched his jacket away and held it in front of her as if she was naked. She began climbing up the slope.
“What did I say?” He looked to Brittany, who drew a deep breath and shook her head, as stumped as he was. “Sam? What’s wrong?”
Sam reached the path, gulped air and sobbed, “I need a bra, okay. I’ve been asking to go clothes shopping thinking I could slip that in at the register. But no-o-o-o.” She glared at him, sparing Brittany. “I hate my life!” She spun and ran off.
Joe stared into the sturdy oak tree branches above him, feeling chilled.
“That was really brave.” Brittany rubbed his back. “Of her, I mean.”
Joe was growing weary of the need for either of them to be brave. “My daughter just had a meltdown and I’m feeling like a bad dad because I didn’t even notice...”
Brittany chuckled, the sound blending with the soft gurgle of the river. “The hardest thing in the world for a girl to do is tell her parents she needs a bra, especially a dad. Have fun at the store.”
Joe’s stomach lurched. “I don’t know how to shop for a bra.”
Brittany picked up the backpack and began making the climb uphill. To her credit, she didn’t collect Sam’s quota of stones. “You can do an internet search on what to measure to determine her size. Do you want to borrow my tape measure?”
“No.” Not for the first time in the past few weeks, Joe wondered how many more hits he could take. “I’ll give you the BMW grille if you go shopping with us.” He worried about putting the offer on the table. He still had no idea who owned the car.
Brittany glanced back down at him with the presence of mind he should have had. “You don’t barter.”
“I’ll barter for Sam’s sake.” The words had trouble breaking free of his throat.
“Going shopping hardly seems fair payment for the grille. I’ll throw in a haircut for her, too.”
“I thought that was girl time and free.”
“Rollers were girl time.” She gave him a wry smile. “Haircuts are business.”
Joe grimaced. “There are too many rules at play.”
“Not so many.” Brit resumed her climb. “You’d be doing me a favor. All requests so far have been for pin curls and petal teases.”
“You cut my hair.”
“I didn’t want to. It’s too short now.” He could tell from the sharp intake of breath after her statement that she regretted sharing that much information.
She liked him. Even if, like him, she didn’t really want to like him.
Joe felt something in his chest shift into alignment. His head and his heart. His breath came easier because of this. This woman. This place. This moment, flawed as it was. “Deal. Come back down here and shake on it.”
“Careful. I might think that tough-guy image is just an act.” Brit grinned, pausing before picking her way back down the slope to him. “Nice guys... Now, nice guys are usually the ones I end up dating. And you aren’t nice and I’m not dating you.”
Joe liked it when she grinned. The angle of her lips created something warm inside him. Something that made him see her in his arms, wish for the subtle smell of her hair filling his lungs, the soft touch of her lips against his. She didn’t think she was beautiful. She didn’t think she was worth dating, if their one teasing conversation about motorcycle rides was any indication.
Nice guys? She probably didn’t know any. She kept men at arm’s length. Until they were in her chair.
Suddenly, he remembered Sheriff Nate had a hair appointment with Brittany. Jealousy pressed in on him.
She stopped a few feet away, holding out her hand to shake.
He ignored it. “You have a...uh...leaf...” Without waiting for permission, Joe plucked an imaginary leaf from over her ear. His fingers brushed the silken softness of her hair. His thumb glanced over the fullness of her cheek.
He wanted more imaginary leaves to be in her hair. He wanted his hands to be in her hair. He wanted...
Their gazes connected.
Brittany frowned. “Hey... Joe...”
&nb
sp; He took a step closer.
“Don’t look at me like that.” Her voice was low and uncertain. “When you look at me like that I see knights in shining armor.” She placed her palm against his cheek and gently turned his face away. “Guys look at Reggie like that, not me.”
He covered her hand with his and easily angled his head back to her, feigning ignorance. “At who?”
“Reggie. Regina.” She swallowed, her voice dropping to a whisper. “The pretty twin.”
Oh, man. Brittany had a huge self-confidence issue when it came to men. “I don’t know who you mean.” Joe moved closer. “To me, you’re the beautiful twin.”
Her brown eyes were luminous and staring up at him as if she’d never had anyone say anything that nice about her. Ever. She should hear someone tell her she was beautiful every day. It was the truth.
She swallowed, lowering her gaze. “Why, Shaggy Joe. I never expected a compliment from you.”
“Stop talking like that.” He placed his fingers beneath her chin, tilting her face up to his. “Stop talking and kiss me.”
She froze. A deer in his headlights.
And then she laughed, loosening his hold. “You almost had me.”
He did have her. He had his arms around her. He tugged her body against his. And kissed her.
A simple act. Four lips. Two hearts. One beat.
It didn’t feel simple. It felt complex and intense and terrifying.
He had no right to kiss her. Kissing implied intent. He was broke, with a daughter to provide for. His world was imperfect when she deserved perfection.
He had no right to kiss her. Kissing opened the door to heartbreak. He couldn’t stand to be left or betrayed by another person he loved.
He had no right to kiss her. And yet he did.
And for a moment, the promise of perfection seemed within reach.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
BRIT WANTED TO float on Joe’s kiss forever.
She wanted to stay within the circle of the arms of Harmony Valley’s bad boy.
She wanted to linger where she was no longer the overlooked wallflower.
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