Page 10 of Working for the Mountain Man

"Started on the crew when I was nineteen." He checks his mirror. "Moved up."

"Did you ever leave?"

"Not for long."

I have a feeling that there’s more to the story than he’s willing to share, which is totally fine, but it does feel as though I’mpulling teeth at the moment and I’m not willing to push him, so I turn to look at the road.

"What kind of books?" he asks.

I blink. "Sorry?"

"You said you write books. What kind?"

"Romance."

He is quiet for a second. "Right," he says, his brow lifting slightly.

I know that tone; it’s the tone of someone rethinking everything that they thought about me. It always happens, whenever someone hears I write romance, they change the way they perceive me.

"It's a business," I say. "A real one. I have a publisher, a deadline, contracts, marketing, a newsletter with twelve thousand subscribers. It's not just women sighing over shirtless men in the rain."

Hugo’s brows furrow. "I didn't say it wasn't," he says.

"Your right brow said it wasn't."

"My right what?"

"Eyebrow. It lifted when you judged me."

"I don't do things with my eyebrows."

"Hugo, you absolutely do."

He doesn’t respond, which is either a concession or a decision to let me think I won. I can’t tell which yet.

The south bridge is worse than I expected. The site is active, which means there are crew members, heavy equipment, temporary barriers, orange cones, and mud in quantities that I wasn’t prepared for. I glance down at my boots and inwardly groan, what the hell was I thinking not getting different boots?

Hugo steps out of the truck and immediately enters boss mode. He talks to Darnell near the deck section and points to the drainage channel and Darnell nods and writes something on a clipboard. He checks a guardrail himself, testing it with bothhands, not trusting someone else's word for it. He crouches at the edge of the south shoulder and looks at the repair from below, really looks at it, and I can see him calculating something, weight or drainage or stress, something I do not know how to calculate but which clearly matters.

I take photos with my phone and make notes in the work file. He shows me which sections I need: the sealed expansion joint on the south end, the final deck surface, the guardrail installation, the drainage channel outlet, and the repaired shoulder

"This one," he says, crouching at the joint and gesturing. "Get the sealant bead visible. And the date stamp needs to show."

I crouch beside him. The joint is clean, properly sealed, exactly what the log says it is. I take three photos from different angles.

"Good," he says, standing.

I stand too fast.

My boot slips on the wet concrete edge, and my stomach drops as my hand shoots out on instinct. I find Hugo’s arm, because of course I do. He’s already there, already moving, one hand at my elbow, the other at my waist, firm and certain as he steadies me. It’s over in two seconds, but my body doesn’t seem to know that.

"Watch your footing," he says.

"I was," I say, which is an obvious lie and we both know it.

He releases me and takes a step back, his jaw’s set and he’s looking at the ground near my feet rather than at me, which I understand because I am also looking at the ground near my feet rather than at him.

"The heels," he says.