Page 24 of Working For Her Second Chance

"That's not what I mean and we both know it." He pulls a rag from his pocket, wipes his hands. "Whatever's going on—and I'm not saying anything's going on—just be careful."

"Careful."

"She's got a life somewhere else, River. A career. Plans that don't include—" He gestures at the pole, the truck, the town. The gesture covers approximately everything I am. "This."

"I know."

"Do you? Because the last time a woman wanted somewhere else and you didn't, you spent six months not talking to anyone and Josie had to cut you off at three beers."

The accuracy stings. Eddie's accuracy always stings.

"I hear you. I appreciate it."

"But you're going to do what you're going to do."

"Yeah."

He pockets the rag. "For what it's worth—she looks at you differently than Cathy did. Like she's trying to solve you instead of escape you."

He walks away. Eddie Malone: maximum information transfer, minimum bandwidth, devastating accuracy.

The good days come in a rush.

Tuesday she shows up at the house after work with Thai food and the IPA I mentioned once, three weeks ago, in passing. She remembered. The knowledge that Macy Sinclair has a folder in her brain labeled "River—preferences" is more intimate than anything that happened in the bedroom.

Wednesday we walk the site at sunset after the crew clears out. She explains the vision—the mixed-use buildings, the green space, the way the revitalized downtown will flow. Her hands move when she talks about design, shaping the air, and her eyes go bright, and I watch her and think: this is what she looks like when she's not guarding anything.

Thursday. Her toothbrush appears in my bathroom. She doesn't announce it. Doesn't ask. Just a blue toothbrush in the cup beside mine, practical and presumptuous and so perfectly Macy that I stare at it for thirty seconds like a man whohas discovered evidence of extraterrestrial life in his medicine cabinet.

Hitch approves of the new arrangement enthusiastically—he's been running a long game since the day she scratched his ears on the porch. He positions himself between us on the couch, collecting attention from both sides, and his quality of life has improved so dramatically that I suspect he's been engineering this outcome for weeks.

Friday night. Her head on my chest. The bedroom dark except for moonlight. She traces the scar on my palm—the arc burn, the first thing she ever touched—and the repetition of it, eighteen and thirty, past and present layered in the same gesture, makes the room feel like a place outside of time.

"Tell me something I don't know about you," she says.

"I can't whistle."

"Everyone can whistle."

"Not me. My father could. Off-key, all day long. I got his hands and his stubbornness but not the whistle."

She laughs against my chest. "What else?"

"I drove past your apartment every night for the first two weeks you were here. Doris noticed. Marlene told me Doris noticed. I kept doing it."

Her finger pauses on my scar. "I know."

"You knew?"

"My window faces Main Street, River. Your truck has a distinctive muffler. You drove past at 10:15 every night like you were running a patrol route." A pause. "I may have moved my desk to the window so I could see the headlights."

The admission sits between us, warm and ridiculous. Two adults, thirty years old, sneaking glances at each other's windows like teenagers. The absurdity. The sweetness. The gut-punch of knowing she was looking for me while I was looking forher, both of us running current through the same wire and too stubborn to close the circuit.

I pull her closer. Her breath against my collarbone. The world contracted to the size of this bed.

Three and a half months until October. The countdown ticks behind every good moment like a meter running.

Saturday afternoon. She's at the kitchen table with her laptop while I work on the Triumph's ignition wiring in the shop. Hitch splits the difference, lying in the yard between the house and the shop, monitoring both operations with the diligence of a middle manager who suspects his direct reports aren't fully aligned.