Page 111 of The Wild Card

Chapter Twenty-Six

Fixer Upper

Crew

The cabin is a disaster.

Nine hundred square feet of rotting wood, busted windows, and a roof that leaks in four different places. The previous owner—an elderly man who’d died two years ago—had let it fall into disrepair, and his kids had been happy to unload it for a price that should’ve been a red flag.

I bought it anyway.

It’s three hours from Dallas, tucked into the woods outside Broken Bow, Oklahoma. No cell service. No neighbors. Nothing but pine trees and silence and a structure that needs so much work I could spend the next decade fixing it and still not be done.

That’s the point.

I swing the hammer, driving a nail into the new porch boards I’m laying down. The impact reverberates up my arm, sharp and satisfying. Swing. Hit. Swing. Hit. A rhythm I can lose myself in.

It’s been five weeks since I ended things with Emmie.

Five weeks of living in the same apartment, passing each other in the hallway like strangers. Five weeks of her bedroom door staying closed, of meals eaten separately, of silence so thick it feels like a physical presence.

Five weeks of watching her move on like I never mattered at all.

I heard her on the phone with Sadie three nights ago. I wasn’t eavesdropping—I was getting water from the kitchen, and her door was cracked, and her voice carried.

“His name is Reece. He’s a sous chef at that new place in McKinney. We’re going out Saturday.”

Reece. A sous chef. Someone who probably knows how to talk to people, how to be warm and open and emotionally available. Someone who won’t flinch when she reaches for him. Someone who can give her everything she deserves.

I’d stood there in the dark kitchen, glass of water in hand, and felt something inside me crack.

Then I’d gone back to my room and started packing a bag for Oklahoma.

Swing. Hit. Swing. Hit.

“You know, when you said you bought a cabin, I pictured something a little less… condemned.”

I look up. Foster is picking his way across the overgrown yard, a six-pack in one hand and a bag of sandwiches in the other. He’s wearing jeans and boots that look brand new—probably bought specifically for this trip.

“I told you it needed work.”

“You said it needed work. You didn’t say it was one strong wind away from collapsing.” He climbs the half-finished porch steps and surveys the damage. “Jesus, Crew. This place is a tetanus shot waiting to happen.”

“It has good bones.”

“It has bones, period. Like a skeleton. The dead skeleton of a cabin.” He sets down the beer and sandwiches. “Please tell me the inside is better.”

“The inside is worse.”

He pushes open the front door and peers in. I watch his face as he takes it in—the warped floorboards, half of them rotted through. The kitchen that’s missing most of its cabinets. The stone fireplace crumbling in the corner, a birds’ nest visible in the exposed chimney. Water stains bloom across the ceiling like bruises, and the smell of mildew and decay hangs thick in the air.

“Is that a hole in the floor?”

“Raccoons got in last winter. I’ve got plywood coming next week.”

“And the kitchen?”

“Previous owner ripped out the cabinets for firewood. Near as I can tell.”