Silas unwrapped his brother’s fingers from where they’d clamped on to his arm. “I am if she accepts my estimate. I made quite the impression on her this morning, so it could go either way.”
“What kind of an impression?” Michael looked like all his hopes and dreams were pinned on this moment.
“Well, like I said, Kevin rolled in mud and splattered me while I heroically shielded her. Then he puked up a pound of bacon on her porch. So I took my clothes off and hosed off—”
“You got naked in front of Maggie Nichols?”
Silas could tell he was dashing Michael’s hopes. “Only mostly naked. Kept the underwear on. And then I tried to steal her truck, but that was accidental because we drive the exact same make and model. Same color, too.”
Michael just stared at him for a long beat.
“Do you need a glass of water or something?” Silas offered.
Snapping out of it, his brother shook his head. “Okay, so you’re not getting the job. Maybe I can get Niri to invite her to the shop.”
6
Silas Shifted the paper bag he carried and raised a fist to rap on the frame of the newly rehung screen door.
AC/DC blared from somewhere inside before being briefly muffled by a loud crash and some colorful swearing. Deciding to do the neighborly thing, he let himself and the contrite Kevin inside.
It was a foyer of sorts with a dizzying green wallpaper with shiny birds-of-paradise climbing the walls, stained hardwood floors that had last seen better days a long-ass time ago, and cased openings under dingy transom windows on either side.
The room to his right had one pocket door hung on the track and another leaning against the wall. Beyond, the hall opened up into a rotunda with carved wood and a not-so-grand staircase.
“Everything all right?” he called.
“Peachy,” came the response. The woman of his dreams poked her head out of a doorway on the other side of the rotunda. She had a bandanna covering her hair, a smear of blood on her blue tank, and a sealed bandage that she was trying to open with one hand and her teeth.
Maggie didn’t seem to be pissed about it. She looked like she was in her element.
“Need some help?” he offered.
She hesitated. “You’re not squeamish, are you?”
“The word isn’t even in my vocabulary,” he promised, approaching.
She held out a hand with a nasty, oozing cut just below the knuckles. “I had to check. Dean fainted and hit his head when I caught my leg with a box cutter once. He needed more stitches than I did.”
“My stepdad is a physician assistant. I give good first aid,” he promised.
“Have at it,” she said, grinning as she handed over the Band-Aid. “Aw, Kevin, you shouldn’t have.”
On cue, the dog spit out the bouquet of flowers he held in his mouth at her feet and proudly waited for her adoration. It came with one hand and a lot of enthusiasm.
“Apology flowers for the porch puking. Hold still,” Silas ordered, eyeing the nasty gash. “Did you clean this yet?”
She waved away the suggestion with her good hand. “Just put a bandage on it. It’ll be fine. I’ll take care of it tonight.”
“My stepdad would rightfully slap me across the face if I allowed my potential client and the object of my affection to get gangrene and die,” he insisted.
“Well, if it will save you getting slapped in the face,” Maggie said, amused.
“Kitchen?”
She pointed, and he dragged her in the designated direction.
The room was big but cramped, he noted, as he put the bag down. Some joker with no taste had painted the mismatched cabinets a bumblebee yellow. Half the doors were missing, revealing a collection of original orange Tupperware containers piled on top of peeling shelf paper. The countertops were a faded red linoleum with a stainless steel edge. The floor was…well, sticky. That was the best adjective for it.
“This is exactly why no one should have been allowed to renovate in the seventies,” he noted, pulling her to the porcelain farmhouse sink, the only thing in the room worth saving in his opinion. He cranked the hot water handle and reached for the new bottle of hand soap on the counter.
“Sixty-nine,” she corrected. “At least according to the receipts I found stashed in the mousetrap drawer.”
“The treasures you find. Kind of like that file cabinet full of carpet samples in the Seattle Craftsman,” he said.
“You’ve been doing some research,” she said.
“I have. Paid the neighbor kid five dollars to show me what the YouTube was,” Silas joked, deciding it might not be the best time to tell her his brother had a Building Dreams T-shirt with her face on it. “I’ll give you a lollipop if you’re a good girl and don’t cry,” he said a split second before shoving her hand under the water.