Josiah Haven
Just his name. Not that I’d been expecting a cute message or an emoji string. That wouldn’t have been like him at all. But his name on my screen didn’t feel impersonal. It was like a declaration, a simple assertion of who he was and the fact that we were connected in a new way.
I suppressed the urge to text him back. I’d already thanked him and I was sure he needed to get to work. He hadn’t planned on starting his day with roadkill removal. Or a squirrel funeral. Plus, he wasn’t a big talker and I didn’t want to annoy him.
Looking at his name on my screen, I realized something. It wasn’t just that I didn’t want to bother him.
I wanted Josiah Haven to like me.
CHAPTER 12
Josiah
A squirrel. Somehow Audrey Young had reduced me to participating in a funeral service for roadkill.
At least none of my brothers had been around to see it. Or my dad. They’d never let me hear the end of it.
Trying to push her out of my mind, I got to work. And there was plenty of it. The drywall wasn’t going to fix itself.
Of course, the more I tried to not think about Audrey, the more I thought about her. And the squirrel.
She didn’t seem like the kind of girl to make enemies, not even ex-boyfriend enemies. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone had put that dead squirrel in front of her house for a reason.
Had it been her ex? Was he still holding a grudge from their breakup? Or maybe it was retaliation for rejecting him at the bar. I’d humiliated him pretty thoroughly; he might have decided to blame her.
Not knowing the guy, I couldn’t be sure.
About an hour later, my phone buzzed with a text. For a second, I wondered if it was Audrey. Had something else happened? I hurried to get my phone out of my pocket, but it wasn’t her. It was my dad.
Dad: How goes?
Me: Slow and steady.
Dad: I won’t be able to get over there today. Mom’s orders.
I knew what that meant. Either his back or his knees—or both—were bothering him and Mom had insisted he take it easy.
Me: Don’t worry about it. I have it covered.
Dad: Thanks.
It would mean a couple more hours of work for me, but that was fine. A little hard work had never bothered me.
A few hours later, I had the drywall done. It was nice to mentally check off a task. One less thing.
When I went outside, I cast a quick glance at Audrey’s place. I wasn’t checking up on her. Just making sure no one had left another present in her yard. I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, so I resisted the urge to go knock on her door to make sure she was okay.
She was fine. What was I worried about?
I locked up and left but instead of heading home, I decided there was someone I did need to check up on. My dad.
My parents lived just outside town, in a log home my dad and uncles had built with their own hands. It had a big front porch with a wooden welcome sign and a shop out back, where my dad spent a lot of his time. I hadn’t lived there in a long time, but in some ways, it still felt like home.
I parked out front and knocked a few times but didn’t wait for an answer. Just opened the door and went in. A hint of citrus was in the air and I caught a glimpse of my mom in the living room.
Although I was old enough to remember my biological mother, Marlene Haven was the only mom I’d ever had. She’d been in my life since I was pretty young, and adopted me and my brothers when I was about ten, making the relationship official. I didn’t need the paperwork to think of her as my mother, but I’d always appreciated that she and my dad had done everything they could to take two broken families and make them whole.
She sat on the couch with a lap full of knitting. She was forever knitting something—blankets, sweaters, hats, you name it. Her brown hair was up in a bun and her blue-framed glasses had slipped down her nose.
“Hi, honey.” She looked up and smiled but her needles didn’t stop moving. “Looking for your dad? Or something to eat?”
I hadn’t come to raid their fridge, but that wasn’t a bad idea. “Both?”
“There’s leftover chicken alfredo but it has spaghetti squash instead of pasta. I’m trying to get your dad to cut down on carbs.”
“I’m sure he loves that.”
“He’s convinced I’m trying to ruin his life, not extend it.”
There was amusement in her voice, but I could also hear the concern. We all shared it. Dad had a few chronic health problems, common to men his age, especially those who’d spent most of their adult life as smokers. He’d quit about a dozen times over the past decade. I was pretty sure this last time was for good; it had been a while since anyone had caught him with a cigarette. But Mom was probably right to clean up his diet, whether he liked it or not.