“Hey!” She turned to me with mock outrage. “Those shoes are still missing. I’m now inmourning, thank you very much.”
“Already transitioned to recovery instead of rescue?”
Margot strode over for another sandbag with a sniff. “Funny. Very funny.”
We were halfway through hauling the pile of sandbags to the foundation outside when Rhett walked in, eyes falling on us with the kind of casual confidence that made my pulse pick up speed. It was the first time I’d seen him in five days—since our kiss and eventual argument in my yard. Just looking at him made my stomach flip and my face burn as the memories pressed into the front of my mind.
“Morning,” he said, pushing damp hair from his forehead. He carried a toolbox in one hand and a coffee cup in the other. His T-shirt was already speckled with drizzle from the shoulders down.
Margot, of course, lit up with a mischievous glow. “Well, if it isn’t Bluebell Cove’s resident carpenter.”
Rhett gave her a polite nod, then turned to me. His eyes softened the way they always did, the way I never saw them with anyone else. As if I was the only thing in view.
“Ready?” he asked.
I swallowed against the sudden warmth blooming in my chest. “Yeah. Let’s start with the big window.”
By mid-morning, the shop was, once again, a construction zone. Rhett knelt outside, drill whining as wood met wood.
Margot supervised from inside where it was dry, perched on a bucket stool that she managed to make look chic. Her biggest contribution had been her trot across the street to get us all coffee and a snack before the Morning Bell closed for the storm.She bounced a graceful foot in the air, gaze dancing from me to Rhett every so often as she sipped her cappuccino.
I carried bags of sand into the alley, my arms aching, but the bustle came with a special kind of satisfaction. The clatter of tools, the upbeat hum of passersby as they hurried to prepare, and even Margot’s dramatic sighs.
“This is depressing,” she announced after Rhett secured the last board. “Like, apocalypse-movie-depressing. Should we all be making confessions? Kissing long-lost lovers?” Margot wiggled her eyebrows at me over her shoulder.
Rhett chuckled low under his breath as he repositioned the sandbags at the door, and I shot her a wide-eyed look. “This isn’t the first Bluebell Cove storm I’ve helped prep for. No matter what, I’m sure we’ll all be fine,” he said.
“Wait—” I cocked my head at him, something tugging at the back of my mind. “What year was that?”
He ran a hand through his hair and kicked a sandbag in place. “I dunno, fourteen or fifteen years ago?”
“No way,” I murmured.
Rhett looked up as he closed the door. “What?”
Margot glanced between us from behind her coffee cup, eyes devouring our interaction with poorly hidden glee. I wanted to kick her.
The way he stood at the door, one hand on his hip and the other gripping a drill, light pouring in from the slivers of gaps left in the door’s glass—it all shifted into place. Rhett leaned against the doorway, his shoulders filling the space the same way they had all those summers ago.
For a heartbeat, everything else fell away, and I was ten again, standing in this very shop.
I remember he had come in, drenched from the rain, locks of dark hair plastered to his face and dripping into his eyes. Older than me by only a few years, he held himself straight as a rod,face pinched into a serious expression even though the tool belt he wore dangled loosely around his hips.
But ten-year-old Georgie thought he looked like asuperhero.
Those dark, somber eyes scanned the shop bursting with plants and flowers before landing on me, hiding behind a potted palm tree. My grandmother had left me for a few minutes to help Ruth with the diner, and the wall-rattling thunder and flickering lights made it all seem like a terrible nightmare.
“Hey,” he said, stepping forward slowly, boots squelching against the floor.
“Hi.” I blushed and hid my face.
Young Rhett surveyed the store again. “Are you all alone?”
Hugging the palm’s trunk, I nodded furiously.
He knelt beside me and pushed some of his wet hair back. “I see that you only have half your window covered. Do you mind if I fix that?”
I shook my head, but another clap of thunder sounded, sending me flying into his arms. He caught me with a grunt, laughing into my wild, frizzed curls. Once I calmed down, he patted my back and dipped his chin to look me in the eyes.
