Brooke snorted a laugh. “Don’t let your guard down just yet. Those scheming old ducksalwayshave an ulterior motive. They’re probably trying to win you over so you’ll agree to a date with one of their grandsons. But if you need a protector against the grannies of the valley, I’m officially on duty!” She saluted me with a wink before darting a guilty look at the door. “Right after I check in the next patient.”
Brooke disappeared to reception, and I took the quieter route, slipping down the maze of corridors towards the break room hidden at the very back. A cup of teawouldhit the spot. What type of fancy biscuits did church ladies bake? Something sweet and crumbly with fluffy icing in the middle? I pushed open the door. Maybe I could sneak one—
“Oh!”
My eyes widened as I sucked in a panicked breath—or, at least, I tried to. My lungs locked up. I stumbled back a step, then another, until I collided with the wall, spine first.
A man crowded the other side of the room.
Not just any man.
A beast of a man.
He was tall, with broad shoulders wrapped in a red-checked flannel shirt, the sleeves folded up to reveal muscular forearms dusted with dark hair. Actually, he had lots of dark hair everywhere—thick and wavy on his head, tamed on his brows, but slightly bushy on his beard. He had grey eyes, though, and they tracked me as I crept along the wall, my hand fumbling along the tiles, desperately searching for the doorknob.
The man cleared his throat. The rough noise forced my eyes down.
Someone. Help me.
My pulse picked up. I had to get out of there. That man would snap me like a twig. He’d crush me even if I stood as proud and strong as the ancient eucalyptus dotted through the valley.
“We’re just…” Sounding almost nervous, his voice trailed off.
I dared to lift my eyes again. The man had worked himself into the opposite corner of the room, his gaze fixed on his tan work boots. Uneasy, almost as if his heart thumped as fast as mine, he hopped a white tile from hand to hand.
I glanced at the wall behind him. Still almost bare like it was yesterday. But now, tiny red spacers dotted the gaps between rows of freshly laid subway tiles. On the wooden counter, a faded blue towel had been thrown down, with an assortment of tools lined up neatly on top—absolutely none of which I could name.
Balls.
Shame curled a slow, fiery path up my neck. The poor man wasn’t a villain lurking behind the door, waiting to attack. He was finishing the break room renovation.
My glasses hadn’t budged, but my finger trembled when I pushed them up anyway. “I—I’m s-sorry.” A gulp of air didn’t help get the words out any easier. “I wasn’t expecting…”An enormous brute to be lurking in the break room. “You.”Or anyone else, for that matter.
“Yeah, uh… We were supposed to finish—”
The back door swung open.
My heart jumped when a second man barrelled inside. He was much younger and impossible to miss, with a bright crop of ginger hair and a blinding neon safety shirt. His khaki shorts were the only dull thing about him.
“Lola from the City!” he cried.
My eyes bulged.
Dideveryonecall me that?
He dropped a toolbox on the floor. “Everyone in town is talking about you! I’m Harry.” Grinning, all dimples, he jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “The old man is Aiden. Has he talked yet? Hedoestalk.”
I masked the tremble in my hand with a tight fistful of skirt but stayed pinned to the safety of the wall.
Harry hooked his thumbs in his toolbelt. Tilting his head, his ginger brows squished together. His eyes went from me to Aiden. We must have looked ridiculous—each of us squashed into opposite corners, refusing to say a word, barely looking anywhere but at our shoes.
Harry sighed. “Did you already scare the new girl?” His pointed look fell on the man wearing red-checked flannel. “What the hell, old man? Were you raised in the Hollyoaks’ barn or something? Sayhello.”
“Oh, uh…” Aiden stood taller and squared his shoulders. He dipped his chin and ground out a simple “Hello.”
“Frigging hell,” Harry muttered. “The cows would do a better job than that.”
Aiden glared at him.
