I grab his hand again. This time I initiate it — thread my fingers through his like it's muscle memory and not a detonation. His fingers tighten around mine. Automatic. Immediate.
That current again. That low hum of contact I feel in my teeth, my collarbone, the backs of my knees.
I let go when we reach the caulk aisle. He lets me. We don't talk about it.
The walk back is quieter. No hands. The performance is over, Nina's shop closed for her afternoon break, the sidewalk empty. But the space between us has changed. Gotten smaller, or denser.
He carries the bags. I didn't ask him to. He just took them at the register, and I let him because my hands were still buzzing and I needed them empty so I could think.
Back at the inn, he sets the bags on the kitchen counter and stands there, looking at the window over the sink.
"You're good at that," he says.
"At what?"
"The cover."
"I used to plan events. Making strangers comfortable in unfamiliar situations was literally my job description."
He nods. Heads for the hallway.
"Liam."
He stops. Turns just enough to give me the edge of his profile — jaw, cheekbone, that impossible stillness.
"We should have the story ready. For Oren. For Nina. Through Del. Her company catered a security firm event. We met. You were reserved. I was persistent. It tracks."
"It does."
"A few months in. New enough that you haven't met everyone. Established enough that you staying here isn't scandalous."
"Fine."
"And you should probably learn to smile. Once. At some point. In public. Near me."
The look he gives me is so deeply unamused that my stomach does a small, stupid flip.
He walks down the hall. His footsteps are even and measured, the sound of a man who moves through the world like it's a series of rooms to be cleared.
I turn to the kitchen sink. Run the water. Stare at my hands under the stream.
My right palm is still warm where his fingers were.
"This is fine," I tell the faucet. "This is a tactical cover. Temporary and practical and I'm a professional at making people comfortable, that's all this is."
The faucet drips.
I dry my hands, toss the towel over my shoulder, and start unpacking the caulk and wood filler, slotting each thing into its place. Order. Tasks. Tangible problems with tangible solutions — that's my territory. Leaky windows, cracked molding, a B&Bthat needs to be ready by fall. I know how to fix things. I know how to make broken spaces beautiful.
What I don't know is how to hold a man's hand like it means nothing when every nerve in my body is cataloguing the exact width of his palm and the way his thumb settled against my pulse point like it belonged there.
The problem — the specific, inconvenient, already-growing problem — is that my body didn't get the memo about the performance.
And I have a terrible feeling it's not going to.
Chapter 4
Liam
