Page 24 of The Heartbreaker Next Door

I’d known the Lockhart men for all of three weeks, but it felt like they’d been rehearsing for roles in a heist movie ever since I set foot in Valentine Bay. There was Dylan, youngest and perpetually tan, who gave off substitute PE teacher energy and wore a baseball cap indoors. Damon, whose sole purpose in life seemed to be winning gold medals in competitive flirting and shit-talking. And, occasionally, there was Dawson, the oldest, looming and monosyllabic. He wasn’t just a horse whisperer so much as an everything whisperer. Horses, cattle, dogs, cats—if it had four legs, it apparently took one look at him and decided he belonged to it.

Damon had this uncanny way of making the entire disaster feel like an elaborate prank we were all in on together. He named the chapel “The Love Fortress” and spent a nonzero amount of time strategizing how to get a chandelier hung from the apex of the unfinished rafters. Whenever I started to panic-spreadsheet the headcount for emergency chairs or bread baskets, he’d just flash that movie-star smile and say, “Just breathe. I know it’s hard since I give you plenty of reasons to be breathless.”

And then there was Dean, who stuck out in this circus like a single, perfectly ironed napkin in a toddler food fight. The financial wizard, all sharp analytics and cynicism.

But out of all the brothers, Dean was the one who joined my side in the mud, a measuring tape in one hand and a utility knife in the other. He had the air of someone who’d only seen weddings from the vantage point of an Excel spreadsheet, but he still rolled up his sleeves and built an altar like he was on a competition reality show.

It took a full hour to lay the temp flooring, which had to happen before we set anything else up, there were so many people running in and out, it was like a clown car with a union contract. Selma Lockhart herself made an appearance around 7:15, clutching a container filled with what she called “emergency brownies,” and immediately began conscripting anyone under the age of thirty-five to haul folding chairs, benches, and tables for the reception set up. Dean coordinated the whole operation with the unyielding calm of a surgeon on a caffeine drip, but every time we worked within arm’s reach, I could feel all my best intentions start to fray at the edges.

Somewhere in the process of zip-tying eucalyptus garlands and moonlighting as a sound tech, I realized Dean was making me laugh. Not just polite, work-appropriate laughter, but the kind that starts in your gut and bubbles out before you can remember it’s not supposed to happen at work. And once it started, I couldn’t stop noticing the other things: the way he never complained even when he had to parkour up a pile of lumber, how he’d made sure I drank water and brought me a bagel when my energy was slipping, and—most dangerous of all—how he’d look at me like he was recalculating a risk equation, and the answer kept shocking him.

By the time the sun started to break through the rain clouds, the inside of the chapel glowed. We’d traded the musty construction smell for the perfume of wet pine, the glass wall facing north gleamed clean as a lens, and the benches were crowded with borrowed cushions from every couch and armchair in the Lockhart family arsenal. The bride and her mother walked through the doors just as Dylan finished taping down the aisle runner, and for the first time all day, I felt like we’d engineered a miracle.

With ninety minutes to guest arrival, Dean and I were the only two left. I was putting on the finishing touches, and he was testing the sound system. I queued up the processional mix on my phone, but the wireless speakers were having a full-scale emotional breakdown. It was the kind of malfunction that would have thrown any normal, non-insomniac, caffeine-addled wedding coordinator into a full meltdown. But for once, I didn’t panic.

Maybe it was the secondhand sugar high from Selma’s “emergency brownies,” or maybe it was the fact that Dean was there, hunched over the tangle of wires and mismatched adapters with the same stoic, unflappable intensity he used to discuss quarterly earnings reports. They say adrenaline makes you do strange things. I’d always assumed those things involved lifting cars off infants or running barefoot through fire. Apparently, in my case, the only thing adrenaline made me do was get irrationally comforted by a Lockhart.

Dean remained calm as a cucumber, never getting frustrated, he just continued working a problem until it was solved. “Who designed this system, a retired Soviet spy?” He shot me a look over one shoulder, just long enough to catch my smile.

“You’re not allowed to be funny, this is serious,” I reminded him, even though I absolutely loved that he was.

He cleared his throat, eyes back on the sound system. “I’m never funny. You’re just delirious from lack of sleep.”

“How do you know how much sleep I’ve had?” I knew it was probably just a guess, but somehow whenever I looked at Dean, it felt like he was seeing right through me. Or that he could read my mind.

“You showed up here a little after five in the morning, and you were logged in to SaddlePoint at 2 a.m.”

SaddlePoint was the online system used to handle staff schedules, ranch activities, guest itineraries, maintenance requests, housekeeping status, dining reservations, transportation, horse assignments, event calendars, internal messages, and task lists—basically the ranch’s entire day-to-day operation.

It was true. I was working that late, or early. But to know that meant he was up at that time and since he’d already been in the office when I showed up this morning, it meant he hadn’t slept either.

“For the record, every event planner I’ve ever met has been less... hands-on.” He looked me up and down, the compliment concealed in the way his lips quirked. “I’ve never met one yet who climbed up to the rafters to hang fairy lights when they are clearly scared of heights.”

“How did…” I started but then stopped. I was scared of heights, and the dark, and, if I was being honest, not a huge fan of spiders.

Every time Dean spoke, he surprised me. I’d never told anyone about my complicated relationship with altitude. I’d kept my aversion to being anywhere gravity could make a point, to myself. I’d learned at a very early age that, like my Miranda rights, any weakness could and would be used against me in the court of life.

It was just one more piece of evidence that Dean Lockhart could read my mind.

“Is that your subtle way of saying I’m neurotic?” I tried to play it off as if he hadn’t just made me feel extremely vulnerable and seen.

“If the color-coded planner fits.”

I laughed. I actually laughed, even though my brain was screaming about the clock, the impending rush of guests, and the fact that we were standing in a glorified cathedral-ceiling warehouse pretending it was a suitable place for a wedding.

He pressed the ‘Power’ button again with the air of a man defusing a bomb. The receiver sparked to life, and with a little creative cord surgery, the sound system shrieked to existence. I winced at the feedback. It took him less than sixty seconds, fiddling with the mixer, and when the opening chords of the bride’s processional song came through the speakers—surprisingly clear—I smiled and let myself relax for a nanosecond. We’d done it. The “chapel” wasn’t just functional, it was magical, at least that’s what I was telling myself.

Dean came from around the makeshift sound booth and walked onto the parquet dance floor, listening to the acoustics, probably gauging if he needed to adjust, and then just... looked at me.

With everyone else gone, even the air felt quieter. I was suddenly aware of how I must look. I’d thrown my hair in a ponytail, which, after the manual labor, had stragglers falling out, my shirt was half un-tucked, my pants were dusty, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I had a smudge of brownie on my lips. He didn’t seem to notice. Or maybe he just didn’t care.

He cleared his throat. “You know, there’s a Lockhart tradition.”

I arched a brow, unsure where this was going. “Lockhart tradition?” I repeated.

He nodded, an actual smile slipping across his lips. “Yep. Before the guests arrive, you always test the dance floor. Make sure it holds.” He bounced his heels on the floor.

Was he flirting with me? He’d barely spoken to me the past three weeks. Surely, this is just a joke.