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Jennifer approved. She located an empty alcove with a view of the water and picked up her drink, ready to make her way over. “See if you can get a bottle of wine instead.”
“Red?”
Red was what Amber liked.
“White,” she said, and sauntered to the table.
* * *
Tony poured out chardonnay, watching moisture condense on the bowl of each glass.
He poured generously, even though he hated chardonnay.
Amber hated it, too.
But Jennifer wanted white wine, and Steve wanted to get lucky, so there were rituals to perform. He added another splash to each glass.
“Thanks,” she said, accepting hers. “So what do you do for a living, Steve?”
“I’m a builder,” he said, and then wished he’d come up with a lie.
He really wasn’t any good at this. First he’d dragged Patrick into it, and now he told her his real job. Why not just announce he was the father of three orphaned boys, looking for a nice lady to scrub his linoleum?
Nice escapist fantasy, asshole. She’ll be playing footsie with you in no time.
“What do you build?”
This, at least, he could manage not to fuck up. “Houses.”
“What sort of houses?”
“Good ones.”
She smiled. “I meant, you know, mansions or prefab boxes or little cottages on the beach? Frank Lloyd Wright–ish sorts of houses?”
“Custom stuff, but only a few that have been super fancy. Mostly they’re just houses, for families to live in.”
“Do you like it?”
“I love it. I used to do commercial stuff—warehouses, renovations, car washes, pull-aparts. That kind of work is a drag. Houses are better.”
“How come?”
She was playing with her earlobe, looking right at him like she really wanted to know. Like she wasn’t sure how he would answer the question, which was interesting.
He thought maybe she’d never asked before.
That he’d never even tried to explain it.
“When you build something like a car wash … it’s fine. The client wants a car wash, they tell you what it’s supposed to be like, you get it done. There’s satisfact
ion there, I guess. But building a house—there’s always a story to it. The people want something, and partly it’s a house, but it’s also this idea of a house, and I love being able to give them what they want. Sometimes even something better than what they want.”
“That’s kind of presumptuous, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, but that’s not quite what I mean. What I mean is, they haven’t thought everything through, and maybe the architect hasn’t, either, but I can make sure their doors get hung right so they don’t cut off access to the light switch when they’re open. I can hire the most talented trim carpenter I know—this buddy of mine who insists on the best wood and always makes sure the grain matches. I can figure out that they’re really serious about the fireplace, or they have this dream about sitting on the front porch together, and I can make sure they get the most careful mason, or that the guys I hire to do the porch are super meticulous so it’s perfect for these people.”
“I get it. So what’s the best house you’ve built?”
