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Not that she’d been looking.
“Mmm, mmm,” Mae murmured.
“He’s kind of a jerk.” The abrupt statement was as much for herself as it was for her friend. His brush off couldn’t have been clearer, so there was no reason for her to be imagining him sprawled in bed.
Shirtless.
The covers sliding down—
“Really?”
“Really,” she insisted. “Both times I met him.”
“Well, double damn, then.” Her friend sighed with disappointment. “Okay, so we won’t go talk to him, but we can still enjoy the scenery.”
Tamping down on an irrational spurt of possessive jealousy, Honor pointed out, “You have plenty of scenery on your crew to drool over all week long.”
“And a lot of weekends, too.” The brag was accompanied by a cheeky grin. “But I can’t openly drool over the guys without risking a sexual harassment suit or a screwdriver in the back from Jen or Becca.”
Jen and Becca had been her first employees, and after each of them married, their hunky husbands had been hired at Lockhart Construction, too.
As Mae stared across the street, her expression turned wistful. “Besides, there’s no such thing as too much scenery when I haven’t been with anyone since Ian was born. Fantasies are all I have these days. Don’t deny me this tiny bit of pleasure.”
Honor’s grudging laugh lodged in her throat when her neighbor swung the mower around to go back across the yard. He glanced over as the two of them stood there ogling him.
She quickly spun around, cheeks burning with mortification. “Let’s eat before the pizza gets cold.”
Mae sent he
r a narrow-eyed glance, then gave a cheery wave across the street before finally turning to precede her inside.
Ian had already found the remote and a cartoon on the TV, and two steps into the open concept foyer-slash-living room-leads-right-into-the-kitchen, his mom pulled up short to scan the furnished room.
“Wow. Did you leave anything for us to help with?”
She snagged the pizza on her way past, carrying it and the soda to her kitchen island. She hadn’t had one in her small apartment and loved it already. “I’ve got a few boxes left in the spare bedrooms upstairs, and most of my pictures to hang, but they can wait. As much as we’ve both been working, it feels like we never get to visit anymore, so I made an executive decision to take the afternoon off. No arguments.”
Mae braced her palms on the island, eyebrows raised in question. The glint of hope in her expression made Honor doubly glad she’d worked past one a.m., then gotten up again by six to get everything done—all the while drinking tons of caffeine. She was used to working into the night at the bistro, but not so much the getting up bright and early. Especially two mornings in a row.
“Fine, twist my arm,” Mae relented with an affectionate grin as she glanced toward the roses in a vase off to the side. “But if I’d have known, I’d have brought wine, too.”
“Not to worry. I’ve got wine. We’ll have some with the pizza now so you don’t have to worry when it’s time to drive home later.”
“This is why I love you so much.”
She slid the bottle across the counter with an air kiss.
“Speaking of love…” Mae looked pointedly at the flowers.
“Oh, please. You know better than that. They’re from a client, nothing more,” she insisted as she grabbed paper plates and napkins before pouring a small glass of chocolate milk for Ian.
Three gulps later, he waited for his root beer refill with a milk-mustache grin while his mother poured their wine. The three of them sat at the island, eating and talking around bites of hand-tossed pepperoni pizza.
While Ian recapped his tee-ball game, Honor braced her chin on her hand as she listened to her godson. She’d known she was missing these moments together with her second family, but hadn’t realized how much until now.
“Dude, I think you’re ready for the pros,” she teased after he told her about his second base hit.
He giggled as he chomped down on the crust of his slice of cheese and pepperoni. “I’m way too small for that yet, Auntie H.”
