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“I’ve never been up here,” she said as she stepped inside.
“I doubt you’ll think the view is worth the climb up those stairs.”
She stood in the center of the room and pivoted to make a complete circle. When she came back to him, he grimaced and reached up to rub the back of his neck.
“I know,” he said. “It’s not even—what’s the term?”
“Shabby chic?”
“This is shabby shit.”
She laughed. “It has potential. With a can of paint and…”
“A hundred thousand dollars.”
They shared another smile. She gestured behind her toward the window. “The tree is lovely, though. The moss seems to have been draped by a decorator.”
“Yeah. It gives me something to stare at while I daydream.” He wasn’t staring at the Spanish moss in the tree, however. He was looking into her eyes. Abruptly he said, “Excuse me a sec.”
He went around her and into the bedroom, pushing the door partially closed. She walked over to the window. He didn’t exactly live in the shadow of their house as Jasper had said, but through the branches of the tree, she could see the back of it almost in its entirety. Screened porch, kitchen windows, the windows of the master bedroom upstairs. Since the Arnotts’ departure in June, she hadn’t had to concern herself with keeping the window treatments closed at night. She realized the need to now.
Hearing him reenter the main room, she turned. He’d put on a faded t-shirt and his docksiders, but she didn’t comment on the change, because it would make them each mindful that she’d caught him bare-chested and wearing a pair of shorts that hung tenuously from his sharp hipbones. It seemed best to pretend she hadn’t noticed.
The t-shirt was faded. His chin was bristly. He had bed-head, the saddle brown strands even more unruly than they’d been the night before. But his eyes—agate in color and ringed in black like those of a tiger—looked anything but sleepy as they focused on her.
“I didn’t know you wore glasses,” she said.
He took them off and, with a puzzled expression, inspected them. “Who put those there?”
She laughed.
He set the horn-rims on the table next to his laptop. “What’s Jasper up to this morning?”
“He went to our country club.”
“He’s a golfer?”
“No. The club has an Olympic-size pool. He swims laps. A serious number of laps.”
“Every day?”
“Unless it’s lightning and they close the pool.”
“Huh. That explains his well-defined traps. You swim, too?”
“No.”
He snapped his fingers. “Your aversion to sun exposure and water.”
“Right. I can stay afloat, but I don’t really get anywhere.”
“So what do you do for exercise?”
“Spin class. Stationary bike.”
“Ah. That explains your well-defined…” He stopped, looked away from her, tipped his head down and scratched his eyebrow with his thumb. Then said, “Would you like something to drink?”
“Sure.” She said it brightly, maybe a bit too brightly, because she was wondering what of hers he found well-defined and why he’d changed his mind about telling her.
