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Chapter 2
Bang. Bang. Bang.Bzzzzzz. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bzzzzzzz.
The alternating sounds of a hammer and a power saw jolted Alison awake. She sat upright in bed, her eyes darting around the room as she searched for some familiar object that would help her make sense of where she was and what was going on.
Almost immediately, her jumpy gaze landed on her suitcase standing in the corner, and everything came flooding back—her trip across the country to escape New York, where she was currently persona non grata with the Who’s Who of the theater community. Her last-minute decision to forgo staying yet another night in a hotel and instead push through the last leg of the drive, resulting in a grueling twelve plus hours in the car.
Her difficulty in finding the right house, which was at the end of a long and isolated cul-de-sac that backed up onto a bluff, which led down to the sand.
There was only one other house on the street, another big and stately one like her own rental, and she’d been assured it would be empty for the next couple of months. That worked perfectly for her. All she wanted was silence and solitude, all the better to contemplate her life and how it had drifted so far off the rails. And, moreover, how she could get it back on track.
The loud, persistent hammering and sawing was not exactly “silent contemplation” material. They weren’t going to be piping it into yoga studios anytime soon.
Oh, God! I have to figure out how to make it stop!
Still shrouded in the kind of denial that only happens during the first moments of wakefulness when the thought of falling back into blissful oblivion still seems tantalizingly possible, she took the only course of action that made sense at that moment—she laid there and prayed it would go away.
As a tool for making the noise disappear, it was singularly ineffective, and after ten more minutes of the banging and buzzing, Alison was fully awake and prepared to be a little bit more proactive.
She ran a brush through her hair and smoothed down her jeans and vintage tee from the day before. Not my most glamorous look, she thought, but it’s not like I’m accepting a Tony.
As she passed through the kitchen on the way to the back door, she had a brilliant idea. I’ll brew a pot of coffee and bring a cup to the foreman as a goodwill gesture.
She knew that most of her passionate, artistic, fiery friends would stomp over and scream at the offending party, hurling insults so creative that not only would the worker be shamed, but also his entire family tree going back generations.
That wasn’t Alison’s style. She’d always believed you could catch more flies with honey—or, in this case, coffee.
She searched through the kitchen cabinets until she found a can of coffee grounds and the accompanying coffee filters. The owner of the house had told her that the cupboards would be stocked with basic amenities, and she was grateful for that convenience now. It was not only going to be heaven to enjoy a cup of coffee before she got herself together to go to the grocery store this afternoon, but it would also provide her a foot in the door for a (hopefully) cordial and (more importantly) effective conversation with the construction foreman next door.
After the thick, hot, brown magic elixir had finished dripping down into the glass carafe, she poured a steaming cup and filled her lungs with the aroma-thick steam that arose from it.
Oh, hell yeah. A person doesn’t exist who wouldn’t be charmed by that heavenly smell.
Alison stepped out of the French doors that opened off the kitchen and into the fog-shrouded morning air. She wished for a moment that she’d taken the time to dig a sweater or hoodie out of her suitcase before setting off on her mission, but she ignored that and pressed forward.
Doesn’t matter. It just means the foreman’ll be all that much more grateful when I hand over this steaming cup of coffee.
Walking across the stretch of lawn that separated the two homes with a purposeful stride, she pasted a smile across her face and resolved to be gracious no matter who or what awaited her at the neighboring house.
Alison pushed aside the plastic tarp that covered the front door opening and stepped just inside the threshold of the unfinished interior, the smell of freshly-cut wood overpowering even the aroma from the steaming mug of coffee she held in her hand.
She stood there for a moment, waiting for a break in the steady buzz of the power tools. When the noise died off, she wasted no time. She didn’t want to lose the opportunity.
“Hello?” she called, pushing her powerful pipes to their limit.
A man stepped around the corner, covered in a light coat of sawdust. He slid a pair of protective goggles off of his eyes as he met her gaze across the room and ruffled his hair to dislodge the wood dust.
He favored her with a smile that was easy and charming. She stood rooted to the floor. She’d been raised to believe it was rude to stare, but damn if all that home training hadn’t flown out the pane-less, tarp-covered window the second she’d laid eyes on the tool-belted Adonis walking toward her.
“Hi, there. What can I do for you?”
God, his voice was just as cheerful and disarming as his eyes and his smile. She opened her mouth to answer, but nothing came out. Her eyes widened and a flush crept up her cheeks.
Rather than looking at her as if she were a crazy person—though he would’ve been well within his rights to do so—he just broadened his smile and put his hand out toward her.
“I’m Troy. Troy Valentine.”
She extended her hand to shake his but her mesmerized brain forgot about the coffee she’d brought over as a make-nice gesture. As her hand shot forward, the hot liquid sloshed over the edge of the cup, getting all over her hand and burning the skin.
She yelped and involuntarily straightened her fingers and yanked her hand back in an instinctual attempt to escape the pain, the way a person would yank their hand back from a fire when the heat started to singe their fingers.
“Oh, God! I’m so sorry!”
Mortification swept through her as the ceramic shattered on the plywood floor and a dark stain spread out from the epicenter.
What. The. Hell. Is. Wrong. With. Me?
