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“I do not,” he said, mostly to Ty, but he maintained eye contact with her. “I haven’t dated anyone in a year.”
“I guess that’s true,” Ty said. “Now, Lauren, don’t let this street deter you from this home. It is fantastic inside.” He prattled off the features, which included quartz, and land out back, and hardwood.
Blake knew the moment he opened the door that Lauren would not be buying this house. She didn’t care about land or hardwood. She had all of that already.
No, Lauren wanted charm, and Blake realized as she shot him a wide-eyed look in the kitchen—which he could admit was nice—as Ty went on and on about the animal zoning this property had that she was looking for extraordinary.
And not just in a house.
In her life.
He immediately thought he wouldn’t fit the bill, that she was completely out of his league, and he should get out of the game before he lost limbs, internal organs, and more.
She’d asked him not to do that, but as they got back in the car and she buckled up again, he couldn’t quite do it.
She looked at him and sighed. “I will listen to you from now on,” she said.
He only smiled. “Plug in the next address,” he said. “It may be the one.” He hoped he could be “the one” for her, but he now knew that outward appearances couldn’t make up for bad bones.
As they drove across the island to the southwest side, he gave her a few details about the plantations down here, and she did seem impressed with the history of the area. She liked the neighborhood too.
“All right,” Ty boomed from the street. “Don’t let this one fool you either. She may look one wind away from falling down, but she has a solid foundation.” He started for the front door, but Blake and Lauren stayed on the sidewalk.
“If I sneeze, that house is falling over,” Lauren said. Ivy climbed the front of it, and Blake actually liked that. He didn’t like the dirt and rust it left behind, nor the weed-infested lawn. He looked next door, and whoever lived in that pristine house probably hated this property with their whole soul.
“Are we going in?” he asked as Ty bounded—yes, literally bounded like an antelope—up the steps. He turned back to them, and Lauren heaved a sigh.
“I guess,” she said.
“Come on, guys!” he called.
“I don’t know how he has the energy,” Blake said. “He’s at least a decade older than me.”
Lauren giggled then, and Blake couldn’t help the smile that filled his soul. She didn’t want a fixer-upper. She didn’t want a place that had been fixed up to hide flaws. No, Lauren Keller wanted—and demanded—perfection, and Blake couldn’t help feeling like he’d never achieve that.
Still, she kept her hand cemented in his, and he wasn’t going to deny her that.
14
“Yes, that’s right,” Lauren said, her phone chiming as she spoke into it. A notification from the security system came up that said someone had triggered the camera on the porch. “I was the senior marketing manager for an enormous firm. I worked with clients as big as Nike, and as small as the mom-and-pop diner down the street.”
She tapped on the notification and saw it was just Joy getting home from the library. Chester had not dropped her off tonight as he had in the past, and she carried a couple of brown bags of groceries in her arms. With any luck, Lauren would emerge from this bedroom with a job—and dinner waiting on the table.
“Your résumé says you led teams of up to sixteen people.”
“Yes, sir,” she said. “I was the team lead over design, and that required meetings with clients, and then interpreting their ideas into designer speak and communicating that with my team in-house.”
“You worked in the office?”
“Regularly,” she said. “Though we had—have—corporate offices all over the country, and I’m able to work remotely too.” She swallowed at her slip, but surely Jameson Langley knew what had happened to Simple Solutions. It had been national news. Everyone knew about it. “I was based out of the South Texas office for years,” she said. “More recently, my files were transferred to the Miami office, as I’ve been working on Hilton Head.”
She held her breath, waiting for him to dismiss her. She wasn’t sure why she couldn’t see the potential in herself. Joy had sat her down that morning and told her in no uncertain terms that KM Marketing Group would be lucky to have her.
“Lucky, I say!” Joy had ranted. “What are they? Some local Carolina marketing firm? You eat firms like that for breakfast.”
They’d both dissolved into giggles then, and Lauren smiled just thinking about the conversation now.
Not only that, but KM was based out of Charleston, which was only an hour from here. Lauren had put up with far longer commutes in her life, that was for sure.
