Page 44 of Lucky Haven

“Sure. We can get you booked in for that next week.”

“I’d like to get it done today.”

I barely contain a snort. “No can do. We’ve got a full schedule.”

His expression shifts, recalculating his plan. “I see.”

I wonder what he thinks he sees. Because he showed up for a reason, bright and early, unable to stay away from the man who has claimed the woman he once wanted. Probably will always want, because she didn’t want him, and that didn’t sit right with him at all.

He doesn’t move toward the door.

Maybe he wants to force me to do work for him.

I pick up a rag, even though I don’t need to wipe my hands. It gives me something to do besides grab the front of his ironed polo and shove him out the door. “I’ll need to order the part in.”

“Right.” He twists and glances over his shoulder. “How long have you and Haven been seeing each other?”

And there it is.

“That’s private.”

He laughs, the fucker. “You’re not her type.”

I grind my teeth together. He doesn’t know her fucking type.

“Well, she always did think the best of people.” And then he sighs and shakes his head, which turns my stomach.

That’s enough of that. I put the rag down on the workbench and close the gap between us, rolling my shoulders. He’s a few inches shorter than me. Always has been, even though he was a grown man when we met and I was a brash sixteen year old kid.

Making him look up at me feels good.

Keeping Hope’s secrets feels even better, though. So I ignore both of his goading statements, and focus on the business he ostensibly showed up here to initiate. “If you want to make an appointment, we’d be happy to replace that cable and do a full brake repair for you. If you’re looking for conversation, you’ll have to find that somewhere else.”

“She’s been through a lot,” he says. “I just want to make sure she’s all right.”

“That’s not for you to worry about.”

He wants to say more, he’s practically vibrating. “She’s always been looking for something to anchor herself to. She needs—” He pauses, choosing his word with care. “Steadiness.”

I don’t answer.

“I just hope you’re good for her. She deserves that much.” He says it like he wants to remind me that he knew her first, he wanted her first. But he didn’t.

I remember when he showed up in her life with a pleasant smile and lust in his eyes.

I was here first, and I know what she needs.

“I’ll place that part order,” I say coldly. “Always happy to be a good neighbour. Doesn’t matter if we’ve had differences in the past, you know? Sometimes, it’s important to just let things go and be an adult for the good of the town.”

Community is important. That’s going to be the message I hammer home, to Jeb and Jessika and anyone else that tries to insert themselves into Haven’s life. They need to be better neighbours to her. But that’s the extent of their involvement in her business.

“Drive safe,” I hear myself say. I don’t mean it. I’d like his brakes to fail and for him to drive off a mountain switchback, but a guy like him probably never leaves town.

Pity.

She’s always been looking for something to anchor herself to.

I hate that he isn’t entirely wrong. He’s weaponizing something real about Haven for his own purposes, but the kernel inside it⁠—