Page 2 of Oops I Fell For The Billionaire Next Door

"You'll want to talk to the owner about that."

"Great. Where's the owner?"

He jerks his chin toward the north side of the build. "Around back. Fair warning, he's on a call."

I'm already walking. My boots crunch the perfect gravel. The noise of a circular saw screams from inside the framing. I round the corner and stop.

The man standing with his back to me is tall. Six two at least. Broad shoulders that stretch a grey T-shirt like the fabric is working overtime. Dark blond hair pushed back from his face, catching morning sun. He's got a phone pressed to his ear, one hand on his hip, and he's talking to someone about server architecture with the easy confidence of a person who understands it and knows he does.

He turns. The face matches the shoulders. Strong jaw. Straight nose. Eyes the color of good whiskey that land on me like I'm a line item on an agenda he didn't approve.

"Let me call you back." He lowers the phone. Looks at me. Looks at my mud-caked boots. Looks at the soil under my fingernails. Looks at my face. "Hi."

"You rerouted my water."

His eyebrows go up. "Excuse me?"

"The shared water access line that runs along the east boundary. Your crew moved it Wednesday. My pressure dropped to nothing Thursday morning. I can't run my irrigation system. I can't shower past seven minutes."

"I didn't realize there was a shared line." He says it calmly. Genuinely. A man who's used to problems being solvable. "I'll have my contractor look into it."

"Your contractor is the one who rerouted it."

"Then I'll have him reroute it back."

Simple. Reasonable. So why does it irritate me?

Because he's standing on a hundred thousand dollars of grading and framing, wearing a watch that costs more than my truck, and he didn't know about a water line that's been serving this ridge since before his construction crew showed up with their imported gravel and their cantilevered deck.

"Your crew also starts at six a.m."

"Permits allow construction noise starting at seven."

"They were running the saw at six twelve yesterday. I checked."

Something shifts in his expression. Not anger. Not annoyance. Amusement.

"I'll talk to them."

"And you sent me a gift basket."

Now he definitely looks confused. "A welcome basket. Yeah. With the local preserves and the coffee from that place in town. I thought it was a nice gesture."

"The note said 'Welcome to the neighbourhood.'"

"Because... welcome to the neighbourhood."

"I moved in six weeks before you did."

He stares at me. Processes. And then he does something I'm not prepared for. He laughs. Not a polite chuckle. A real laugh, short and bright, and it changes his entire face from expensive to warm and the difference annoys me more than the water.

"You're right. That's backwards. I should've said welcome to my neighbourhood." He pauses. "I'm Beck. Beckett Rhodes."

I know the name. Everyone with an internet connection knows the name. Rhodes Security Systems. Cybersecurity. Sold a division last year for some absurd number that I only remember because Margot texted me the headline and said girl this man has more money than God and worse hair. The hair, for the record, is not bad. It's the kind of hair you want to pull, which is a thought I bury immediately under six feet of professionalism.

"Desireen Laurent."

"The landscape designer." He says it like he already looked me up. "I saw your site. The terracing work you did for that property in North Van was impressive."