‘About not wandering off.’
‘Ahh!’ How could he have forgotten? And Julia was bound to be off the phone any second, wondering where they were. He felt a flick of schoolboy panic. ‘We should go down.’
She nodded. ‘Yeah...’ But then, incredibly, she was turning in the opposite direction. ‘I’ll just get my hat and my phone...’
What?
He grabbed her arm. ‘No, you don’t!’
Her eyes filled with bemusement. ‘I was obviously going to be careful.’
‘You’re not going to be anything, Quinn! And you’re not going anywhere near that hole either.’ He squeezed her arm to make her stay. ‘I’ll get them.’
Something flickered through her gaze—surprise perhaps, gratitude, maybe a combo of the two, and then she broke into a smile that split his atom. ‘Thanks, Will.’
‘No problem...’ Unlike breathing. Functioning. He cut free and scanned the floor ahead, glad of the distraction.
There, against the wall beside the lethal chasm, one white hat. One phone in its—surprise, surprise—orange case.
He went to the wall, flattening himself against it, testing the floor with his foot between each sideways step.
Wasn’t today just the gift that kept on giving? Confusion at every turn. Warm, golden feelings he had no idea what to do with. And now here he was, risking life and limb for a hat and a phone because they were hers. Of all people, hers!
‘Be careful, Will...’
He paused. Her concern was touching though. He bent his knees, scooping up the hat. ‘What do you think I’m being?’
‘I just...’ And then she made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a giggle being smothered.
Was he amusing now? He planted his foot, ducking a second time for her phone. To be fair, he probably did look like a bit of a berk, inching along like this in his smart overcoat and safety helmet!
When he got back, she was smiling at him hard. ‘You were amazing!’
Definitely laughing at him, but that was fine. He could deal with that.
He pressed his lips together, nodding. ‘I know. I was actually thinking the same thing.’
Her face stretched. ‘Oh, and so modest!’
He nodded again. ‘That too.’
She stared at him for a blink, and then suddenly she was laughing into his eyes, making the warm golden stuff flow again. What was she doing to him? Making him want to be funny, making him feel...
Focus!
He held out her things. ‘Here you go.’
‘Thanks.’ She took them, holding his gaze for a sweet, tangled beat, and then she was jamming on the hat, brushing her phone off, tapping the screen to life. ‘Oh, thank goodness.’ And then she was looking up again, her eyes twinkling like magic. ‘After all your heroics, I’d have been gutted if it was broken!’
CHAPTER FIVE
WILL DIPPED HIS CHIN. ‘So, you’ve got trades primed, ready to go?’
Julia nodded. ‘More or less.’
Impossible not to look at him—to stare! He was so different. Ever since they had rejoined Julia—ambling back through as if they had only been in the adjoining room waiting for her to finish on the phone—Will had been shouldering the load, taking notes, displaying the smarts Anthony used to so admire.
‘What about specialist plasterers?’ His eyes came to hers briefly, stirring a warm little ripple inside. ‘I’m informed that restoring plasterwork can take a while.’
‘It can, but I have a team lined up. They could start in a couple of months.’
‘No earlier?’
Focus, Quinn!
She cut in. ‘Will...’ His gaze came back. Warm. Disconcertingly attentive. ‘A month isn’t going to affect the time schedule on a project like this. If the other trades are starting soon, it would be better to hold off on the restoration plasterers because they’re going to need scaffold towers erecting and those will only hinder access for the other trades, slowing them down.’ She smiled to soften the blow. ‘No point robbing Peter to pay Paul.’
His eyes signalled resignation. ‘Okay.’ And then he was turning back to Julia. ‘I suppose we need to prioritise the roof anyway.’ His lips moved as if to smile, then flattened into a line. ‘And the floors too, for safety.’
Her heart quivered. Upstairs... Pulling her from the brink... Holding her tight, breathing into her hair. That close, safe feeling. Then arguing with her about whose fault it was that she’d almost taken the express route to the floor below. Blaming himself for making her work at getting him onside when it wasn’t he who’d asked her to do that at all, but his father.
And yes, she might well have stumbled down a hole anyway, because she did get distracted, but she’d been walking backwards upstairs expressly because of Anthony, because she’d been thinking about what he wanted her to do for Will—stretching Will’s horizons—and of course Anthony meant well, wanting her to open Will up, but many a slip and all that. Like at that pub quiz...
Her heart pulsed. Oh, it was all coming back now: Anthony asking Will if he’d mind joining that other table because some friend of his had pitched up and wanted to join them... Will smiling, getting up. But it had felt a bit off to her, made her heart hurt for Will, and maybe it had made Will hurt as well because he’d been silent all the way home.
Typical Anthony! Blinkered once he’d got a notion in his head. Maybe it was a strength in business, but it didn’t work for family, for Will. And he’d come to see it too late, hadn’t he? Regretted it too late.
She drew Will back into focus. But she couldn’t get into all that with him. Not yet. For now, she was just glad they had ‘upstairs’—the saving part, and the funny part when he’d gone back for her stuff—because it was their secret now, a warm little strip of connection between them that was making everything feel better, more hopeful.
