A screen door banged, and he immediately glanced over. He swallowed,

once. It was Kate, coming this way, holding a bottle of her Fiji water. She moved

slowly around the short privet hedge that separated their two yards, arms folded

casually, bottle dangling.

Try to act nonchalant. Be cool. “So, how'd it go at Nitrovex last week?” he

asked, descending the ladder.

“Lousy. Penny Fitch was assigned as my tour guide.”

Oops. He had hoped she wouldn't bump into Penny so soon. If at all. “You

saw Penny?”

“Yes, I saw her. All five-foot-nothing of her and her perfect smile. She gave

me a pile of materials on the company,” Kate said with a sniff.

Mayday. Change the subject. Think of something. “Oh.”

“But she can't sabotage me if I don't let her. I still have a chance to win this

proposal.”

“She wasn't that bad, was she?”

“Well, truth is…” She stopped.

“What?”

She put the bottle on a nearby chair and her hands in her pockets. “Truth is

she actually seemed to know what she was doing.”

“I think she does.” He saw Kate's eyes narrow. “From what I've heard.”

She nodded. “Maybe.”

“So, aside from Penny, did it go well? You're back for another meeting?”

She blew a wisp of red-gold hair from her forehead. “More research. I'm fine

with the general scope of the business, but the chemical stuff is tougher. The tour didn't help much, to be honest.” She walked to a white metal lawn chair next to

the corner flower bed and sat. “I thought I'd be able to bluff my way through the

science part, but it's just a bunch of sludge bulk to me.”

Peter cocked his head in her direction. “Oh, so you already learned about filamentous bacteria?”

That won a musical laugh. The laugh he remembered hearing here in this treehouse, on her family's porch swing, walks home from school…

“I wish,” she said. “I'm still trying to figure out what a flocculant polymer is.

Sounds like something illegal Randy Palmer used to snort behind the high school.”

Peter laughed. “That's actually kind of funny.”

“Thanks.”

“No, I mean, Randy Palmer's a sheriff now, over in Jasper County.”

“Really? Wow. I guess you never know about some people.” She looked

away, then stood and approached him, hands in pockets. “I have an idea. You think maybe we could switch places and you meet with John Wells tomorrow?

You two seem to speak the same language.”

“No chance.”

“C'mon—you shave that face stubble, put on a nice, navy-blue business dress. You could probably borrow one of Penny's.”

He shook his head for emphasis. “Definitely don't have the legs for it.”

She gave him the once-over, then pursed her lips. “Oh, I don't know. I've seen you in shorts.”

He put the hammer back in the toolbox. “Nope. I don't shave my legs for anyone.”

“Well, then, can you at least tell me why I should at all need to know what a

flocculate is?”

“Sure. Sludge needs a high-molecular-weight, high-charge structured

cationic flocculate in order to be separated or dewatered.

She batted her eyes. “Oh, Peter, stop. You had me at sludge.”

Peter nodded, wiping his hands on his jeans. “Good one.”

She cocked her head up at the tree as if seeing it for the first time. “What are

you working on?”

Peter wagged his thumb towards the huge gnarled oak tree. “Taking down