Page 13 of She Was Made for Me

As much as I want to shake my head, I nod. “Sure.”

“You know what guys are like on these kinds of job sites. I don’t want any creeps trying to take advantage of her.”

Guilt claws up my throat and I try to swallow it down with my beer. Thank God Rich doesn’t know I’m the creep who hit on her today.

“I’m sure she can handle herself,” Diana says with a laugh. “She’s not a little girl anymore.”

No, she most certainly is not.

“Still.” Rich looks at me pleadingly. “You’ll look out for her. We’re going out of town next month and it makes me feel better knowing you’re going to be there.”

I can’t help but laugh. “Rich, she’stwenty-five. She doesn’t need me looking out for her.”

“It’s not only that.” Rich sighs, setting his bottle down. “This is her first project like this and she has a lot to learn.”

“What do you mean, this is her first project? I thought she’d done this before?”

“She has a background in project management,” Rich hastens to assure me. “But not in renovation. She comes from the tech world.”

Irritation flickers in my ribcage. “So she doesn’t know a thing about remodeling a house?”

“She’s a very fast learner,” Di says. “But this is new to her, so she might need some guidance.”

I take a long chug from my bottle to hide my frown. I already felt uneasy about being back in the city and taking on this project, and this doesn’t help. I’m about to ask why he’s hired her if she’s so inexperienced, but I already know the answer. She was out of a job and her father, being the good guy he is, wanted to help her out. It makes sense, but it doesn’t make the job any easier for me. It’s bad enough that I have to work with a woman who is both attractive and completely off-limits, but now I have to babysit her? Micromanage her so she doesn’t fuck things up?

This is too much.

I open my mouth to protest, but Diana rises from her chair with a smile. “Is Mexican still your favorite, Kyle? I was thinking of making fajitas for dinner.”

Any annoyance I feel quickly dissolves. “I’d love that, Di. Thanks.” I swallow, gratitude warming me through. “You always take good care of me.”

She pauses to squeeze my shoulder on the way past. “Of course, honey.” She wanders into the kitchen and Rich smiles in the way that says he’s glad I’m here—that I’m always welcome here.

These two took me in when my life fell to pieces four years ago, and have worried about me ever since. The least I can do is keep an eye on their daughter while we work together.

But how am I going to do this? This morning I was seconds away from asking her out and now I have to pretend I’m not interested in her.

I mean, I’mnotinterested in her. She’s twenty-five and Richard’s daughter, for God’s sake.

I’ll have to put some proper, professional distance between us. No more laughing and flirting, obviously. No mention of what happened this morning; that would be inappropriate. All I can do now is pretend it was an innocent coffee, nothing more. Instead, I’ll focus on needing to keep an eye on her, and how annoying that is. Rich never told me, when he strong-armed me into this job, that it was also a babysitting gig.

I repeat this fact to myself like a mantra, stirring the irritation inside me again, letting it fester.

It’s the only way I’ll survive this.

6

Violet

Iused to wake by 5.30 a.m. most days, sometimes earlier, but since leaving DigiSwap I struggle to drag myself out of bed in the mornings. It’s as if my body somehow knows I no longer have a job and is taking the chance to catch up on all those years of missed sleep.

Well, Ididn’thave a job, but now Dad’s roped me into doing this project. I’m still in two minds about it, to be honest. When I got home yesterday I did some research about how to manage a renovation like this, and while some of it was familiar—I’d get to use my beloved Gantt charts, yay—a lot of it wasn’t.

Then there’s the rugged foreman I met yesterday, and the unusual predicament we seem to find ourselves in. My belly flips with nervous excitement when I think about working with him, but I get the sense he wasn’t thrilled when he learned I was Richard’s daughter. More like mildly horrified. Still, I can’t seem to bring myself to message Dad and tell him no, so that means Kyle and I are officially working together. We need to forget about what happened yesterday and focus on the job, which suits me just fine. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s prioritizing work.

I roll over and check the time on my phone, surprised to find a text waiting for me.

From Kyle, of all people.

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