Page 19 of Whiskey & Wreckage

I survey the wreckage. “So… locksmith wasn’t an option?”

“He said it’d take days,” she says, crossing her arms. “And I didn’t want to leave the door like this.”

“Right. So your plan was to make it worse?”

Poppy sighs dramatically and drops onto the floor, legs crossed. “I don’t need the judgment. I need the drill. It keeps slipping.”

I crouch beside her, eyeing the damage. “That’s because you were using the wrong bit.”

She holds it up. “No, I wasn’t.”

“You were.”

She stares at me. “Okay fine, I might’ve been. It was labeled ‘universal.’ That felt promising.”

I reach over, gently prying the screwdriver from her hand and replacing it with a bottle of water from her kitchen counter. “Drink that. Sit still. Try not to injure yourself again.”

She watches me work, biting her bottom lip. “You didn’t have to come all the way over.”

“You’re bleeding and trying to perform home security surgery with a beginner’s toolkit from Walmart,” I mutter. “Yes, I did.”

She’s quiet for a beat. Then softly, “Thanks.”

I glance over. Her eyes are wide, full of sincerity, and for a second I forget what I’m supposed to be doing.

“I mean it,” she adds. “You’ve done… way too much. The hotel, the clothes, now this? You don’t even know me.”

I straighten. “I know enough.”

“Like what?” she challenges.

“That you’re stubborn,” I say, nodding at the mess. “A little reckless. Smart. You’ve been holding up your whole life for people who didn’t deserve it.”

Her lips part, but no words come out.

“And,” I add, reaching for the new lock, “you’ve got terrible taste in men.”

She laughs, really laughs this time, and the sound hits me dead in the chest.

“Well,” she says, voice softening, “clearly I’m trying to do better.”

I pause. Look at her.

And for a moment, everything’s too quiet. Too charged.

But then she grins. “You gonna finish that, or am I sleeping with a wrench under my pillow tonight?”

I shake my head, the tension breaking as I get back to work.

Chapter Seven

POPPY

I sit cross-leggedon the floor, chin propped in my hand, watching Thomas work on my door like he’s done it a hundred times. Because, apparently, he has.

The new lock is already halfway in, and his sleeves are pushed up to reveal forearms that have absolutely no business being that attractive. Like, rude. He’s focused, steady, ridiculously competent. Meanwhile, I’m just sitting here trying not to swoon like I’m in some low-budget rom-com that skipped the budget for chill.

“You know,” I say, tipping my head, “you’re kind of alarmingly good at this. Are you sure you’re not secretly a locksmith?”

---