Page 62 of Single-Minded
By Thursday evening, I was ninety-five percent sure Presley was avoiding me.
After a quick dinner with my girls, I headed to her shop to get a few hours’ work in while Sam Cordova, Chance’s daughter, babysat.
I parked at Bergman Hardware, grabbed my tools, and hoofed it toward the shop in the rain.
I’d only seen Presley in passing since finding her and Magnolia at her shop Monday afternoon. A good morning on her way out of her house, an impersonal wave as she passed through our work zone, a brief response to my text on Tuesday, in which I’d explained I’d be sanding that evening at the shop and that it was a dusty, dirty, one-person job she’d be better off staying away from.
As I neared her shop, I noticed two things. One, she’d papered over all the windows so no one could see in. Two, the lights were on, telling me she was inside.
That made me way too fucking happy.
The main door was unlocked, so I went in, anticipating laying eyes on her. The first sign of her was the open, brightly colored umbrella lying on the concrete floor to dry.
When she appeared in the doorway of the kitchen, I nearly swallowed my tongue as I drank in the sight. She wasn’t dressed up, wasn’t wearing anything sexy, just a simple cami and some cotton shorts. Plain as plain could be.
The truth was, Presley did not look plain no matter what she wore or didn’t wear.
“We’re painting today?” she asked, her eyes lit with excitement. About paint.
No matter how much I tried to build my resistance to her, it was pointless. It crumbled with one glance at her, one eager question out of her mouth.
“Painting today,” I said, shooting for professional but unable to keep the dumbass grin off my face as I walked toward her. “Are you here to help?”
“Am I allowed?” She moved out of the doorway to let me by, but I still managed to catch her light, sweet scent.
“You’re the boss.”
“That’s not what you said Tuesday. You were bossy.”
“Drywall dust is nasty.” I set my tools down and tried to gather my thoughts about how to split up the work tonight. This woman had a way of scrambling my brain. I hadn’t been sure she would show up. “I was starting to think you were avoiding me.”
“I was,” she said, surprising me with her bluntness.
“Why?” So much for staying professional.
“I might be slow, but the message finally got through to me.”
“What message was that?”
“That we were a one and done, emphasis on the done.” She shrugged. I tried to discern whether she was really that carefree about what she was saying, but I couldn’t tell. “Sorry about the kiss in my garage Monday morning.”
I busied myself opening the paint, putting on gloves, and crouching to prep a strainer to run it through. “You don’t have to apologize,” I finally said. “I liked it. But we were supposed to be a one and done.”
She moved in close, watching me pour the slate-blue paint into the strainer bucket as if it was the most interesting thing she’d ever seen. “Supposed to be?”
I watched the paint flow too, trying to figure out what to say. How much to admit to. “I gave in to our…chemistry, we’ll call it, against my better judgment by convincing myself it would mean getting you out of my system. Seems that was a misfire.”
She crouched down next to me. “I’m not out of your system?” Her blue eyes were intense, focused. Curious. So damn enticing. And definitely not carefree. “Is that even a thing?” she asked, raising her brows in question. “Getting someone out of your system by sleeping with them?”
“Maybe,” I hedged. I stood and squeezed the paint out of the strainer, then took the gloves off.
Presley stood too.
“But apparently not for me when it comes to you,” I admitted.
The slow smile that lit up her face made me wonder if being honest was a mistake. That smile was so pretty though; drawing one out of her couldn’t be a mistake.
“Maybe you just need a second dose,” she said, stepping closer, peering up at me.
