Page 36 of Burning Love
“Always ready for a meal.”
“Do you need a hand here with anything before I get back to the site?”
“I’m good. I’m going to finish painting, then I’ll install the trim this week. I’ll put the trim up in the laundry room after the half bath since I ran out when I finished that room a few weeks ago.”
“Then the first floor will be complete,” his father said.
“Finally. It’s been a long six months.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t have to take the whole house down to the studs. It could have been worse.”
“I pretty much did except for my bedroom and most of the living and dining room and another bedroom upstairs.”
He’d changed the layout in his bathroom to put in the large shower over having the tub. Another bedroom had water damage from a roof leak.
He had to put new sheetrock up from where he’d ripped a wall down to open the layout down here.
A new roof had been the first order of business. Then windows. His furnace and water tank had enough life left in them he didn’t need to replace them right away, but the AC unit was upgraded once the weather turned warm.
He’d poured a new patio at the same time he’d done the AC unit and was able to grill outside until his kitchen was done. Having his fridge sitting in the living room was comical, but it worked for him.
He still had a shit ton of work to do outside. He’d get to it in time. Probably next spring.
“I’m glad I got to see the progress.”
“I didn’t think I’d ever see this when we started.”
“Demo was fun as always,” his father said, laughing.
“Who doesn’t like smashing down walls? Putting up supporting beams is a bitch like always though.”
His father slapped him on the back. “The bad comes with the good and vice versa. It’s the balance we have to figure out in life.”
That was the thing about his father.
He was always good-natured and it burned his ass that his mother couldn’t see that.
Since he’d never got to meet his grandparents, Jace had no clue if anything his mother had said about them not accepting her would have held true.
His father could have carried a grudge against Stella Miller for hiding a child for seventeen years, but was only thankful he was given this chance to have a relationship with his son.
When Dean asked if he wanted to legally change his name to Rigby, Jace had thought it was a joke.
He found out it wasn’t, and agreed.
That move finally let him feel like he wasn’t going to be kicked out and end up on his own.
“I’ve balanced it as well as I can so far.”
“You have. I’ve got to get it out. I’m proud of you, Jace. You should be proud of you too. Your mother would be.”
“Yeah,” he said quickly and turned away to pick up the roller.
His father sighed and took his leave. There had always been hints and statements dropped for years about his mother but nothing more.
Jace never wanted to talk about it much.
Twenty minutes later, his phone went off with a text. He pulled it out of his back pocket and noticed it was Talia asking if he was busy.
