“You okay?”
Rebecca spun around at the sound of his voice. “The dryer isn’t drying. I cleaned the vent. That didn’t help.”
Damn. So much for getting back to my routine.
He only used to see Ginny about once a week; he could tell that Rebecca was going to command much more of his attention and his time than her aunt had.
“Aunt Ginny always used to have a clothesline in the backyard,” she said to him after she started the washing machine. “Any luck it’s still around?”
“Let me take a look at it before you go to all that trouble.”
Her pretty eyes widened in surprise at his offer and then she smiled at him. “Thank you.”
Shane went to get his tools so he could open up the back of the dryer. On his way to the porch, he checked the air vent to make sure it wasn’t blocked or an animal hadn’t made a nest in it. Once he confirmed that the outside air vent was clear, he rejoined Rebecca on the porch.
“I really appreciate you trying to fix this for me,” she said. “My sons make a ton of laundry.”
“Boys tend to do that.” Shane pulled the dryer from the wall.
“Yes, they do.”
Before he opened the back of the dryer, Shane pulled the discharge line—the large silver tube hooking the dryer to the vent—out of the wall. “Well, here’s some of the problem.”
“Oh, my gosh.” Rebecca peeked over his shoulder. “Is that all lint in there?”
“It’s packed.” Shane began to pull the tightly packed lint out of the line.
“You know, I had a brand-new front-loading washer and dryer, but I sold them because there was a washer and dryer listed in the will. I had no idea that they were the same washer and dryer that Aunt Ginny had when I was a kid.”
“Your aunt liked to hang on to things, that’s for sure.” The memory of Ginny brought a brief smile to his face.
Shane sneezed several times, and once the discharge line was unclogged, he pulled some tissues out of his pants pocket and blew his nose. He was still sneezing from Top and his eyes were driving him nuts because they were so itchy.
“Is that from the lint or the kitten?”
He sneezed again. “I’ve never been allergic to lint.”
“Shane.”
“Yeah?”
“Have you seen your eyes?”
“No.” He blew his nose again. “But they itch like crazy.”
“They are swollen. And red.”
“That explains it, then.” Shane pushed the dryer sideways so he could remove the back.
“I’m going to get you some over-the-counter allergy medicine. I always have some on hand because of Carson.”
“No need to bother.” He knelt down by the dryer. Rebecca heard him, but ignored him. She disappeared into the house while he unscrewed the back of the dryer.
Once the back was off, Shane was sure he’d found a second cause of the problem. He had cleaned a large ball of lint out of the discharge line connection that was located inside of the dryer when Rebecca returned.
“That’s disgusting,” she exclaimed. “How has this dryer not caught on fire?”
“Luck.”
“Here—take these. Generic Benadryl.”
Shane decided just to go along with Rebecca; she had that motherly look on her face and he knew better than to fight those instincts.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Do you think the problem’s fixed?”
“I’m thinking it is,” he said while he unscrewed a second cover that connected to the lint. “But I want to check this first.”
By the time Shane was finished, there was a large pile of lint, decades in the making, on the ground. He put the dryer back together, used a pair of her son’s jeans as a test garment and turned it on. Rebecca stood next to him, her fingers threaded together as if she was praying for a miracle. Standing next to this woman made him feel strong for some inexplicable reason; she made him feel capable. How could a stranger make him feel like the Shane he was before his first tour to Iraq?
Shane took a step away from his new landlady, not wanting to feel anything, much less the loss of the man he could no longer be.
Rebecca didn’t notice that he had moved away from her; instead, she was focused on the dryer. She opened the door and let out a happy noise, which signaled to Shane that he had successfully fixed the problem.
Rebecca turned to him with a broad smile on her face and her pretty eyes shining. She looked up at him as if he had done something amazing. He supposed for a woman with two boys and a basket full of dirty laundry, perhaps he had.
“Thank you, Shane.”
He liked the way her two front teeth crossed just a little, drawing his attention to her full rosy lips.
He nodded and began to gather up his tools. When he stood upright, she was looking at him as if she had something to say. So, instead of turning to leave the porch, he waited.
“What you did for me today—helping with the kitten and now this—it means a lot to me.”
“I always helped your aunt. I don’t see any reason why I can’t help you if you decide not to give me the boot.”
“I think we could all share the space,” she said, thoughtfully.
There was something she was hesitating to say to him—he could see it on her easy-to-read face.
“But there is something that is a deal breaker for me.”
He waited for her to continue; his fingers tightened on the handle of the screwdriver, but other than that, he didn’t show her how tense she was making him.
“I know that...” Another pause and a throat clear. “I know that cannabis is legal in some states now. But it’s not legal in Montana.”
Rebecca looked him straight in the eye then. “I won’t have my boys exposed to anything illegal. Do we understand each other?”
His fingers loosened their death grip on the screwdriver’s handle. “We do.”
His response got a nod from her and she seemed satisfied with the exchange. He said goodbye then and walked down the porch stairs. Rebecca finished loading the dryer and the washing machine and then headed to the screen door, where she stopped and called after him. Shane stopped walking.
“Hey. I meant to ask you. Why did you name that kitten Top?”
Something twisted in his gut and he had to swallow several times before he said, “Because that’s what I was. First Sargeant. My men all called me Top.”
* * *
After she said goodbye to Shane, the rest of the afternoon flew by for Rebecca. She only had time to get a few more boxes opened and organized by room before it was time to pick Carson and Caleb up from school. Caleb had already started to make friends; he had always been more outgoing than his older brother. Carson, on the other hand, seemed to have a dark cloud over his head all the way home.
“I want to start riding the bus.” Carson said his first words as they were pulling into the driveway.
“You do?”
“Yeah.”
Rebecca worked to keep the sadness she was feeling from showing up on her face as she parked her car by the house and