“Stay put,” Seely called. “It’s just a delivery.”
I sighed and put the stick down. A moment later I heard the door shut, then she came back into the room carrying a box. “I like Manny. I wish you’d told me, though. I’m afraid I stared at first.”
“What? Oh. That’s right—you hadn’t met him in person.” In addition to being a pain in the butt, a master electrician and the best foreman I’ve ever had, Manny is a dwarf. “I didn’t think about it. To me he’s just Manny.”
She handed me the box, treating me to that slow smile. “Not ‘Manny the dwarf.’ Just Manny.”
“Well, yeah.” The logo was printed in the corner, so I knew what it held. I didn’t want to open it now. “You know how it is. Once you know someone, you don’t see them the same way.” I decided to give her a hint. “There should be a screwdriver in the toolbox. You’ll want to remove the switch plates first.”
“I was hoping for a tool belt.” She bent and rummaged through the toolbox. “I’m sure I’d feel more competent with a tool belt.”
My lips twitched. Picturing a tool belt slung around those thoroughly female hips didn’t make me think of competence.
Seely ambled over to the entry and began unfastening the switch plate there. “You like to read, don’t you? I noticed that your bookshelves are heavy on history.”
It turned out that Seely enjoyed history, too, though she was a slow reader. A mild case of dyslexia, she said, made a book a major investment of time for her. She considered herself lucky, since she’d been diagnosed early, and talked about a teacher who’d helped her. When I asked, she claimed paramedic training hadn’t been too hard. It might take her a while to read something, but, as with many dyslexics, she had an excellent memory.
Though she usually leaned more toward historical fiction than the straight stuff, she asked if I could recommend something on American history “without too many battles,” since she was more interested in people than military action.
I did, of course, and invited her to borrow my copy. By then she’d finished taping off the woodwork and was prying open the paint. She poured it into the pan. “Oh, look! Isn’t that luscious?”
I looked. She’d taken the drapes down already, so light from the two tall windows flooded the room. The old pair of painter’s coveralls I’d found for her completely obscured that glorious figure; her exuberant hair was braided tightly away from her face.
Which glowed. Not in an unearthly way, though. With pure delight. “Luscious,” I agreed.
Maybe I did know how I’d ended up agreeing to let her paint the room, after all.
As she spread great, sweeping strokes of sage green across my walls, I found myself telling her how I’d come to enjoy reading so much. I didn’t miss the architectural career I might have had; the hands-on business of construction suited me. But abandoning college before I could get my degree had nagged at me, as if I’d drawn most of a circle and never finished that last arc. So I’d started reading the kinds of things I thought would complete my education. In the process, I discovered a taste for history.
“It’s full of great stories,” she agreed, stepping back to survey her work. The roller work was almost done; next came the nit-picky brush work. “Daisy says we have to know where we come from to understand where we are.”
“Your mother sounds like a bright woman. You missed a spot up by the ceiling in the west corner,” I pointed out politely.
She glanced at me over her shoulder. “You’re enjoying this.”
“Who’d have thought it?” I shook my head in amazement. “I never tried sitting around watching someone else work. I like it.” Especially when she bent over and the coveralls stretched tight across her round, lovely bottom.
She’d ordered me to stay on the couch. I doubt she was thinking about me making a quick tackle, then rolling her onto her back on the drop cloth. I was, though. Never mind that I’d probably have passed out if I’d tried. It was just as well that our agreement kept me from pitting common sense against the irrational optimism of lust.
Seely got the spot I’d pointed out, then stretched…an inspiring sight. “So what do you think? Will it need a second coat?”
I made myself take a good look at the walls. “Hey,” I said slowly. “This looks good. Really good.”
“It does, doesn’t it?” She put her hands on her hips, surveying her work. The streak of green paint along her jaw curled up at one end, as smug as her smile. “Though I still say red would have worked, the green looks great. Refreshing.”
She’d brought me some paint chips to choose from that morning. I’d held out for a lighter, warmer shade than she wanted, being more familiar with translating the way a color looked on a tiny chip to an entire room. “You were right about the room needing color.”
“Well!” Her eyebrows rose. “A man who can admit he was wrong. Color me amazed.”
“You have brothers,” I muttered. “Or used to. You probably murdered them and buried the bodies.”
She let out a peal of laughter. “Watch it, or you’ll end up with a green nose.”
“To match yours?”
She lifted a hand to her nose. The bracelet she never removed slid down her arm. “It isn’t…”
“It is now.”
“I must look like a little girl who’s been finger painting.”
“No,” I said slowly. “You look like an uncommonly beautiful woman. Only slightly green.”
The smile she turned on me was different. Hesitant.
“Why have you never married, Seely?”
Her smile faded, as if it were on a dimmer switch and I’d just turned it down. “You’re changing the rules on me. Feeling safe, are you, over there on the couch?”
My heart began to pound. I didn’t have to figure out what she meant. “Not safe at all. You?”
She shook her head and bent to get the narrow brush I’d told her to use around the baseboards. She took the brush and the paint tray over to the window and settled on the floor, giving me plenty of time to wonder why I’d suddenly taken us both into the deep end.
Because I wanted her to know, I decided. I didn’t want her to have any doubts that I was interested, even if I couldn’t do anything about it yet. I wanted her aware of me the way I was aware of her.
I wanted an answer to my question, too.
For a while, it didn’t look as though I was going to get it. She seemed totally focused on the strip of wall she was painting next to the baseboard. At last, not looking up, she said, “I lived with a man for several years. His name was Steven. Steven Francis Blois.”
I chewed over that for a moment, then offered, “There was a king of England named Stephen Blois. William the Conqueror’s grandson.”
She snorted. “Oh, yes. Every time Steven was introduced to someone he’d say, ‘no relation.’ When they looked confused or asked what he meant, he’d grin and add, ‘to the former king of England, that is.’”
She bent and dipped her brush in the paint. “It was cute the first dozen or so times I heard it.”
Sounded like she wasn’t hung up on the man anymore. Encouraged, I said, “Stephen wasn’t much of a king. Weak. The country was torn apart during his reign—barons chewing on other barons, eventually civil war.”
“I don’t think Steven knew or cared what kind of a king his namesake had been. He wasn’t interested in history.” She chuckled. “Actually, he was an accountant.”