Page 85 of Your Place or Mine

“You sticking around?” I asked, hoisting the bag onto the nearest bench.

He shrugged. “You mentioned BBQs and tables. Hard to ignore a vision like that.”

I smirked. “You here for the aesthetic or the snacks?”

He gave me a look. “I’m here because I can dig a post hole straighter than anyone in this town. And because someone before you apparently thought rusted benches and dead ferns counted as charm.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Is that your way of offering help?”

“I’m saying your garden patio has potential,” he said, pushing off the railing and walking toward me. “But you could use a hand.”

I opened my mouth to shoot something back, probably something clever and biting, but then he bent down to lift the other bag of soil I hadn’t touched yet, and I lost all access to language.

Because, of course, he made lifting forty pounds look effortless. Of course, his forearms flexed, and his shirt tugged across his back just right. And of coursethatwas the moment my traitorous brain whispered,This is a terrible idea… but maybe just once, let it be a beautiful one, too.

“Fine,” I said, recovering. “You can help. But no unsolicited design advice.”

He smirked. “That wasn’t part of the deal.”

“It is now.”

“I don’t like not giving my two cents.”

I chuckled. “You don’t say.”

We worked in silence for a bit, side by side in the warm hush of the morning. I pulled old weeds from the brick path while Callum pried up warped planks on the garden bench, using a crowbar he’d apparently had tucked away in his truck.

Every once in a while, our arms would brush. Just barely.

And every time, I felt it all the way down to my toes.

We didn’t talk much—not aboutus, anyway. Not about the kiss, or the words that followed, or the awkward emotional landmine I’d exploded all over the last night.

But there was something different in the way we moved around each other now. Not tentative exactly, but… aware.

He handed me a trowel without being asked. I passed him a water bottle without a word.

We were orbiting.

And I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to crash into him or push him back into space.

“You’ve got good instincts,” he said after a while, standing back to look at the new bench placement. “About the flow of the space. People’ll want to sit here.”

I blinked. “Are you… complimenting my design sensibilities?”

“I’m tolerating them.”

“That sounds dangerously close to praise.”

He smirked again. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

Too late.

Because of that smirk? The kind that tugged just one corner of his mouth while his eyes stayed serious? Yeah, that one had already burned itself into my brain.

I turned away quickly, pretending to fuss with a pot that didn’t need fussing.

“You know,” I said after a minute, my voice casual, “you’re not the only one who cares about this building.”

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