Page 14 of 40 and (So Over) Fixing It
Thad shook his head. “Uh-uh.”
Of course not. “My friend Claire owns it. It’s called Gimme Sugar.” The name made Thad laugh. “She has lots of great goodies there.”
“Does she make sugar-free stuff?”
Carter had a real hard-on for not giving this kid sugar, didn’t he? “I don’t know, but I bet she does. She has all kinds of treats.”
Thad nodded. His curious gaze going back to the wood, he asked, “Can I help you?”
“How about you watch me for a few minutes, and then I can supervise if you want to try it?”
There went the little bounce again. “Great!”
“First, you have to wear safety glasses.” She pointed to the ones on her head. “Always wear safety glasses when you’re doing anything in a workshop or on a construction site.”
“I wore a hard hat the other day. Do I need to wear a hard hat in here?”
She chuckled as she searched on her makeshift desk—a piece of plywood laid over two sawhorses—for an extra pair of glasses. “No hard hat in here. Hard hats are for when heavy stuff could fall on your head.”
“Oh. That makes sense.”
She got Thad settled with the glasses, making extra sure that his eyes were protected and that he stood back far enough that he wasn’t in danger of any flying splinters. “Now just watch for a minute and see what I’m doing.” She tilted the sander to one side and pointed at the strip of paper secured to the bottom. “See this?”
Thad nodded vigorously.
“This is sandpaper, and when I turn the sander on”—she flipped the palm-sized machine until the sandpaper was facing the wood—“it vibrates the paper so that it sands faster than I can do it by hand.” She flipped on the machine and applied it to the wood, moving in slow circles to polish any bumps or dents or splinters from the surface. Thad watched quietly, and each time she glanced at him, his gaze was intent on her work as if he could absorb how to do it by sheer willpower. The kid definitely seemed to enjoy learning new things.
After a couple of minutes she flipped the sander off. “Wanna try?”
“Yes!”
She didn’t have a step stool in the shop, but she found a block of wood that would give Thad a little more height, allowing him a better angle to see what they were doing. After he stepped up, she moved in beside him. “Are you left-handed or right-handed?”
“Right-handed.”
“Good. So am I.” She smiled down at him as she took his hand. “Place your palm here”—she laid his hand on top of the sander—“and I’ll help guide you after I turn the machine on. You have to hold it tight at first,” she warned, “because sometimes it wants to run away from you.”
Thad laughed. The sound did something funny to her heart.
“Ready?”
Thad glanced up at her, his smile lighting up his whole face. “Ready!”
And that was how JD and Carter found them, a long time later, running the sander over and over the butcher block until it was ultrasmooth. Unfortunately Carter didn’t look as smooth as the wood they were working on. Hearing the door squeak, Erin glanced up automatically, her mind still mostly on Thad, to be greeted by the infamous Carter Deveraux glower, as she was coming to think of it.
She lifted the sander from the wood and powered it down. Thad bounced on his block of wood. “Look at it! It’s so neat.”
“Thad.”
At least he wasn’t barking at the boy. Still, Erin could feel her own frown deepen as she lifted her safety glasses. Removing the barrier only made the displeasure on Carter’s face clearer.
Thad lifted his glasses as well. “Dad, look! We’re making butcher block.” He glanced up at Erin. “That’s what you call it, right?”
She gave the boy a smile. “That’s what you call it.” With her gloved hand, she dusted the bits of debris from the surface to give a clear view of the beautiful slab beneath. “You’ve done a good job, Thad.”
“We’ve been looking everywhere for you,” Carter said sharply. Erin would’ve jumped down his throat for that if she hadn’t caught a glimpse of fear in Carter’s face. Thad had gone missing; she could understand how that would affect a dad, even if she did feel her hackles rise anytime she was in the man’s vicinity.
Thad’s shoulders slumped. “I just came to see Erin. I didn’t go to the building site, I promise.”
