Page 18 of The Reno
He spoke slowly. “Yes, you did.” He pointed to the front door. “Your door is broken. It was half open. I figured no daft sod is going to sleep in a house without a door that can at least shut closed.”
It was my turn to blush. I’d forgotten about the broken lock, and after the second bottle of prosecco, I hadn’t cared. After Lydia got an Uber home, I stomped upstairs, collapsed on my makeshift bed and went to sleep.
“I—” I opened my mouth, attempting to reclaim some ground, but came up with nothing.
The man raised a single dark eyebrow. “I got a voicemail from an unknown number at one thirty in the morning. Two women, sounding pissed as farts, asked if I’d come around and look at the house. As soon as possible. It sounded like an emergency—”
“No—” I opened my mouth to challenge,but then—oh god.
A memory hit me. Lydia and I still sat on the living room floor, calling up her family friend on my phone and leaving a voicemail. It was a messy, drunk voicemail that probably made no sense.
“Now I’m realising it was you and Lydia. The cousin. Brian and Sandra’s niece.”
“How do you know my auntie and uncle?”
He crossed his arms. “We’re family friends. My parents and Lydia’s parents were close.” He flinched and corrected. “Are close.”
My eyes narrowed. “She said it was Kevin who was coming to take a look.”
My eyes trailed over him. His arms were crossed over a wide, defined chest. This was not a Kevin. No one with arms like his was called Kevin.
“Kevin is my dad. He’s out of action at the moment. Knee op.”
I groaned. “Lydia.” She could have warned me that it was her annoyingly handsome friend we were drunk dialling at one thirty in the morning.
The man chuckled, shifting his weight in a way that was a bit too casual for me.
“She’s a bit of a menace.” His gaze shifted to the two empty prosecco bottles in the corner of the lounge, then back to me. Judgemental much?
“She never mentioned a cousin.”
“We don’t see each other much.” I lifted my chin. “So we were catching up.”
“Lydia’s good at ‘catching up’. She does that every Friday.” I thought he was joking, but his face didn’t change or soften. Hewas so… stoic. It appeared he’d recovered from his obvious discomfort about seeing me again after the funeral and had resumed whatever this persona was. Big grumpy builder, I was guessing.
“I’m Liam.” He slipped his hands into his back pocket and produced a business card.
Did builders usually have business cards? The card was black and simply designed, if a bit too masculine for my taste. But then, he probably just ordered it on some boring website without a thought. It read Liam Hunter, Partner, Hunter Building and Construction. The logo was abbreviated to HBC.
“This could be a bit more exciting, you know.” I lifted the card, the criticism tumbling out.
Liam’s eyebrows drew together. “Excuse me?”
“This design—it’s boring. You could design something that represents…” I gestured towards him. “You. Or your brand.”
“It’s just a business card. Not a dating profile.”
I laughed humourlessly. “If you don’t care, how do you expect anyone else to? Design is important. It’s how we want to be seen in the world. It’s how we represent ourselves.”
I don’t know what possessed me to pull out my first-year design modules for a bloody builder.
“I—I’ll just leave you to it.” He took a step away.
After he broke into my house, I offered him free design advice, but he looked atmelike I was the weirdo. Incredible.
Liam took another step back. “I can come by again when you’re expecting me.”
His eyes glanced down so briefly to my bare legs that I almost missed it. God, I’d run down the stairs half-dressed, screaminglike a hungover banshee, and ranted about the design of his business cards, only to find out he was here because I’d called him. Not to mention, his first impression of me was calling him a prick and then having a breakdown on a church pulpit.
