Page 11 of Hold

“Well, it’s good to see you. Never thought you’d set foot back on a jobsite.” Sean looked up at the house. “Look at this poor darlin’,” he said in his Irish brogue. The house was a Victorian that had been manhandled so many times over the decades, there was now nothing for it but a complete gut job. Sean loved houses and talked about them as though they were his children.

“You’ll fix it,” Liam said.

“Yeah, but we lost most of the original moldings and the chimney can’t be saved and all that hardwood got termites.” Sean shook his head. “It’s a bloody shame.”

“Speaking of which,” Liam said, “I have to get back in there and rip up century-old tile.”

“All right, son, I’ll let you go.” They shook hands again. “I had a good look before we started the demo, but if you see anything worth saving, let me know, won’t you?” Sean kept a salvage yard as well as his contracting business.

“If I don’t steal it myself.” Liam grinned. He’d renovated a similar old house by making good use of the salvage yard.

Except you’ll probably have to sell the house now.

The smile slid off his face before he could stop it. “Y’all right, son?” Sean said.

“Yeah, sure.” Liam hiked some sort of cheerful expression on his face and waved goodbye, turning his back so Sean wouldn’t see how fake it was.

Liam lived on the middle floor of a Gothic Revival house that had been so badly renovated before he got there, the town had condemned it. He’d bought it with money he’d earned working for his father and called in every favor he’d gained from five years of friendship with other contractors to fix it up. He could now put a price on those years he’d promised to his father—the cost of a complete replumbing of a hundred-and-fifty-year-old house. The pointed gables and stained-glass windows had been saved. He’d found wide-plank flooring and old bricks to revive the place inside and out and had paid a local millworker to recreate the elaborate trim in the eaves.

Another thing Avery had taken from him, that house and the promise he’d felt in it. Once, he’d thought he had everything he wanted. Now, he just wanted not to lose anything else.

♦

Thea’s house, the second week, and everyone came back. This time they brought food and a bottle of wine. Zahra brought sparkling apple cider.

Even Liam came back, though he arrived after everyone else, fidgeted for fifteen minutes, and then went into the kitchen. Thea heard the bathroom door close.

Ten seconds later he was back. “Your toilet’s running too? Do you know how much money you’re literally flushing away?” Before she could answer, he added, “And what’s with that window? Your heating bill must be through the roof. Literally.” And he stomped out to his truck where, they saw from the front window—to which, yes, they’d all rushed—he pulled two toolboxes and a toolbelt out of the back seat and went around the back of the house. Judging by the cording on his arms, the toolboxes were heavy.

Not that Thea was interested.

“That man is going to fail his exams,” Chloe commented.

“He already knows all this,” Zahra said. “Haven’t you noticed?”

“Don’t tell him that,” Seth begged. “He’s our best resource for real-life classroom stories.” He held up the wine bottle to Thea. “Pretty obvious why he’s here, you ask me.”

“Nuh-uh,” Thea said, who was blushing again. “You think I like having all my crappy housekeeping skills pointed out? And I told him to quit it.” At least, she thought she had. Yet he’d brought his own tools this time. “He’s just an interfering, grumpy old—well, young—hipster, and we can do without him.”

“I can’t,” Chloe interjected. “I think I might go watch him bend over the toilet.”

“Gross,” David said.

“You know what I mean.”

“Stay where you are!” Thea commanded in a hiss. “No one is going to ogle him in my bathroom.”

Chloe leaned back in her chair as if it were a throne. Her Titian curls helped her general impression of a queen. “Okay, then, Miss I’m Not Interested, go tell him to stop.”

Thea closed her eyes. “Fine. I can’t do that. I’ve been fighting that toilet for six years. And Ididtry to fix it myself,” she added, begging them with her eyes. “I just always seemed to buy the wrong size O-ring or something.”

Chloe spat wine all over the coffee table.

“It’s a legitimate term,” Seth reminded her.

“I know!” she choked. “Sorry! My innuendo meter is very sensitive!”

“Let’s get back to work,” Zahra said, handing her a napkin.

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