Page 14 of Drilled (Dad Bod Contracting 2)
He nods. “I did. They’re very serious about their wine, so they really wanted this room, especially, to be totally custom.”
I frown. “Isn’t the entire house a custom job, seeing as the four of you built it?”
He smirks, shaking his head. “Nah, custom means I personally made this built-in rack from scratch. I designed the rack, chose the wood, cut it, shaped it, stained it, polished it, and installed it, as opposed to a prefab rack that I’d have just fixed into place. The cabinets are prefab, for example, because as cool as it is to say you have custom cabinets for your kitchen, they’re stupid expensive for a product only nominally better than a readily available version, not to mention if you need to replace or repair a custom cabinet, you’re gonna pay out your ass.”
“Oh, so I should rethink the custom cabinets I was considering for my kitchen remodel?” I ask, grinning.
“You’re remodeling your kitchen?”
I shake my head. “No, I was joking. My kitchen is already amazing and needs no renovation.”
“Oh.” He reloads his nailer, sets it aside, and then eyes me. “So. Um…you’re here.”
I lift an eyebrow. “Yeah, unlike you, yesterday morning.”
“Audra, can we talk later?”
“You could have at least left a note. Didn’t have to be elaborate. Could’ve been as simple as, ‘I had a great time, Audra, maybe we’ll catch up again sometime.’”
“I am at work, so maybe we could—”
“But no! You just vanished. Poof. Gone. I came out of the shower talking to you, but you weren’t there. Imagine my surprise.”
“Audra—”
“I mean, it was a hookup, goddammit! I knew it, you knew it—we both knew it. I wasn’t expecting much—I would have been fine if you were just like, ‘yo, I gotta go to work, see ya.’” I say this in my best approximation of a deep, gruff, gravelly voice that is nothing at all like Franco’s voice, which is deep but fluid and smooth and quiet.
“I don’t sound like that,” he says.
“That’s not the point.” I’m winding up for another salvo, but I’m stopped by Franco’s hand across my mouth.
“Audra.” His piercing blue eyes are pale and icy. “I’m working. I can’t do this with you right now.”
“You’re just trying to escape.”
He flares his nostrils, which shouldn’t be sexy, but somehow is. “I take my work very seriously. The clients are inclined to show up on a whim, without warning. I will not be found having a personal discussion on a client’s property and on their time. They are paying me to be here, and while I’m here, I’ll do my damn job.” He pulls a tiny spiral notepad from his pocket, a pencil from behind his ear, and scrawls on it: Callihan’s 7:30; he rips the paper free from the spiral across the top and hands it to me.
“Callihan’s is—” he starts.
“I know where it is,” I cut in.
“You have it in writing—I’ll meet you there at seven thirty, and you can bitch me out then, okay? Just not here, not now.”
I stare at the paper and allow my thoughts to range past feeling pissy at him for leaving, to how attractive he looks with the tool belt and tight T-shirt and tight, ripped jeans and backward ball cap with his Oakleys upside down on the brim, to being irritated with myself for being so attracted to him.
The thought that filters through to my brain past my emotions and libido is that I’d be irritated if someone showed up at my place of work and tried to have a personal discussion with me while I was with a client.
“Fine. Callihan’s, seven thirty.” I stare hard at him. “You’ll be there?”
“I’ll be there.” He holds up a finger for me to wait, and then crouches to rummage in a toolbox on the floor; he withdraws a huge hammer, old and rusty and pitted, the leather wrapped around the handle tattered and rotting away—he hands it to me. “If you need insurance that I’ll be there, take this. It’s my grandfather’s hammer, and it’s one of my most prized possessions. He gave it to me himself when I was eleven.”
Something inside me melts a little. “Franco, you don’t have to give me your granddad’s hammer.”
He looks relieved as he takes the hammer back. “Thank god. I’ve never let that hammer out of my possession in the thirty-four years I’ve had it.” He places it back in the toolbox, and then withdraws something else—an old drill, a huge, heavy, bulky one from about fifty years ago. “This was his, too. Still good insurance that I’ll meet you, but not as hard for me to let go of.”
“Franco, I don’t need a drill. I just need your assurance you’re not gonna stand me up to get out of having this conversation.”
He places the drill in my hands, and it’s even heavier than it looks. “Take it.” He grins. “Maybe the insurance is for me, not you.”
