Page 17 of Grin and Bear It

“Ah, yeah. It came off at force and my head was in the way.”

“And you didn’t think to get it looked at?” He bent his head closer, studying the cut. God, why did I want to stay the focus of his gaze forever? Uncle, I reminded myself harshly, he is the boys’ uncle. “What if you had a concussion or something?”

“I’m… I’m fine, seriously.” My hands were all fluttery, needing to go somewhere, do something, but I couldn’t decide what. Instead I just took a half step backwards, despite not wanting the space to widen between us, and his hands fell away. “And I shouldn’t be bothering you—”

“I asked.” He stated that bluntly, softening his words with a slight smile. “I wouldn’t if I didn’t care…” His voice trailed away, as he seemed to consider what he was saying, and he shook his head. “Alright, I’m gonna take a look at the shower head, probably replace it outright for tonight and see if we need to do something more systemic tomorrow.” He picked up his tool box and walked over to the scene of this morning’s crime against my forehead.

“Tomorrow?” I blinked, then shook my head in denial. “Oh, I couldn’t impose on you like that.”

“You will if you want the job done right and don’t want some old prick coming into your house, seeing a couple of young women as a nice mark to overcharge.” He said this in an offhand way as he stood under the shower, inspecting the plumbing that was still attached to the wall, before grabbing a wrench to unscrew the fitting from the wall “Yeah, I’ll need to rethread this pipe.” He tapped at the copper pipe protruding from the wall. “The pressure over time has worn it off and that’s what caused it to hit you in the head.”

Then he leaned down and opened both sides of his tool box, squatting down beside it as he rummaged through the contents.

That shouldn’t have been hot, right? Big, burly guy like him just doing his job, doing a favour for me. But I was mesmerised by how the flannelette shirt he was wearing was rolled up above his forearms and I could see every muscle popped as he moved tools around, looking for what he wanted. Powerful thighs strained the seams of worn jeans, his whole weight resting on the tips of toes encased in work boots. Nash was a million miles away from Derek’s slick attire at Diablos, but there was no contest as to who was hotter.

I was staring, and what made it worse was that Nash knew. He shot me a quick sidelong look, a small note of question in his eyes, but then he put his hand on the tool he’d been looking for and his attention was back on the task at hand. He got to his feet while I took another step back as I was reminded of just how fucking tall he was. Then he walked over to the pipe and started working.

I forced myself into action, because it was either that or I’d just stand there staring all night at the way his muscles flexed as he did his thing. I moved around and collected up all the wet towels, shuddering slightly at the cold, clammy feel of the fabric against my skin, then I bundled them up and walked out of the bathroom. I felt like I couldn’t take a full breath until I was out of his vicinity. One long sigh later, I dumped the towels outside the laundry door, then turned back towards the kitchen to grab the mop so I could start working on the pools of water on the floor.

“Shit!”

Nash stepped out into the hallway while I was mid-stride and it was only quick reflexes on his part that stopped us from colliding. My hands landed on those thick corded forearms, there and then snatched back, but I could still feel their breadth, the prickle of his arm hair on my palms. He kept hold of my shoulders where he’d grabbed me on impact, steadying me until he was sure I was okay.

“Sorry,” I yelped. “I was just—”

“The shower’s—” He said at the same time. We both laughed. “I’ve just gotta grab a new shower head from my ute. I’ll be back in a sec,” he told me.

I nodded, watching him turn and go. My fingers rubbed my breastbone idly as I felt some god-awful wrench in my chest, and I frowned, trying to work out what was causing it. Given I’d had a liquid dinner, it was probably heartburn, so I shook my head and forced myself to go and grab the mop.

I remembered that I couldn’t mop up in the laundry yet, remembering his advice about turning the power off first, so I went into the bathroom, and was running the mop over the damp tiles there as he re-entered. He frowned when he saw me at work and set the replacement part down on the sink before walking over to me.

“Let me.”

“What?” I stared up at him. “I’m just cleaning the floors up while you get the shower head done.” I wrinkled my nose. “It smells a bit dank in here.”

Trouble is, it always did, I was always trying to mask the smell with bleach.

“You’ve had a rough day and you don’t need to be mopping floors,” he told me, that same rich, deeper tone coming into his voice, as he’d used when he’d spoken to me on the phone washing over me.

But I couldn’t let that happen. He was the foster dad of two of my students and… I gulped then, thinking about how June would be framing what was happening here.

“I’m fine—” I started to say, plastering on a smile.

“You’re not.” People didn’t look at others like the way Nash did me just then, like they could see all the pain inside me and he wouldn’t flinch for a second. We were all so caught up in our own aches, we couldn’t afford to take on anyone else’s, so we avoided it like the plague. But Nash’s hand wrapped around the mop handle, just above mine and he gently pulled it free from my grip and set it aside. “Look, I’m gonna make this weirder than it needs to be.”

“Weirder than me ringing the wrong person and spilling my guts to them before they’ve had a chance to speak?” I asked wryly.

“Much weirder,” he promised, still so solemn. “You know what happened to my brother and his wife.” His brother had to be one of the husbands, I assumed, that had died in a freak accident while they were on holiday. I nodded slowly. “So I haven’t left the house since that happened.”

“What?” I peered up at him, studying his face, waiting for the punchline that surely had to come.

“I’ve been fucked up.” A small smile, a desolate one, formed on his lips. “A fucking mess since the accident. If you’re dealing with some issues with the boys? Well, fuck, that’s on me, so just let me do this for you. I need to, Ellie. I need… to do something productive, to do something useful, because this is the best I’ve fucking felt in months. Seriously, you’d be doing me a favour.”

It felt like something reached inside my chest and squeezed my heart, taking my breath away.

“I’m sorry—”

“Don’t be.” The smile was more genuine as he shook his head. “Just… let me fix your shower and your laundry. I’ll mop up, make sure everything is nice and clean when I’m done. It’ll go some way to making me feel less guilty about…” He shrugged. “About all the shit that’s gone on.”

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