Because I was an idiot. That seemed like the only reasonable explanation. I’d learned time and time again that relationships and I did not work out. I was apparently a picky bastard, and I was tired of wasting time putting people through a series of tests I knew they couldn’t hope to pass.

  “Thought so,” Peter said. He had walked up beside me at the window and followed my gaze. “I’ve never seen a bird quite like that.”

  “Yeah, me either,” I said distractedly.

  Peter laughed. “Damn. Is it that serious?”

  “Hardly. Just looking.”

  Peter punched my arm. “In all seriousness, I think a woman would be good for you. This whole thing you’ve been unofficially doing isn’t natural.”

  “I don’t know what thing you’re talking about.”

  “You haven’t admitted it, but it’s pretty obvious. I haven’t seen you flirt with or so much as look twice at an attractive woman since… what was her name?”

  I sighed. Peter and I usually had a kind of understanding. I didn’t ask him uncomfortable questions, and he didn’t ask me any. So why was he trying to dig through my dirty laundry? “Is this why you really came here? Like some kind of intervention?”

  “You really do have a talent for seeing straight through people. I have to admit, I’m envious of it. Sometimes I feel like I can’t even tell if I know what Violet is thinking when she comes out and tells me herself.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s a mixed blessing. Sometimes you’d rather not know what people are really thinking.”

  “Is that it? Women are hurting your feelings?”

  I laughed. “No. I wanted to uncomplicate my life. Women were a pretty big complication.”

  He gave me a skeptical look. “And how long do you plan on living the simple life, exactly?”

  “Is there a magical answer I can give here to end the interrogation?” I walked away from him to the barbell and yanked it up again.

  Once I was done, Peter was still watching me. The bastard wasn’t going to give it up.

  “I got tired of looking for something I was never going to find, okay?” I snapped.

  “Elaborate.”

  “Fuck you. How’s that?”

  Peter smiled. “It’s good, probably. It sounds like somebody has a lot of pent up anger. Anything else you want to get off your chest?”

  “Those new sunglasses you got a few months ago? They make you look like a douchebag.”

  Peter frowned. “Okay, that was more personal than I was expecting. It’s also hurtful.”

  I couldn’t help smirking. “Good.”

  Peter gestured toward the window. “You could go talk to her. Finding the right person isn’t supposed to be easy. Maybe it’ll take you five more years or fifty, but you sure as hell aren’t going to find her by glaring out a window and slamming heavy weights against the ground.”

  “If I talk to her, will you leave me alone about it?”

  “Probably not. I’ve got a wife now and a stepdaughter. Maybe I’m starting to realize my job as your brother is more than just writing books and letting you take your agent’s cut out of my big ass royalty checks.” He reached out and squeezed my shoulder with a rare, empathetic look on his face. “I wouldn’t mind seeing my brother happy again. That’s all.”

  3

  NELL

  We arrived at the house before the sun rose. Even in the darkness of early morning, it was clearly the home of somebody who was incredibly wealthy. We had been let in through an ornate gate, driven up a winding, perfectly manicured path, and ended up in front of a classical style mansion. It was impossible to look at the place and not imagine being transported back to some Gatsby-era world, where well-dressed men and women in huge, stiff dresses wore travel hats and spent their evenings dancing outside on crisp, cool grass.

  The only slight bummer was that my uniform made it hard to enjoy the daydream. In my little fantasy, I wouldn’t be wearing a loose-fitting jumpsuit with a “Gardening Gnome” logo on the front, complete with a picture of a winking gnome who was flashing a chubby-fingered thumbs up.

  I could also see why it was going to take an entire team of gardeners to work the property. It sat on top of a softly sloping hill, which gave an unhindered view of what had to be acres of land. There were never-ending rows of lush, green bushes, flowers of every variety, statues, and even several huge hedges that I imagined were going to become my canvas soon.

  Davey did the egg-cracking move on my head this time. “You okay in there? They’re just plants. And the client is just a mega-millionaire who could ruin all of our lives.” He added the last with a touch of sarcasm, but I wasn’t entirely convinced he was kidding. Just beneath the humor, I knew he was nervous. For both of us.

  “Try to loosen up,” Davey said. “If you go sculpting bushes all tight like that, you’ll end up making the world’s biggest, greenest penis or something.”

  I laughed. “For somebody who claims to be straight, you always seem to bring conversations around to penises.”

  “I can admire the hardware without wanting to put it in my mouth.”

  I squinted at him. “I don’t even know what to say to that.”

  The driver of the van got out and opened the double doors at the back. The men we rode with all grabbed their tools and hopped out of the van to set off in different directions across the property.

  Davey pointed to a row of hedges that must’ve been a hundred yards long. “Just square up that row of hedges until the client comes and tells us what he wants done with the big centerpiece bushes, okay?”

  “He’ll come out himself?”

  “He’s not a vampire. He’s just a rich guy. So, yeah, he usually comes out himself.”

  I started working on the hedges but couldn’t shake the silly image of a vampire dwelling inside the huge house. I imagined the prototypical Victorian-era hunk, and then I blasted him with a heavy dose of vampire, stylish hair and clothes, and then a vampire-worthy bulge between his legs.

  Once I was satisfied with my mental image, I let the fantasy play out. He’d emerge from his coffin and find me trimming his bushes. I grinned a little at that because I was about as mature as a seven-year-old sometimes. He would recognize me as the down-trodden treasure I was—sarcasm included—and my vampire man would decide I was far too precious to be outside doing manual labor. He’d sweep me out of the disappointment my life was quickly turning into. He’d also be nothing like he-who-shall-not-be-named, my ex. I was enjoying the daydream, and my stupid ex wasn’t going to ruin it.

  I’d like to say my fantasy took several girly, very wholesome turns past that point, like finding love and happiness. Instead, it just got pervy, and I explored the many ways a vampire’s superhuman strength and speed would be fun in the bedroom.

  “Does it always take you this long to trim a bush?” a man asked from behind me. From the tone of his voice, he was far from pleased.

  I had a bad habit of getting lost in my head, as in, really lost. A quick glance at the sky told me I’d been zoning out for at least an hour if the rising sun was any indication.

  I looked at the bush I’d been working on. I could vaguely remember trimming it one leaf at a time to get the edge absolutely straight. The one or two feet worth of bush I’d managed to trim did look good, but at this speed, it would take days to finish the job.

  “Sorry,” I said. “It’s my first day. I like to really get to…” I trailed off when I turned around and saw who I was talking to. I’d been expecting one of the guys from the truck. Instead, I thought I saw my vampire. He was missing the silly details I’d tacked on, but the base model was there. He was the kind of hot guy you could play dress up with in your head for hours and never find a combination that didn’t work. Breathtaking. Belly clenching. I could practically feel my ovaries start to rumble like two old, unused machines purring to life.

  Calm down, old girls. If my life were a racecar, it would be scraped across the wall of the track, burping out black smoke, and about to erupt in flames. The last thing I needed to think about was hitting the gas and trying to take another lap.

  Still, my hormones didn't seem to care about any of that. My not-a-vampire was wearing a button-down shirt in the way hot guys seemed to have a patent on—a single button undone to give just a tantalizing hint of his chest. And if forearms were the male equivalent of cleavage, this guy's rolled-up sleeves were like cleavage to drool over. No sleavage, and yes, sleavage is a thing. Note to self: coin the term, “sleavage” later and make millions.

  I tried to move my eyes around until I found some part of him I could look at without feeling like I was gawking. I eventually settled on a spot a few inches above the top of his head, because even his ears were hot.

  “Hi,” I said. Look casual. Collected. Act like the little people inside your head aren’t running around in a panic while alarms are blaring. I decided to go for the lean move. People always looked more comfortable and confident when they leaned on something. Unfortunately, the something I decided to lean my elbow on was a bush.

  My elbow sank right into the bush, and the rest of me followed closely behind. In a scratchy, confusing second, I was completely horizontal. I’d fallen through in a way that made it look like someone had shot me from a bow and arrow, but only my head made it through to the other side. The rest of my body, except my feet, was completely jammed into the thing.

  I could hear muffled laughter from the other side.

  “You know,” I said loudly enough that I hoped he could hear me. “Maybe you should just push my legs all the way through. I’ll run away, and we can both pretend this never happened.”

  The bush shuddered, and I felt strong hands take me gently by the shoulders and pull me back through. It was a little bit of a scratchy trip, but I was back on my feet a few seconds later.

  “Or that,” I said. I cleared my throat. Despite my best efforts, I looked up at his face again.

  His eyes were practically twinkling. They were a mesmerizing shade of brown. Light with little flecks of gold that caught the rising sunlight and shot it back at me. “In one hour, you’ve managed to trim about twenty leaves and put a gaping hole in one of my hedges. Remind me why I’m paying you?” he asked.

  I opened my mouth and couldn’t think of any real grounds to disagree with him. “That’s an unfortunately accurate summary. I promise I’m a fast learner.”

  “I see. And you’re the one who is supposed to be creating the centerpiece sculptures, too?”

  “Yes?”

  He let out a breath. Was that an annoyed breath, or just the kind of breath you used to flush the carbon dioxide from your system? God, he was terrifyingly handsome, too. One moment, he looked approachable and kind. The next, the heat in his eyes made me want to dive back into the bush and hide.

  “Well,” he said. “I guess there are worse first impressions than shoving your head into my bush. Probably, at least.”

  I felt my composure threatening to crack. His face was completely straight, but I could’ve sworn he was teasing me. I also had to remember this was almost surely the rich guy. The one who owned everything I was looking at and the one who could end my budding career as a bush sculptor before it started.

  “It was a joke,” he said. “You can laugh.”

  Unfortunately, all my nerves bubbled out in a shrill cackle.

  His eyebrows crept up.

  I swallowed hard, then laughed again, more normally this time. I couldn’t help shaking my head at myself when I replayed the last few seconds and thought about how crazy I must already seem.

  I expected him to be cringing back from me, but he was just watching me with a thoughtful expression. “You’re sure you’ve done this before?”

  “Yep,” I said through a tight throat. “Trust me, this will not be the first bush I’ve trimmed. Not by a long shot.”

  His lips twitched into a smile. “Is that so?”

  “Plant bush,” I corrected. “You thought I meant—” I forced myself to take a deep breath and slow down. “I’ve done this sort of work before. I was only going so slow because I get very personally invested in doing a good job.”

  "Oh, I'm sure you're very thorough. I always admire somebody willing to throw themselves into their work."

  I bit my lip but still couldn’t help smiling. He had to be doing that on purpose. On the surface, he seemed irritated by me. Just beneath that, I thought I could sense amusement.

  This time, he smirked back, but it wasn’t an entirely easy smirk. It was the kind of expression that said, I’m enjoying this conversation, but I’m also still considering whether I’ll destroy you when it’s finished.

  “Are you okay?” he asked. He was bending his neck down to get a better look at me since he was so damn tall.

  “Totally,” I said quickly. “I was just trying to remember if you already told me your name.”

  “Harry,” he said. “Harry Barnidge.”

  I suppressed the urge to wiggle my eyebrows fancily. It was a very fancy name, and bit by bit, he was fitting into my fantasy. “I’m Nell.”

  “Just Nell?”

  I shrugged. “I mean, I have a last name. It’s just kind of an unfortunate one because my parents had a terrible sense of humor.”

  He waited in complete silence. It only took a few seconds of the building pressure to make me crack.

  “My last name is Snell.”

  Harry tried and failed to hold back a snort of laughter. It was the first time I’d seen him laugh, and the first definitive sign that he was at least a little human. “Nell Snell. That’s unique.”

  “You don’t have to try to be nice about it. Trust me, I know how stupid it is.”

  “Do you plan on marrying someday?”

  It felt like someone grabbed me by the lungs and squeezed. I must have looked as confused as I felt because Harry shook his head.

  “Sorry. I meant because you’d get a new last name. I wasn’t—” He lowered his eyes and smiled. It wasn’t exactly a shy gesture, but it was another dose of human for the man I’d been starting to suspect had a stick up his ass. For that flicker of a moment, I could see there was a regular guy underneath the distracting packaging and the serious eyes.

  “Right,” I said quickly. I was desperate to change the subject, so I glanced toward his house and said the first thing that came to mind. “So, what do you do for a living, if you don’t mind me asking? This is quite the place.”

  “I’m a literary agent. My brother is an author, Peter Barnidge.”

  “Oh, wow. I’ve seen him on TV a few times.”

  “Yeah. It’s a necessary evil.”

  I felt more than a little star struck. Harry was talking about his brother appearing on national TV shows like it was as ordinary as getting a haircut. Coincidentally, my life started to feel aggressively dull by comparison. This was a man from a completely different world than me. Harry had the money and resources to have anything he could possibly want. To go anywhere he wanted. Thinking about it was making my head start to hurt, so I decided to steer the conversation back to my world—to the mundane. “So, they said you’d tell me what you wanted me to sculpt out of those big bushes?”

  “Right.”

  I was surprised to see Harry looked slightly put off by the way I’d changed the subject. It was almost like he had wanted to continue making small talk with me.

  “I was thinking something kind of humorous,” he said. “We’re throwing a release party for a pair of my authors who are known for their thrillers. Their thing is kind of adding in a heavy dose of comedy, though.” Harry stared at one of the bushes and thought for a few moments. “I don’t know, a penguin building a snowman? Just something goofy like that would probably be fitting.”

  I looked at the single, towering structure of the bush I was expected to use as my canvas. I was hoping I’d be asked to sculpt something a little more basic. Like maybe a square?

  “Is that a problem?” Harry asked. “You’ve got this sort of look on your face right now.”

  “Oh, no. You say fall, I’ll say how hard,” I cleared my throat. Jump. The expression was about jumping, not falling. “It’s just that I take my art pretty seriously. I’m trying to visualize the piece right now. You know, feel it. I’ve got to find the energy.” I had to try very hard not to look at Harry. I knew I was neck deep in bullshit and still shoveling, but if he saw my face, he’d know too.

  “I see. Does the penguin idea conflict with your, what was it? Artistic energy? We could make it something else.”

  “It’s fine. It’ll be great.”

  “Well, I’m excited to see what you come up with.”

  Once Harry left, I amended my little fantasy. I couldn’t be the demure damsel who laughed softly and shocked vampire Harry with her wit anymore. Clearly, any wit I might have had dried up and died when I was around him. The only way to continue to enjoy my little ongoing fantasy was to add the fact that I’d suffered some kind of trauma in my youth. Unfortunately, it had left imaginary me completely mute.

  I wanted to curl into a ball and give up on life when I thought back on the conversation I’d had with him. Was I a little odd at times? Yes. Was I as crazy as I must have seemed? No way.

  I decided the only thing I could do to redeem myself was nail this penguin and his snowman. Figuratively speaking, of course. On the other hand, I hadn’t even decided what my true motivations were for wanting to impress Harry. The man might look like he belonged in a pair of pristine white pants and topless on the back of a horse, but I couldn’t quite read him.

  I decided to stop worrying about the guy and focus on the job. At the end of the day, I was just a sculpture. A bush sculpture. How hard could it be?

  4

  HARRY

  I’d always had a thing for boats, even when the nicest one I could afford was rusted through and barely big enough to hold a cooler. More often than not, I missed the days when my brother and I would head out to the lake after school in our shitty little boat to catch some fish. I missed when things were simple—when my biggest concern was how long it was until deer season or how I’d manage to fit in some fishing over the weekend between football games.

 

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