Chapter 11

• Beau had been swingin’ a hammer in the sun for damn near three hours, sweat tricklin’ down his spine like hot syrup, shirt long since peeled off and tossed over a fence post. The old bakery’s busted porch steps were halfway torn out, scraps of dry wood piled in a crooked heap near his boots. Every swing of the crowbar just fed that restless thing rattlin’ behind his ribs — the part that said touch her, taste her, ruin every promise you ever made.
• He didn’t hear her at first — just the soft squeak of the screen door behind him, then the scuff of her bare feet across the dusty floorboards.
• She smelled him before he saw her — that faint curl of sweat, sun, and splinters. She always said he smelled like summer storms and woodsmoke when he worked shirtless. He’d laughed it off once. Now the thought made his jaw clench tight.