Getting Lucky (The Portland Pioneers Book 2) (19 page)

“I can do that,” Maggie said, trying to find her optimism. She hadn’t realized just how bad of shape this place was in. Maybe Cal had been right. At the very least, she
knew
there was no way Noah was going to be able to do this on his own. Sooner or later—and probably more sooner than later—he was going to need some professional help.

He was going to need Cal, and Maggie was not
looking forward to the moment when that became painfully obvious.

“We’ll run to Home Depot and get some supplies, and I’ll call for the dumpster. Get it here while we’re gone. Okay?” Noah asked, glancing over at her, his eyes so fond that Maggie couldn’t help but wonder when this project had stopped being just
his
and had become
theirs
.

Maybe the moment Noah had looked her in the eye and had told her to throw Tabitha’s email away.

“That sounds good,” Maggie said with a smile that was way bigger than this run-down house with its disgusting carpeting and ugly wallpaper deserved.

Two hours later, Noah pulled up to the curb behind Maggie’s car with his Jeep, the back full of the supplies they’d picked up at Home Depot. “Oh good,” he said, pointing to the dumpster sitting in the driveway, “they were quick about it.”

Maggie barely restrained her eye roll. “You promised to pay them double if they got it here before we got back.”

“Money’s a great motivator,” Noah said with a completely unapologetic grin.

“You’ve got zero shame,” Maggie grumbled.

“Absolutely none, darling.”

They loaded up with bags of supplies to bring inside and when they walked in, Maggie’s stomach roiled at the smell in the living room again. “Better open the front door again,” she called, “and I’ll open the back.”

“Still bad?” Noah asked.

“It’s awful,” Maggie said. “I can’t even imagine you smelling it and still wanting to buy this house.”

He just shrugged as he dropped the bags into the entryway. “I guess I’m used to clubhouses and how bad
they
smell. I didn’t even think twice about it.”

Maggie thought it was interesting how he almost never mentioned baseball, and when he did, he almost hesitated first. As if he wasn’t sure he could handle saying it out loud.

“Are you sure all this hard, physical labor is good for you?” she asked innocently.

“Good for me?”

“Like, with your concussion and everything,” Maggie said, busily pulling out the wallpaper stripping knife and searching through the other bags for the garbage bags they’d bought.

“My concussion happened months ago,” he retorted. “I’ve just got a few residual symptoms. I’m not fucking crippled, Maggie.”

She glanced up at him. “I thought it was worth checking,” she said quietly. “You don’t really talk about it.”

“Talking about it doesn’t change anything,” he admitted.

“You know,” she tried to suggest as casually as she could, “
if
you ever did want to talk about it, I’d be happy to listen.”

Suddenly, his arms were wrapped around her and he was gripping her hard and tight against him. “Thank you for saying that,” he mumbled into her ear. Then he released her, and went back to unpacking the supplies as if he’d never said anything at all.

“I’ll go bring in the ladder,” he said.

“Be careful on that ladder,” Noah warned as Maggie climbed it, settling on the middle step, leaning forward to begin peeling off the wallpaper near the ceiling.

“
Please
, this isn’t even very high,” she retorted.

“Just. . .don’t hurt yourself,” he repeated.

“You’re in danger of sounding like Calvin again,” she insisted and he laughed.

“Best way to get me to stop,
ever.”

“Go pull up your nasty carpet so I can take a deep breath in this room,” Maggie said. “I’ll be fine here.”

She dug the knife under the peeling edge of the paper and pulled back, grimacing at how much worse the smell seemed to get as a long strip of stained wall emerged. “This is just . . .gross,” she called. “Like you owe me so big for this.”

“But you volunteered!” Noah retorted with an adorable lop-sided grin that she caught as she twisted to dump the limp paper into the garbage bag she’d tied to a rung of the ladder.

“Yeah, I was clearly crazy.” She slipped the edge of the knife under another strip and another length went into the garbage bag.

“Crazy about me, maybe,” he said so smugly that she wanted to argue but it was kind of true, so she just turned and shot him a smile.

And he
honest to God
blushed. It was more than a little adorable and not for the first time, Maggie had a hard time picturing this kind of goofy, sweet man and her sister together. Had he really been so very different a few years ago? She had a hard time believing it, but then he seemed different even from the man who’d showed up in town that first night. He’d been so hot and mysterious and charming back then, and he still was
those things, though maybe not quite as mysterious—but he was also this other Noah. The one who laughed and grinned like silly and
blushed
.

Focus Maggie
, she told herself firmly and returned her attention to the wallpaper in front of her. Another strip came off, and this time, Maggie peered a little closer, both grossed out and curious at the same time. There were little bits of almost blue-ish green fuzz on the wall, and she wrinkled her nose at the smell. It had somehow, even with both front and back doors open, become even more rank.

“Hey, come look at this,” she called over, and suddenly he was there behind her, and even though his feet were balancing on the bottom rung of the ladder their heads were at nearly the same height.

“Okay, that’s disgusting,” Noah said and for the first time she saw him actually affected by something they’d found at the house.

“I think it might be mold,” Maggie suggested.

“Mold?” His voice got all high and squeaky and she couldn’t help but giggle helplessly. “That’s a thing? Mold?”

“Totally a thing,” Maggie said, all faux-seriousness. She realized the moment she’d been dreading had come. “You know,” she observed as casually as she could with him hanging all over her on the ladder, his arm warm and solid around her waist, “there’s this kind of mold called black mold and it’s . . .well. . .it’s bad news. Like it makes you really, really sick.”

It was amazing how fast he moved. Like she’d known
he was a baseball player and was good with his reflexes and his muscles and yeah. . .it was tough to ignore those things. But one moment she was on the ladder, and he was practically wrapped around her, and the next, he’d lifted her right off the rung she was standing on and was carrying her through the living room, legs churning. He didn’t set her down until they were through the front door and in the driveway.

He wasn’t even breathing hard, Maggie thought, as she stared at up him. “What the hell are you doing?” she cried.

“You said . . .you said. . .” He gasped out, and since he wasn’t really panting from the exertion, it had to be panic brought on by her last statement. “You said it could make people sick.”

“Yeah, I did say that. It’s true,” Maggie said, both in awe of his concern and determined not to waste this golden opportunity.

“If it’s true. . .” Noah hesitated. “If it’s true, I think you should call Cal.”

Maggie had just been about to suggest this, but she was definitely glad that he’d done it first. She’d primed the pump, so to speak, but it was a potentially tricky situation, full of uncertain ground, because she was just a girl he knew, a girl he’d kissed a handful of times. He’d said she was important, but what did that even mean? Maggie certainly didn’t know, and she wasn’t even certain
he
knew.

“I can do that,” she said. “Are you sure?”

“I’m in over my head. Cleaning up gross wallpaper and ugly carpet is one thing, mold is something else entirely,” he admitted.

So she dialed Cal’s number, and even though she’d never doubted him before, she was almost surprised when he answered. They weren’t fighting, exactly, but Maggie realized it had been at least a week since she’d called him. That in itself was just weird. She really hoped that whatever strange thing was going on between her and Noah and Cal, they’d figure it out soon.

“Maggie,” Cal said and she was relieved to hear none of the strangeness in his voice.

“Hi,” Maggie said. “I think you need to come over to Noah’s house. We have a mold problem.”

“Mold?” Cal asked, suddenly all business.

“I don’t think it’s black mold, but it should get checked out. You know someone, right?” Maggie asked.

“I do,” Cal said.

Maggie glanced up to see Noah motioning for her to hand the phone over. She reluctantly did.

“No, no, it’s okay. I know, it’s a big job. I don’t have a clue how to deal with it.” Noah paused. “Tell him I’ll pay whatever he wants to get here today. I don’t want to wait.”

Sitting down on the concrete curb, Maggie wrapped her arms around her knees, picking at the beginnings of a hole in her jeans, and listened.

“This is just business,” Noah said brusquely. “That doesn’t have a damn thing to do with the house. Besides, she’s her own person, damnit.” He shot an apologetic look Maggie’s direction and she just shrugged. “Then you’ll have to discuss that with her, but right now, I’m trying to talk business. I need my house fixed. You fix houses. I think we should be able to work something out.” Noah paused, and Maggie watched as whatever Cal said made his frown relax into a smile. Then Noah actually laughed at something Cal had said, which was frankly even
more
impressive as Cal’s sense of humor wasn’t one of his strong points. “Okay then. I’ll see you soon.”

Noah hung up and extended Maggie’s phone back to her. “I think we’re good to go,” he said, settling next to her on the curb.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “Well,” he added with a wry smile, “we’re not
good
maybe, but I think it’ll work out.”

“Do I even want to ask?”

“Well, I’m sure you heard how I ordered him off my property,” Noah said with a sigh and Maggie nodded. “Mostly that was because he came sauntering onto it being a massive blowhard, warning me off you. As if he had some kind of control over you. And that frankly pissed me off. I’d asked him to come look at my house and help to remodel it, not to get a lecture on a woman I was interested in.”

That was definitely a surge of pure, pure annoyance Maggie felt. How dare
Cal warn anyone away from her? Especially someone who’d never done a single damn thing to deserve his distrust? Oh, they were going to have a really,
really
unpleasant conversation. Later.

“I’d apologize for him,” Maggie said through gritted teeth, “but I’m not going to.”

“You shouldn’t have to. He’ll need to apologize for that himself.” Noah paused and gave her lopsided smile that twisted the corners of his mouth up in the most adorable way. “Someday.”

“I really don’t know what his problem is,” Maggie confessed. “This whole thing is so unlike him.”

“Are you
really
sure he’s not . . .” Noah stuttered, “. . .you know. . .in love with you or something?”