Chapter Sixteen

Owen stayed close to his phone, waiting for a response from Rose after her meeting ended. He turned the ringer on so he’d hear it. Then added the vibration, too, so he wouldn’t miss the ringtone when he was using the saws.

But his phone stayed quiet.

He hoped she wasn’t in trouble for texting with him. And he really hoped she wasn’t off with some asshole bigwigs plotting the demise of Crowley & Sons.

Especially not some asshole bigwig she’d once been engaged to. Shit. Thinking about Jason made Owen go all hot and cold from head to toe. At least he no longer had a raging hard-on.

He needed to stay focused now more than ever, which meant keeping his mind clear and his work on track. He was almost done with the last commission. And there was more good news coming his way. The couple had swung by to check out his progress and were thrilled with what they saw. So thrilled that they’d told their friends…who’d called him to set up a consultation.

Spending hours daydreaming about the crinkle around Rose’s eyes when she smiled wasn’t going to change his priorities. When he finally put down his tools and went upstairs to check on his dad, his hand was cramped and his fingers sore—not from furiously jerking off like he’d wanted to all afternoon, but from getting things done.

“How’s it going down there?” his dad asked as he closed the workshop door.

“Okay, I think? It’s slow going.”

“Anything worth doing takes time.”

“Too bad time doesn’t pay our property taxes.” Owen opened the fridge.

His dad gave a small, rueful laugh. “But you’ve got work coming in now, and that does. This commission, and then the next one. Get one after that, and we’ll—”

The intercom buzzed. Perfect timing. Just thinking about all the “ifs” in his father’s vision for the future was making his palms itch. If the new commission went through. If there was another one after that. If this all didn’t fall apart in a matter of months.

If the woman he was sleeping with didn’t help drive away the last of his business altogether.

“You expecting anyone?” Owen asked.

Hank shook his head. “A package for you?”

But Owen hadn’t ordered anything. It was probably a wrong number, a delivery for somebody else. He pressed the intercom. “Hello?”

“Why, hello. Is this Owen Crowley of Crowley & Sons?”

Even through the garbled intercom, he could tell the voice coming from the sidewalk was chipper and cheerful. And decidedly feminine.

“Rose?” he asked uncertainly. His stomach somersaulted, and he glanced at his father, who raised an eyebrow in response.

“Oh, good. You’re home.” Her voice switched from her joking, official tone back to her usual self.

“Yeah?” Usually Owen liked living with his father. It was affordable, he didn’t have to worry about his dad being alone, and since he had so little free time anyway, it didn’t matter that they were packed in like sardines.

But in that moment, he would have given anything to not have his dad standing right beside him, listening in on every word.

“What are you waiting for?” Hank asked, a bemused glint in his eye. “Invite her up.”

“I’ll be right down,” Owen said instead and shot his dad a look.

“Is this the woman you’ve been seeing all these nights?” Hank asked as soon as Owen took his finger off the intercom.

“Who said anything about a woman?”

His father laughed. “I know you think I just fell off the turnip truck…”

Owen rolled his eyes like he was a teenager again. “Just stay here and don’t be nosy,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

He grabbed his keys, laced his boots, and went downstairs. When he opened the front door to the building, Rose was sitting on the steps with a large pizza box resting beside her and a paper bag shaped suspiciously like it was holding a bottle of wine.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

She stood up. “I Googled you and found the address for the shop. And since I knew you lived above it…” She raised her palms skyward, as if to say, What could I do?

He twirled his keys around his finger. “I thought maybe I’d scared you off when I didn’t hear back from you this afternoon.”

She grinned, a sweet, naughty Cheshire cat grin that seemed to reveal everything and hide it all at once. “I had work.” She paused, and the grin shifted into something far less wholesome. “But now I don’t.”

He wasn’t sure which he liked better—Rose in her put-together work clothes, so that he got to peel away her perfect exterior piece by piece until he wound up at the warm, wet center of her, or this Rose, in dark jeans, slip-on shoes, and a striped shirt that hugged her curves like it was made to hold her.

“I wasn’t expecting you to just…show up,” he said, trying to remind himself there were a lot of things seen as acceptable on the streets of New York City, but running his hands all over Rose’s incredible body right this second probably wasn’t one of them.

Her eyes flashed with something positively wicked. “Two can play this game.”

He groaned. “I guess I deserved that.”

“You don’t think I can give as good as I get?”

“Oh, I know you can. It’s just—” His eyes glanced up at the second-floor window.

“Your dad?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Good thing I brought enough pizza for three of us,” she said. “Plus wine. I don’t know what he likes, but I got another red.”

She passed him the paper bag, and he pulled out the bottle as though he really gave a shit about the label. She was going to torture him, wasn’t she? As payback for the times he’d shown up unannounced at her place. And tied her down. And made her wait, and wait, and wait. She was going to sashay past him, checking him with her hip like the fucking pizza and booze delivery queen, and act like she hadn’t just gotten him all hot and bothered right there on his very steps, out in public, for all the world to see.

He’d created a monster. But there was no way he was going to turn her away.

It wasn’t like showing her where he lived would give her any dirt to help CUBE, right? Even if it did…he had bigger concerns right now.

She was actually. Meeting. His father.

He hadn’t brought a girl home since…he tried to think. Twelfth grade, before skipping prom? No, he’d gone to the girl’s house—not dressed up, obviously—and they’d hightailed it out of there. Had he ever brought someone home to meet his family?

But he couldn’t start freaking out over what a big deal it was. Because it was already happening, whether he liked it or not.

And maybe it wasn’t a big deal. With the way Rose was shaking his father’s hand, putting down the pizza box, and acting all chummy with Hank, it was hard to look at the kitchen and declare that the world was exploding because of these two people laughing like they’d known each other for years.

“So you’re the one who’s been eating up all of Owen’s free time,” Hank said, getting down plates as Rose poured the wine.

Rose glanced at Owen. “Uh, oh. Am I in trouble?”

Hank snorted. “I should be sending you flowers to say thank you for getting this kid out of the workshop.”

“Okay.” Owen swept in quickly, ushering them to all take a seat. “As much fun as this is—”

“So I don’t need to worry about all his other dates?” Rose interrupted. She winked at Owen.

Screw. You, he mouthed when his dad wasn’t looking.

Hank roared with laughter. “Dates? I tried to get Owen to see a movie once. In 1999, it probably was.”

“Well, we’ve been having plenty of fun, so you don’t have to worry.”

Owen thought he was going to drop dead on the spot when she said it. But this was Rose, and she said it so primly, so perfectly, that there was nothing untoward about it at all. It sounded like she meant they’d been getting milkshakes and occasionally holding hands.

Only Owen caught the devilish wink she gave him when Hank’s back was turned. Jesus Christ, there was a reason he tried to keep his personal life far away from home and work. This woman was going to be his undoing.

But he had to at least pretend to keep it together as they all sat down and dove into the dinner Rose had brought. She seamlessly carried the conversation along even as Owen kept scrambling to come up with something not completely asinine to say.

“Wait—so he actually stole the teacher’s textbook?” Rose was practically howling with laughter as Hank launched into one of his eighteen thousand completely unflattering stories about Owen as a teenager.

“He had a test question marked wrong that he knew was correct.”

“So you stole the textbook,” she repeated, turning to Owen for confirmation.

He shrugged. “If she thought she knew everything…”

“Oh my God, you were such a jerk.” She covered her mouth with her hand, laughing.

“Thank you,” Hank said, tossing up his hands. “You can see what I had to put up with.”

“Hey! You knew I was right,” Owen said.

“I thought you were going to get expelled.” His dad shook his head at the memories. It certainly hadn’t been funny at the time. He’d thought his dad was going to bite his head off when he found out what Owen had done.

“What happened?” Rose asked.

“Suspended,” Owen grumbled. “I should have been so lucky to get kicked out.”

“Something tells me your parents didn’t have to field quite as many calls from the principal’s office,” Hank said to Rose, shaking his head.

Rose gave a tight smile. Owen knew what it meant.

“None,” he guessed. “There’s no way you got in trouble.”

“Once,” Rose said. “I was standing three blocks away from the school when this girl I barely knew gave me her lit cigarette to hold while she looked for something in her backpack. My English teacher happened to drive by right then and held me after class to give me an earful about throwing my future away.”

Owen put down his fork. “Over a cigarette?”

“I cried in her classroom. I was afraid she was going to tell my mom.”

He nodded sagely. “One puff, and the next thing you know, you’re freebasing in the bathroom before Geometry.”

“I didn’t even smoke it!”

“Of course you didn’t,” he teased. God, she was so good. So, so good.

And funny, and kind, and sweet, and thoughtful, cutting a slice of pizza in half because his dad only wanted a little bit more. She wouldn’t even have talked to him if they’d gone to school together.

Hell, she wouldn’t have talked to him now if she hadn’t walked in on him. And if he hadn’t literally broken her bed.

The reminder of how random this was—how this was not meant to be—made him have to put his wineglass down.

“You okay?” Rose asked, glancing over.

He coughed a little. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m good.”

Rose had always grown up expecting to do the right thing. Graduate, get a steady job, work in a cubicle for a company to pay the bills. Even if she didn’t love it. Marry the right man. Even if he, too, wasn’t who she loved.

He wondered if she felt differently about any of that now. If she was ready to bend the rules a little…or a lot.

“Has Owen showed you the shop yet?” Hank’s question jerked Owen out of his thoughts.

Rose shook her head. “He hasn’t.”

“Forgive my son’s manners,” Hank said. “You’d think I’d have raised him better than that.”

“You know I’m sitting right here,” Owen said.

Rose laughed. “Where’s my tour? I’ve heard all about his work, but he hasn’t shown me anything.”

“I’ll take care of cleanup,” Hank said before Owen could use that as the obvious excuse. “You kids head downstairs.”

“We really don’t have to—” he started, but Rose was already pushing back her chair.

“He’s afraid I might steal his trade secrets.” She said it to Hank, as though teasing. But her eyes on Owen were full of meaning. I won’t, they said. You can trust me.

He gave a small nod.

But he was still nervous. Not only about that.

But he was showing her his space. His life. Everything that mattered to him.

“Did he tell you about the new commission?” Hank asked.

“No.” Rose whirled on him. “But he’s about to.”

Owen took a deep breath. “Remind me to never let you two meet again,” he said as he opened the door to lead her downstairs.

“Is it the bedroom set you’ve been working on?” she asked.

“It’s a new one,” Hank called out as they started down the stairs. “Tell her how you drummed it up.”

“That’s enough, Dad!” Owen called back and closed the door behind him.

He loved his father plenty but thank everything they were finally going to be alone.