The Perfect Hope Part 28

She stood for a beat, as he did, then unlocked the door to J&R and disappeared inside.

"Must have someone coming in," Beckett commented.

"Huh?"

"Caught ya looking."

Ryder picked up a fresh mask. "No law against it."

"Not yet. Why don't you ask her out?"

"Why don't you put that shovel to work?"

"A little dinner, some conversation. h.e.l.l, she baked you a pie."

"You had as much of it as I did. You take her to dinner and talk to her."

"I have. Or Clare and I've had her over. You need a buffer, bro? We can have the two of you over, smooth the way."

"Blow me," Ryder suggested, and hacked away.

IT DIDN'T HURT to look, Hope told herself. She went inside, unlocked Eve and Roarke. There she could open the blinds, just enough to see through, and across to the roof. Or what she imagined was left of it.

She'd had no idea how they'd intended to remove it. It seemed to involve a lot of sharp-bladed shovels, heavy bars, and some sort of saw. Along with a great deal of noise.

She imagined it miserable work, but it provided her with an interesting perspective.

Most of the men had stripped off their s.h.i.+rts. She hoped they'd made liberal and repeated use of sunscreen or they'd be hurting tonight.

She debated with herself a moment, thought, what the h.e.l.l?

She hurried up to her apartment, grabbed her opera gla.s.ses, and jogged down again.

Definitely miserable work, she concluded as she brought that perspective close through the gla.s.ses. And oh my, my, the man was seriously built.

She'd seen it, when he had a s.h.i.+rt on, felt it the few times she'd been pressed against him. But ... there was nothing quite like a full-on view of a sweaty man with muscles rippling.

No woman alive could deny a little buzz, even if the sweaty, ripplymuscle sort wasn't her usual type.

She saw him glance over, pull down the mask to call out something to one of the other men. He had a d.a.m.n good face, too-a little scruffy and unshaven over those strong bones, but d.a.m.n good. And when he laughed, as he did now, another buzz zipped along inside her.

She made a little humming sound.

"Hope? I wasn't sure what you wanted to do with ..."

Hope turned. She nearly whipped the opera gla.s.ses behind her back, but she wasn't quite that bad off. Instead she grinned, maybe a little sheepishly, as Carolee stopped at the door.

"I'm spying on the neighbors."

"Really?" Wiggling her eyebrows, Carolee walked over. "What's-Oh, the roof. G.o.d, they have to be hot and sweaty and-" She broke off, laughed. "And that's the whole point. Let me have a look."

She took the gla.s.ses, peered out through the slats of the blinds. "They are pretty, aren't they? I only see two of the boys-Justine's boys. Owen must've figured a way out. Horrible work. We should make them some lemonade."

"Oh, well, I don't know if-"

"Absolutely." Beaming, Carolee handed the gla.s.ses back to Hope. "We'll fill a couple of coolers, an ice bucket, take some plastic gla.s.ses. We have that folding table downstairs. It's a good deed."

"And I should pay for the show?"

Carolee gave her a little pat. "I wouldn't say that. Come on, it won't take much time. We've got a couple hours before check-in."

She couldn't say no to Carolee, especially since she'd been caught ogling the woman's nephew. So together they made vats of lemonade. They carted out the folding table, coolers, ice, cups. Carolee called one of the men by name, hailed him over. That started a rotation of men from the roof, from inside.

She got a lot of "thanks, Hope," or in a few cases "Miss Hope."

"You're a lifesaver." Beckett downed a cup, winked at his aunt.

"You be careful up there."

"You bet. We're almost done. We're cutting through to the d.a.m.n rubber now. Your timing's good. We're going to break for lunch, finish it up after."

"Sweep that area over there for nails," Ryder ordered someone, then grabbed a cup, gulped down the contents. "Thanks."

"I'm going to call in the lunch order," Beckett announced, and stepped away with his phone.

"Here, Ryder, have another. Your mama's coming by later."

"What for?"

"Because I told her you were tearing off that roof, and she wants to see. I'm going to make another batch so y'all can have more with lunch."

"And she's going to want to see the restaurant, and the bakery," Ryder muttered. "Where the h.e.l.l is Owen?"

"Here." Hope poured him another cup herself. "Cool off."

"There isn't enough lemonade in the world." But he drank it. "We'll have gotten that b.i.t.c.h off before it gets too hot, so that's something."

Hearing his master's voice, D.A. wandered out, rubbed up against Ryder's legs. Hope took a dog biscuit out of her pocket.

"He's going to start expecting a cookie every time he sees you."

"You got lemonade."

"He hasn't been ripping off a tar-and-gravel roof and sweating off ten pounds."