Brendan did come back . . . the next day, with Fox, Sanders, and a man named Deke in tow. The four of them hauled the tree out through the front of the bar, and with an indecipherable look in Piper’s direction, Brendan promptly left again.
Bright and early on Monday morning, he was back. Just strolled in like not a moment had passed since his last dramatic exit, this time with a toolbox.
Piper and Hannah, who were in the process of prying sheetrock off the perfectly good brick wall, glanced through the front door to see a pickup truck loaded with lumber. One trip at a time, Brendan brought the wood through the bar to the back patio, along with a table saw, while Piper and Hannah observed him with their heads on a swivel, as if watching a tennis match.
“Wait, I think . . .” Hannah whispered. “I think he’s building you that freaking pergola.”
“You mean us?” Piper whispered back.
“No. I mean you.”
“That’s crazy. If he liked me, why wouldn’t he just ask me out?”
They traded a mystified look.
Hannah sucked in a breath. “Do you think he’s, like, courting you?”
Piper laughed. “What? No.” She had to press a hand to her abdomen to keep a weird, gooey sensation at bay. “Okay, but if he is, what if it’s working?”
“Is it?”
“I don’t know. No one’s ever built me anything!” They hopped back as Brendan stomped through the bar again, long wooden boards balanced on his wide shoulder. When he set the lumber down, he grabbed the rear neck of his sweatshirt and stripped it off, bringing the T-shirt underneath along with it, and sweet mother of God, Piper only caught a hint of a deep groove over his hip and a slice of packed stomach muscles before the shirt fell back into place, but it was enough to make her clench where it counted. “Oh yeah,” Piper said throatily. “It’s working.” She sighed. “Shit.”
“Why ‘shit’?” Hannah gave her a knowing smirk. “Because Mom made that ominous warning about fishermen?” She made a spooky woo-woo sound. “It’s not like you’d let it get serious. You’d keep it casual.”
Yes. She would.
But would Brendan?
Builds a Pergola Guy didn’t seem like the casual type. And his lack of a wedding ring was almost more a presence than the actual ring had been. Every time their eyes met, a hot shiver roared down her spine, because there was a promise there, but also . . . patience. Maturity.
Had she ever dated a real man before? Or had they all been boys?
* * *
It was Wednesday afternoon during their lunch break. Brendan, Deke, Fox, and Sanders ate sandwiches from paper wrappers, while Hannah and Piper mostly listened to the crew pitch theories about their upcoming crabbing haul—and that’s when it hit Piper.
She pulled out her phone just to be sure, blowing sawdust off the screen.
And decided the oversight couldn’t stand for another moment.
“Brendan,” she called, during a break in the crab conversation. “You still haven’t posted your first picture on Instagram.”
His sandwich paused halfway to his mouth. “That’s not required, is it?”
Fox gave her an exaggerated nod behind the captain’s back, urging her to lie. “It’s totally required. They’ll delete your account otherwise.” She studied her phone, pretending to scroll. “I’m shocked they haven’t already.”
“Can’t look at pictures if your account is gone, boss,” Deke said, so nonchalantly Piper could only imagine how accustomed these guys were to pranking each other. “Just saying.”
Brendan flicked a look at Piper. If she wasn’t mistaken, being called out for stalking her Instagram account had turned the very tips of his ears a little red. “I can put up a picture of anything, right? Even this sandwich?”
How far could they take this without him calling bullshit? Already it was an unspoken game. Get the captain to post a picture on the internet by any means necessary. “Has to be your face the first time,” Hannah chimed in, scrubbing at the hair beneath her baseball cap. “You know, facial recognition technology.”
“Yup.” Sanders pointed his sandwich at Hannah. “What she said.”
“The light is perfect right now.” Piper stood and crossed the floor of No Name toward Brendan, wiggling her phone in the air. “Come on, I can pose you.”
“Pose me?” He tugged on his beanie. “Uh-uh.”
“Just give in. We all do it, man,” Sanders said. “You know those engagement photos I took last year? Two hours of posing. On a goddamn horse.”
“See? You only have to pose with a sawhorse.” Piper put a hand on Brendan’s melon-sized bicep and squeezed, loosing an unmistakable flutter in her belly. “It’ll be fun.”
“Maybe we don’t have the same idea of fun,” he said dubiously.
“No?” Aware she was playing with fire but unable to stop herself, Piper leaned down and murmured in his ear, “I can think of a few fun things we’d both enjoy.”