I limped to the door and grasped the handle. “I’ll let you know how dinner with Halla Hottie goes.”
She pointed at me and winked as I swung out the door to the sound of her laughter.
Four
I pounded a post marker into the ground at the front of the driveway. I had done the same at the back of the property before I started pulling the wooden planks out of the packed soil. I was shocked when most of them came out with little effort from me. Only two or three planks were anchoring it in the ground, and the rest were rotted beyond help. I was honestly surprised it hadn’t fallen over in a strong breeze.
I rolled the fence up and dropped it in my backyard, before heading back to Amber’s yard to fill in the holes. I wanted to have most of the work done before dinner, so I could focus on her. If I were lucky, I’d have time for a shower before she started dinner. I knew she was home since her car was in the driveway, and I noticed her moving around inside her apartment, but I decided not to be pushy. She’d come out when she was ready to face me after what happened the other night. I could see how embarrassed she was, and she was going to struggle to keep her promise to cook dinner tonight. She had nothing to be ashamed of, but for some reason, she was.
I love a woman with spark, sass, and pizazz. Amber has all three in spades. Okay, so maybe the sass was on the high end of the spectrum, but something told me she used it as a defense mechanism. There was no doubt it had everything to do with that left leg of hers. I didn’t need her to tell me that she had a problem bigger than she was letting on. Holding her in my arms made that obvious. She wore a brace on her left leg, but the limb itself was nothing but skin and bones. She was a slight woman to begin with, but that leg was something else entirely. Hopefully, she’ll tell me what happened at some point, but until she does, I’ll continue to treat her with respect. I would always be here to listen when and if she decided to talk.
“You’re hard at work,” her sweet voice said as if I had conjured her from just my thoughts. “You were supposed to wait for me.”
I leaned on the shovel I was using to fill the small holes left by the fence. “I figured after the other night that your hands would appreciate not having to deal with the old wood again.”
She held up her palms, and the red marks were still apparent. It wasn’t the splinters that left them red and abraded, but the gravel she landed in when she fell.
“They thank you, and so do I,” she said with a smile. She lowered her hands to her hips and pointed at the small holes along the length of the yard. “Did it come out okay?”
I stomped down on a dirt-filled hole as I answered. “I don’t know how the fence was still standing. I barely had to pull on it before it went down like dominos. I’m going to fill all these holes, and then tomorrow I’ll plant some grass seed.”
“I appreciate all your help,” she said, biting her lip as she stared at the ground instead of making eye contact.
“It’s no problem. Taking down the fence improves my property, too.”
She searched around the area where I was working. “Where did you put the fence? Did you haul it away already?”
I leaned on the shovel again and pointed at the fence in my yard. “I was going to pull the boards out of the wire and burn them. Then all I have to do is take the wire to the metal recycler on Monday.”
Her head nodded as I spoke. “I’ll get a pair of gloves and help you cut the wires apart. I’d offer to help you fill the holes, but you look like you’ve got it covered.”
She was putting all her weight on her right leg, and I could tell it took effort for her to keep from falling over.
“I only have a few holes left to fill. Why don’t you grab a chair and talk to me while I finish?”
“I don’t need a chair,” she said defensively.
That was a kneejerk reaction. I sensed it was something she often repeated whenever someone even suggested she might need to sit down.
I held up my hand. “Whatever you’d like,” I said, going back to packing dirt in the holes. “How was work today?”
Air blew from her lips in exasperation. “Exhausting. We’re so busy this time of year we can barely keep up.”
“That doesn’t sound fun.”
I noticed her shrug out of the corner of my eye as I stomped on another pile of dirt. “We’ve grown so much over the last couple of years that we need to reevaluate our plan. We’re going to have a meeting tomorrow to figure out how to make the workday easier on everyone.”
“You and Haylee are partners in the business, right?” I asked, starting on the last hole.
“Yup, we started The Fluffy Cupcake nine years ago. It was just the two of us running this little bakery that no one even knew existed. Word of mouth spread about Haylee’s cupcakes, and soon, we had customers lined up out the door. Eventually, we hired Brady so we could offer bread and buns besides our cakes and pastries. He’s such an amazing bread artist that now we have so many standing orders with restaurants around the area it’s hard to keep up. We even do the buns and bread for the school. Though, at least during our busiest season, we don’t have that order to worry about.”
“Wow, I’ve had the buns and bread at the school and wondered how the
