From the corner of her eye, she saw Noah watching.
“Not without a request, no.”
Sheknewit. That son of a bitch. “Hmm. Is that so. How are the property lines looking?” She spoke through clenched teeth.
The guy looked at Noah, back at Grace. “I should probably write up my report for the customer before I say anything.”
God damn it. If she had to pay to have the fence moved over, she was going to throw the slats at him.
“For argument’s sake, what if your findings show part of my property is Mr. Jansen’s?” She wasn’t sure why she’d gone all professional, but it seemed like a necessary buffer.
The man shifted from one foot to the other. “It would depend on the residents but in most cases, adjustments would need to be made.”
“And if that happened, who would be responsible for paying the costs?”
The guy was clearly uncomfortable. Noah disappeared into his house. Grace locked her gaze on the city worker. “Would it be me?”
“Again, it would depend but most likely, it would be the person encroaching on the other’s property.”
Encroaching? Noah Jansen had been encroaching on her thoughts, space,lifesince the day she’d all but stumbled into him. Never mind fences. He was crossing lines and it needed to stop.
Going around the fence, she climbed up his steps, and walked right into his house without knocking. She called his name, heading up the stairs to where she heard voices.
She took the stairs two at a time, which her thighs would regret later, finding Noah and his company in his master bedroom.
They stopped, midconversation, and stared at her, standing in the doorway, her chest heaving.
“Hey, Grace. Everything okay?” There was a mixture of genuine concern and nerves in his voice. He walked over to her, and she couldn’t hold back her sarcasm. It was the only shield she had for the duality of feelings he evoked.
“Okay? Gee. I don’t know. Let me think. I thought things wereokaybetween us but turns out I may need to move the stupid fence after all. You paid for a surveyor? Of all the petty, childish things. You need to learn to take no for an answer, Noah Jansen. In this life, you donotget everything you want no matter how much money you have.”
Noah put a hand on her shoulder but she shook it off, stepping back. “Grace.”
“Shit,” Josh muttered behind them.
“Oh my,” the woman said.
“Grace. I requested it weeks ago. I forgot they were coming and I had a”—he looked back at the woman—“a thing today. Please don’t worry about whatever the report says. I didn’t mean for this to upset you.”
She shook her head, tears cracking her voice. “Of course you didn’t. You don’t think about consequences or backlash for anyone else. You just think, ‘What do I want and how do I get it.’ Then you bulldoze your way over anything and anyone to do just that.”
“Grace. That’s not fair.”
Tears burned her eyes. “That’snot fair?That’swhat’s not fair in all of this?”
She had to curl her fingers into her palms to steady herself. “You have no idea what fair even means. You think because you’ve painted a couple of boards, learned how to use a roller, you’re Mr. Fixer-Upper. You’re not. You’re just another rich suit who’ll do whatever it takes to get what you want. You’ll probably get bored of this place and move on. Then none of this will matter to you. But it matters tome.”
Noah’s face went through an array of emotions: surprise, regret, anger, and hurt. Good. It was good to know he had some human feelings.
“Grace, please. Forget the report. I’ll fix this,” he whispered.
She leaned in. “What will you use? Your money or your charm?” She hated herself the minute the words left her mouth.
Noah reared back. “You’re upset. I get that. But like I told you before, Grace, you don’t know me. I don’t have your story to tell but I have one of my own. Unless you know what it is, don’t make assumptions about me. I’ll figure out the survey thing, but, for now, you should leave.”
Tears blurred her vision as she turned on her heel to go. As she went down the stairs, she heard the murmurs of conversation but not what was being said. She couldn’t do this. She’d let Noah Jansen into the tiny cracks in her heart. He’d seeped in like molasses, sticking to all the empty places with the way he made her laugh, smile, and imagine.
How was she supposed to live next door to him, see him every day with the double-edged sword of wanting him and wanting to throttle him? Hopefully, her words would come true: he’d get bored, move on, and she’d pretend he never existed.
