A Handful of Heaven

She blinked again. There he went again, and this time he was definitely almost smiling. The gentle upward curve of his hard mouth cut the hint of dimples into his lean sun-browned cheeks. She felt a flutter of interest down deep in her heart, and dismissed it. She was a woman after all, sworn to a single celibate life, but that didn’t mean she was dead. “Call for help if I don’t return.”

“You can’t deal with that yourself.”

“Watch me.” She swept past him, wading through the torrent streaming down the hallway. What would it be like to be free of this place? She’d been here so long, she couldn’t even imagine it. But she would sure like to.

She was planning to put the diner up for sale this summer. She’d been accepted at the nearby university to begin classes in the fall.

“Do you want me to call a plumber?” He spoke with that polished baritone that could make a girl take a second look.

She absolutely refused to turn around. She didn’t need a second look. She wasn’t interested in Evan or in any man. “Not yet, it might be something I know how to fix.”

“Are you telling me you’re a good cook and a handyman, too?”

“Just because I’m a woman doesn’t mean I can’t use tools.”

Right. Evan watched Paige McKaslin march away from him, all business. She was a study in contradiction. On the surface, she was brusque, crisp and coolly efficient. A man might draw the conclusion that she was made of ice.

But if he watched close enough, he’d see a different woman. A woman who was vulnerable and overworked and tender. He’d seen the look on her lovely face when the crying customer had said they were on their way to a funeral. She cared. And she hadn’t charged the couple for the hot coffee and snacks to help them along on their all-night drive.

She wasn’t as coolly tough as she let on, either. Not judging by the way her straight shoulders had slumped when she’d first eyed the leak cascading down the hallway. She was handling the flood now, marching up the water-filled hallway braced like a warrior facing battle. She was a small woman, and that came as a surprise. She was always moving, a busy, no-nonsense, get-things-done woman. Now, as he watched her, he realized just how lovely she was.

Why he was noticing, he couldn’t rightly say. He’d given up on women and the notion of trusting them ever since he’d come home to find a quick note from his wife taped to the refrigerator door explaining why she was leaving him. That wasn’t all. She’d drained their bank accounts, maxed out the credit cards with cash advances. She’d even liquidated their nest egg of stocks and bonds.

All very good reasons never to notice another woman again.

So, why was he standing here watching as Paige disappeared into the men’s restroom? Water lapped around the toes of his shoes. A smart man would go back to his seat and finish off the rest of his meal and contemplate the dessert menu. He would not be staring down the hallway, feeling as if he ought to lend a hand.

Why? That made no sense. He wasn’t much of a handyman, so there was very little he could do to help, unless it was to turn off a valve. Paige had been clear she could handle the leak and any required tools. She was a competent woman; he’d have to believe her. Maybe the reason had more to do with her beauty than her competence.

No, that didn’t make any sense. After Liz had broken his heart, wrecked their family, and destroyed his financial security, no woman’s beauty could affect him. No, the reason he was standing here as the flood rushed past him into the dining room had nothing to do with Paige McKaslin. Not one thing. His chest constricted with a pain worse than a root canal.

He thought of his absolutely quiet, very empty house and took a step upstream. Water sloshed over the top of his shoes and wet his socks. Helping her was the only decent thing to do. It wasn’t likely that she could find a plumber this time of night. And certainly not fast enough to save her entire diner from water damage. At the very least, Paige would have a serious repair bill on her hands.

He’d see if he couldn’t help keep that to a minimum, he thought, as he knocked on the closed men’s bathroom door and shouldered it open. Water resisted, and when he shoved harder, he saw why. What might have started as a small leak had resulted in complete erosion of the major water pipe to the sinks. Water gushed out of the floor full-force now, and Paige sat beside it, her face in her hands, her shoulders slumped.

In utter defeat.

Evan’s heart twisted. He stepped forward, blown away by an overwhelming need to help her. To make this right.

Chapter Two

This is going to wipe out the diner’s monthly profit. And a lot more as well.

Paige scrubbed at her face. Tired, she was just so tired. She had to call a plumber. She couldn’t do this herself—this was no minor repair. Already the water level had risen a few inches. And since the break in the pipe was below the shut-off for the sinks, the main line would have to be shut off.

Not only that, but the clean-up was going to take time—hours of hard work. Don’t think about that, she commanded herself as she climbed to her feet. One step at a time. First she had to get this water turned off.

“Where’s the main shut-off valve?” A man’s voice came out of nowhere, bouncing off the bare walls.

She jumped, splashing the water around her. “Evan. I didn’t know that you were there. What are you doing? You’re going to ruin your shoes.”

“I’ve had worse problems. This is an older building. Don’t tell me the shut-off is underneath.”

“There’s a crawl space, but you can’t go down there.” She waded across the room, splashing and slipping, as fast as she could go.

Evan had already turned and was wading down the hall. “Evan!”

He was gone with a splash, but like the ripples ringing outward from his movements in the water, the effect of his kind presence remained.

You’re only imagining that the kindness in his voice is personal, she told herself as she slogged after him. Waves washed against the tile protection along the walls and threatened to start wetting the wallboard at any time.

Evan had gone back to his seat, right? As she scurried down the hall she caught a glimpse of the nearly empty dining room. Evan wasn’t in it.

Men. This was why she didn’t have one. You couldn’t trust them to do what you said—you couldn’t trust them at all, not as far as you could throw them. She grabbed her coat from the kitchen closet and the flashlight from the top shelf.

The chill in the wind cut through her, tearing at the edges of her coat, and she zipped it up tightly as she ran. The light from the windows gave just enough light to thin the shadows as she tripped along the icy flagstone path around the far edge of the building.

The trap door was flung wide open and the scant light down below gave her no hint of what was happening. Had Evan already found the valve and turned it off?

He peered up at her from the shadows below. Dust streaked the top of his head. “You wouldn’t happen to have any tools on you, would you?”

Those dimples had dug into his cheeks again and caught her off guard.

“I—” Her brain shut down. Tools. He was talking about tools. “You don’t need one for the shut-off. Just let me—”

“I found the valve, but it’s stuck open.”

“It’s stuck? No, it can’t be. The handle has to be jiggled just right. It’s temperamental.” She barreled down the wooden steps, swiping cobwebs out of her hair. “Let me try it.”

“Do you have a toolbox upstairs?”

“There’s a kit in the kitchen closet by the door but—” She stumbled along the uneven ground and went down on her knees by the valve. He was already gone. It didn’t matter. She wrapped both hands around the small metal handle and pulled. Nothing.

She strained harder. Nothing.

Okay, what she needed was a little more muscle. She braced her feet, used her weight as leverage and heaved with all her strength. The pipe groaned. The valve screeched a millimeter and then stuck as if it had been cemented into place.

No, this can’t be happening. She took a step back and her heel splashed in something wet. Water. It was coming through the floorboards at the end near the bathrooms. What was it doing upstairs?

Before panic could set in, Evan was back, thundering down the steps and into the narrow space, stooping as he went, the toolbox clinking with his movements. He dropped the box at her feet and snapped it open. Her hand shot out for the wrench but he’d already stolen it.

“Hey, this is my job,” she decided loudly.

He didn’t seem to care, as he was already shouldering next to her and fitting the wrench into place. “It’s just rusted some. Let’s hope this doesn’t break the pipe.”

“And if it does?”

“There’s always the shut-off at the meter in the street, but let’s—” he paused as he put some muscle into his effort “—hope that it doesn’t—come—to that.”