Page 19 of The Ex Project (The Heartwood #3)

HUDSON

Wren opens the door to let me pass her.

“The burnt kitchen has been staring me in the face for the last few days. I can’t wait for it to be fixed and never have to think about that disaster again,” Wren calls over her shoulder as I follow her into the kitchen.

Suddenly the reality of why I’m here smacks me in the face, waking me up from the daydream I’ve let myself slip into.

Wren didn’t ask me here to hang out, she isn’t having me over because she likes my company.

I’m here because I offered to help fix her kitchen before her dad finds out about the fire.

The thought of her struggling with anxiety and panic attacks reminded me that I still care about her. It had me feeling like I would do anything to help her. But I can’t let that cloud my judgement. I ended things with Wren for a reason, and clearly nothing significant has changed.

The kitchen opens up before me, and Wren puts her hands up as if to display the charred backsplash like a piece of artwork she’s unveiling. I half expect her to say Ta-da .

“It’s not so bad,” I say, rounding the island and nearing the stove so I can inspect it closer. “You’ll need to get a new oven. This one is wrecked.”

“Okay. I can do that,” she says, momentarily hopeful.

“The rest of the work will take a couple days, tops,” I inform her.

“A couple days?” Wren exclaims, as if she’s reeling from me having to come over again.

“Yeah. To redo the tile will take a couple of days,” I say plainly. “You have to let the mortar set and then come back to do the grout.” Her mouth works as she mulls this over, working through the idea of spending even more time together, no doubt.

“Fine. Try and be quick, though. I have work to do.”

“You can work while I’m here,” I offer. “You don’t need to be sitting next to me the entire time.”

“Eyes on your own paper, Landry. I’m working on top secret arts centre stuff, okay?

” Wren points her index finger towards me, her eyes squinty.

“So, I don’t want your snooping eyes wandering over to me.

And besides, I should watch to make sure you’re doing the job right.

” She drops her hand now and crosses her arms over her chest.

We stand here for a moment, staring each other down.

Her, assessing my ability to complete the job properly, and me, trying to get over the judgement she made about the quality of my work.

I may have decided to stay behind in Heartwood, to not chase big career aspirations by going to university, but I do take pride in my work.

I’m good at what I do, and I’m content where I am.

And if Wren thinks less of me because I didn’t go after her and follow her to engineering school, that’s on her.

“Suit yourself.” I whirl on my heel to head out through the front door and grab the tools I need from my truck.

When I get back, Wren is sitting on the kitchen island across from where I’ll be working.

Like she wants a good vantage point to oversee me.

I give my head a subtle shake, muttering under my breath, asking myself why I even agreed to do this.

And then I remember the look on Wren’s face as she stood on the lawn in front of the house, thinking about the ramifications of the fire.

The way her eyes were cast down, all the fight in them extinguished.

I get to work chipping the old tile off the wall, which doesn’t take me long since the charred ones crumble right off.

She did a number on them. Wren’s eyes bore through me as she scrutinizes my every move.

The only time I get relief from her stare is when she goes out to the backyard to dig around for the extra tile her dad had kept after they remodelled the kitchen.

“There’s only one box left,” she says, her words chopped from being out of breath after lifting it inside.

“That’ll be enough.” I say, as she sets them on the floor in front of me. “Lucky he had these—this company has gone out of business. We wouldn’t have been able to match them otherwise.”

Wren swallows, her face paling, but she manages to squeak out a “Yeah, lucky.”

Another silence falls between us as I start prepping the wall for the new tile. If I don’t look at Wren, I can pretend that it’s a comfortable silence, but she’s chewing nervously on her bottom lip, and it makes me uneasy. I’ve never had a client sit and stare at me like she’s doing now.

“Are you going to sit there the entire time?”

“Yup,” she says absentmindedly. “I need to make sure it looks exactly the way it did before.” She chews at a hang nail, and I recognize the gesture from the public forum, right before she bolted outside. Something inside me flips, a new perspective on her being so neurotic about this.

I stand and turn to face her. I can’t fucking help myself. I close the distance between us and use my thumb and forefinger to lift her chin, making her look at me. Her deep brown eyes are shimmering because they’re glassy. The line between her brow is not from scrutinizing me, it’s worry.

“I will make it look like nothing ever happened.” She swallows again, thickly. “Got it?”

“Got it.”

“You can trust me.” Wren’s gaze flicks away from mine and turns her head out of my grasp. I catch the words and hear the enormity of my ask. I haven’t exactly earned Wren’s trust.

“Just finish the job, please, so I can put this behind me.” I back away from her, letting my hand drop from her face. She doesn’t look at me again, not while I’m this close to her, but she stays where she is to watch me finish the tile.

I place the last one, and I know it’s been done to her satisfaction because I haven’t heard her mutter ‘That one’s not straight’ in a little over ten minutes now.

“There. We’ll need to let this set, and then I can finish the grout.

” I stand back and wipe my hand off on my jeans, admiring my work.

Wren slides off the counter and comes to stand next to me, hands on her hips.

She tilts her head to examine it, and she must deem it sufficient because I can feel the tension within her loosen.

“It looks great, Hudson.” Her tone is softer, almost tired. Like being so wound up all the time is exhausting for her. I’m sure it is. “I don’t know about you, but I need a beer.”

“A beer sounds great to me.”

“And some pizza?” Wren offers. “You must be hungry for dinner.”

I glance around the kitchen nervously, thinking about Wren trying to make pizza after I finished redoing this tile.

She rolls her eyes in an exaggerated way, realizing why I’m hesitating.

“Don’t worry, I’m going to order it.” She holds up her phone and then wanders into the living room to place the call while I clean up my tools in the kitchen.

When I come back from putting them all in my truck, I spot Wren through the French doors at the back of the house, lounging on a patio chair in the glow of dusk.

She’s sipping on a beer and there’s one cracked for me on the small wooden table beside her.

“I didn’t think you’d want to spend any more time with me than absolutely necessary,” I say, sitting down on the lounge chair next to hers.

“It’s the least I could do. You are doing me a favour after all. A big one.” Wren stares off towards the trees surrounding the yard. “You’ve met my dad. You know how intense he is. I can’t give my family any more ammunition.”

“Ammunition for what?” I cock my head to one side.

“Proof of what a fuck up I am. ”

“A fuck up? You’ve got to be kidding me. You’re a senior engineer at VanTek. You’re far from a fuck up.”

“Not in the eyes of my family. Not compared to Claire.” She takes a long sip of her beer, her eyebrows twitching upward.

“You’re still doing that.”

“What?”

“Comparing yourself to Claire,” I answer. “What happened to ‘Claire is such a geek, Claire is such a kiss ass’?”

“Well, one day I woke up, and I looked at my life, my prospects, and then I looked at Claire and thought maybe she had the right idea all along. And unless I made something of myself, I’d always be living in her shadow.

” Wren lets out a self-deprecating laugh.

“The funny thing is, I still feel like I’m living in her shadow. None of it mattered anyways.”

“But you’re happy, though. You followed your dream,” I add.

“Happy is a generous word. But yes, I achieved what I set out to do.”

“If you’re not happy, then that means …” I don’t finish my sentence.

We’re not there yet. I don’t feel like I can be that vulnerable around Wren yet.

Not enough to tell her the only reason I broke up with her was so she could move on, go after what she wanted, get her prestigious job with a big corner office without me holding her back.

So she could be happy. And if she’s not, then … it was all for nothing.

The sound of the doorbell chimes through the house, and Wren gets up to go get the pizza.

When she gets back, she sets the box down on the table and heads back inside to grab two plates and some napkins.

She hands me a plate when she comes out and sits down again.

It’s been a long day of work, so the smell of the warm crust and cheese is making my mouth water.

“Here, eat,” she says, gesturing for me to take the first slice. “You’ve been drinking on an empty stomach, so you need to eat before you start making bad decisions.”

“Bad decisions?” I raise an eyebrow toward her playfully. “And what kind of bad decisions do you think I’ll make, Miller?” I say, sliding a slice onto my plate. She does the same and lifts the slice, careful not to let the toppings slide off, and takes a bite.

Wren pins me with her stare while she chews. She swallows and says, “I don’t know, but based on your antics, I don’t want to find out.”

“My antics, huh?” I casually take a sip of my beer, the bottle making a pop sound as I pull it away from my lips.

Wren nods.