Page 70 of The Fire

“Yep. That’s what Jamie wants for the spare room.”

He nodded thoughtfully. “Hmmm. How big’s your spare room?”

“Not mine,” I reminded him. “And it’s maybe ten by twenty? I think a gallon will be more than—”

Hen leaned over the counter toward me, and looked from side to side like he wanted to be sure we wouldn’t be overheard, though I was pretty sure we were alone in the store. “You ever thought about anaccent wall?” he asked, his gray and white mustache twitching.

I blinked. “I… have not.”

Hen sighed. “Kids today don’t bother looking at the design magazines. Accent walls are all the rage.”

Kids today cared about interior design?“Are they?”

He pulled a dog-eared copy ofDecorfrom under the counter and slapped it down in front of me, then pointed at the room on the cover. “See that there?Accent wall.”

“Wow.” The picture showed a bedroom with dark-toned furniture much like Jamie’s bookcases and walls almost the exact color of the paint Jamie had picked, except that the wall immediately behind the bed was a medium blue. It looked… good, actually. Really good. “That’s excellent.”

“Of course.” Hen shrugged modestly. “I don’t recommend bullshit, Parker.”

“Right.” I rubbed at the back of my shoulder again and forced myself to stop.Iwas not the one with an injury. “Lemme just call Jamie. Since it’s his house and all.”

Hen’s mustache twitched. “Sure it is.” But he waved a hand at me anyway. “Call him.”

I turned away, then hesitated. Jamie was working at the diner, and I hated to interrupt him… But if he was busy, he just wouldn’t answer, right? Friends called friends at work sometimes, didn’t they?

I found his name on my contacts list and pressed it.

“Parks?” he said, answering after a single ring. “You okay?”

“Oh, yeah. Everything’s fine. Sorry to worry you. I, ah, just had a question about paint.”

“Paint?” He sounded a little confused, and I didn’t blame him.

“You remember how I was gonna get paint for the spare room today?”

“Oh. Pepper gray,” Jamie said. “Right?”

“Yeah. Well, Hen had an idea for an, um,accent wall. And I think it would look great in that space. I can just take a picture of some chips and text it to you. Or even walk the chips down, since you’re like a hundred feet away.Duh.”

“Youcould,” Jamie agreed in a low voice that did things to my belly. “Might brighten up my last hour of work.”

I laughed. “Okay then.”

“But just get whatever paint color you want,” he said. “If you like it, that’s good enough for me.”

I frowned down at a display of seed packets. “You don’t have a preference?” I said. “You sure? You spent like a hundred years looking at shades of gray, debating the merits of each one.”

“Which is why I can say with no hesitation that I do not enjoy picking paint colors. Atall.”

I snorted. “I caught that.”

“I’m happy to outsource to someone who knows what I like.” His voice went even lower, and he added, “And you know what I like.”

“Well.” I forced a tiny laugh and felt my face go hot. “I guess that’s true. But that’s not… um…”

“I trust you, Parks. Just get the paint. And then meet me atFanaille. I’ll buy you a cupcake to thank you, and you can drive me home. The walk in to work was nice, but I’m thinking I can come up with a better form of exercise than strolling back to the house.”

I barely heard the last part of his statement. My throat had gone dry at his first sentence. Because, I mean, we were talking about paint, right? But it felt like a lot more than that. Like I’d won something I hadn’t even known I could win.