Brody & Reagan

Excerpt

“I can’t let you cut down that tree,” she snapped. “I love that tree.”

His smile fell, but he seemed more curious than angry.

She immediately wanted to Ctrl+Z her emotional outburst. It wasn’t like her not to be pragmatic. On the drive over, she’d concocted a perfectly sensible list of reasons to leave the tree as it stood. Now that she was standing in front of a broad set of shoulders, thick hair that begged for a woman’s fingers, and a pair of thighs she could bounce a quarter off of, well, she…what was she saying?

“Trees are helpful for the environment.” The words burst from her lips. She was grateful to have remembered at least one of her mental bullet points. “Oxygen production. Which we breathe.”

He took a step closer to her. At least he was listening.

“Did you know that trees communicate with their surrounding environments, including with one another? If you cut down that maple, there will be a break in the chain.”

“You sound like my sister. You two know each other?” He turned his head right, then left like he was suspicious. “Did she send you over here?”

“I don’t know your sister. But I can promise you that this tree is not going to fall down anytime soon. Five years ago, there was a torrential storm, and the winds reached upwards of eighty-nine miles an hour. That maple lost three larger branches, but its trunk didn’t so much as bend. She’s rooted deep.”

He folded his arms over his chest, skepticism lining his brow. “How do you know how many branches that maple tree lost? Kind of hard to tell from your vantage point, wasn’t it?”

“My vantage point?”

“Jean’s front window.” He gestured across the street to where Jean surreptitiously yanked the leaves off one of her fruit tree’s branches and threw them into a rose bush. When the tree guy turned around, she showed him the naked branch. “Is she related to you?”

Reagan understood why he’d think that. The only other time he’d seen her was when she’d stepped out of Jean’s house. It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him that Ike was her grandfather, but she didn’t know if she could trust Brody Crane not to rat her out. The last thing Ike needed was to worry about Betty’s tree.

“She’s not a relative, but she is a friend. And a customer. I have a lot of friends who are customers on this street. I’m a repairwoman.”

“Really.” His eyes narrowed in apparent interest. “What do you repair?”

She lifted one shoulder into a shrug. “Pretty much anything, as long as it’s minor and doesn’t require a permit.”

“Leaks? Creaky floorboards?” He raised an eyebrow. “Kitchen sinks?”

A smile tickled the corner of her mouth as she recalled him tossing a kitchen sink onto his front yard. “All of those.”

“Really,” he repeated.

“I’ll swing back by, ma’am.” The tree guy waved to Jean with his clipboard and returned to Brody’s yard. The stitched name tag on his work shirt read Alberto. “Your neighbor’s something else,” he told Brody. “If you want to sign this, I can put you on the schedule for tree removal. Might not be until early next week, but we’ll fit you in.”

Reagan’s mind raced. There had to be another point she could make that would convince him not to—

“Actually, I’ve decided to keep it.”

Alberto glanced at Reagan who offered an uncertain smile.

“She convinced me to keep it. What can I do?” Brody thrust both hands into the front pockets of his jeans and shrugged.

Alberto narrowed his eyes as if to say Cut it down, that’s what you can do. But instead, he said, “Is she opposed to me lopping off the dead branches?”

“You’ll have to ask her.” Brody turned to Reagan for an answer, and she grew warm under his full attention. Those golden-brown eyes that had captivated her in his headshot online were more captivating in person.

“Um, yeah. That would be fine.” When Alberto moved toward his truck, she quickly added, “As long as they’re small.”

“Small. Got it.” Alberto gave her a thumbs-up.

“Gate’s open,” Brody told him.

Alberto nodded and returned to his truck for a pair of loppers and an electric chainsaw. Then he walked down the driveway and disappeared into the backyard. Brody turned toward her expectantly.

“I assume I won’t have to give the tree three days’ notice for the branches being trimmed. Isn’t that more like a haircut?”

“I guess so,” she said slowly, not sure what he meant. “You didn’t need my permission, you know. It’s your house. Your tree. Out of curiosity, what changed your mind? The bit about how they communicate, or the oxygen thing?”

“You had me at ‘I love that tree.’”