He planted his hands at his hips and scoured her from head to toe. Her work clothes included faded jeans worn through at the knees and thinning in the thighs, a T-shirt bearing the logo of her previous employer, and her standard lightweight suede work boots. Everything she had on was scarred and stained. While the fabric had been washed, it was all smeared or spattered with paint, cement, caulk, oil, grease, tar, and other compounds she couldn’t immediately identify.
With no makeup on and her unbrushed hair pulled into a ratty bun, she couldn’t have looked worse. She also couldn’t have looked any different than she had when they’d met for the first time last night.
Holy crap. They’d only met last night.
That was surreal.
His gaze moved back up her body and held just above her left breast. “Isn’t that the logo for Pacific Coast’s Finest?”
A spark of panic singed her heart. She hadn’t thought about it when she’d pulled on the shirt. This tee was her work shirt, and the bar was a potential job. She’d reached for it automatically. But she didn’t need him digging into that mess. Certainly not after what had happened between them. And certainly not in this town, where rumors spread like wildfire in dry brush. She already had a goddamned scarlet A on her forehead.
So she offered a curt, “It is.”
He looked as though he wanted to ask more. Looked as if he was putting the company’s reputation for renovating historical commercial buildings into hip, urban brewpubs together with her clothing.
Instead of questions, he surprised her with, “I was going to tell you who I was this morning. But I couldn’t do that because you were gone.”
She could have picked up on the bitter undercurrent in his tone and worked it into an all-out argument, but she didn’t need any more conflict in her life. And certainly not with this man.
“It wouldn’t have mattered if I’d known a few hours earlier,” she said. “It would have mattered if I’d known last night. Let’s get this over with. Where do you want to start? Inside or outside?”
“How about if we start with some common sense. You’re not really thinking of renovating this place, right? Last night you were planning on tilling it under.”
“How about you start with some common decency and assume I have enough sense to make my own business decisions?” This was one of those days when she wanted to go back to bed and start over. Since she couldn’t, she looked down the length of the building. “We’ll start outside.”
She trampled the forest of ivy and weeds that had grown in the property’s three vacant years, and scanned the siding, foundation, and windows for the second time that morning.
“There’s so much wrong I could easily tell you to tear it down and start from the ground up, if you really want my opinion. And if you think this will be some sort of quick flip, you couldn’t be more wrong. There’s nothing quick, easy, or cheap about this place.”
Irritation worked its way over her shoulders and tightened her neck. She stopped and turned on him. “Do you share your opinions with all your clients?”
“I’m giving you the facts, Delaney. I’m telling you the truth.”
“You mean your version of the truth.”
“Man.” He laughed the word, but it came out bitter. “You’re not giving an inch.”
She clenched her jaw. Fingers fisted. “What do you expect? We both know you’re not objective about this.”
“Why? Because we screwed around?”
“No, Ethan.” The tension ebbed, leaving a dark film of guilt and regret. “Because Ian died here. Ian died here, and your entire family thinks it’s my fault.” She softened her voice. “You can’t be fair under these circumstances. It wouldn’t even be humane to expect that of you. And it’s not fair to me or my family to have your prejudices working against us. Everyone loses.”
“Really? You want to talk about loss? About fairness? Think hard before you go down the ‘not fair to me or my family’ road, Delaney, because Ian’s death changed everything. And not just for me.”
His strike back cut deep. Her breath caught, and her eyes stung. That was what she got for showing concern.
“This is exactly why you shouldn’t be working on this project. It’s also the reason you should never have slept with me. Unless you slept with me so it would be a problem. So it would put me at a disadvantage. So you would have all the power.”
“What?” He pulled back and lifted his hands out to the sides. “How? How does us sleeping together put you at a disadvantage? How does it give me power? I could just as easily say you slept with me to use it as blackmail to force me to let substandard renovations go through, or in hopes of getting favors out of me during the process.”
Hurt jabbed the center of her chest, but she sputtered a laugh. “Perfect. Good to know that sleeping with me is something you’re so ashamed of I could blackmail you with it. Tell me that’s not a conflict of interest.”
“Holy shit.” He dropped his head back and closed his eyes. “That is not what I meant.”
Maybe not . . . okay, probably not, but still, it had been a thoughtless thing to say, and it hurt.
“Can we move on?” Delaney asked. “And focus on the reason we’re here?”