Trouble (Dogwood Lane 3)

As much hell as I give Matt Madden, he gets equal amounts of respect. I don’t know a nicer guy. No one is more loyal, and despite the truth about not wanting to even have to try and fill in for him on our three-man crew, I’d miss him if something happened to him.

I’d never tell him that, though.

“You feeling good enough for a beer?” I ask. “If you feel good enough for Mucker’s at night, you feel good enough for work in the morning.”

“You sound like my dad.”

“Kill me now.”

I pick up the rest of my tools. There’s always a bit of pride when I look at them and think about it. I’m a carpenter. A taxpaying, work-every-day, responsible guy—even though Dane may disagree about that since I left the cutoff saw out in the rain last week. Regardless of my fuckups, I didn’t turn out like my pops, even though everyone said I would.

Matt laughs again. “Dad’s getting soft in his old age. He’s in his backyard right now, digging another koi pond because Mia wants a few more and there’s no room in the current one.”

“For the record, I will never go soft. Ever. Too much testosterone in this blood.”

I lean against my truck and look up at the sky. The blue is so bright, the breeze so perfectly warm that it reminds me of being out on a boat with not a worry in the world—exactly what I had planned for my vacation.

I close my eyes and breathe in the fresh air . . . and as soon as my mind relaxes, I see her face again.

Avery.

Shit.

“Ugh,” I say, pushing off the truck.

“What?”

I shouldn’t bring her up. There’s no reason to. She’s just another gorgeous, witty girl that I’ll get my fill of. I know this. But I want to talk about her. To say her name out loud.

“Matt, do you know a girl named Avery?” I say it quickly, probably too quickly, and cringe as soon as the words are out of my mouth.

“Um, not that I know of. Why? Should I?”

I kick a rock. There’s some satisfaction when it bangs into the lattice under Lorene’s porch. “No. Probably not.”

He laughs. “Is it finally catching up with you?”

“Is what catching up with me?”

“Are you finally confusing all the women in your life?”

“First of all,” I say, “I don’t have women in my life.”

He snorts. “Bullshit. You have more women in your life than anyone I’ve ever fucking met. Period.”

This is a point I could argue, although I typically don’t. My reputation is that of a man who gets women by the boatloads, and it’s not inaccurate. I generally don’t have a problem finding someone to spend time with, to put it nicely. But at this point, I think my exploits have become a little exaggerated.

There was definitely a time when I lost track of whom I was seeing here and there. Lately, that’s not been the case. There are a few numbers I can call if I want to fuck. But what single person in their late twenties doesn’t have that?

“The problem I have with that whole thing is the ‘in my life’ part,” I say. “That makes it sound like I’m spending time with them doing things other than getting off.”

Matt chuckles. “It never ceases to amaze me how crude you can be and women still like you.”

“I could explain that.”

“Please don’t.”

I lift my toolbox and toss it into the back of my truck. It hits with a loud thud as Matt goes into a spiel about how I need to settle down and date one woman at a time. I roll my eyes as I pretend to listen.

The Saint Christopher’s medal that’s hung around my neck since I was nine catches the sunlight. I take it in my palm and feel the warmth radiate into my hand.

My grandmother promised me on the day she gave me my grandfather’s pendant that as long as I wore it around my neck, I would be blessed with safe travels. I thought she was crazy. I still think she might be crazy. But I wear it, anyway.

“You listening to me?” Matt asks.

“Yup.”

“Liar.”

“I heard everything you said, and I still disagree,” I say, hoping I’m as much of an expert on Matt’s rambling as I think I am. “Here’s the thing—I can’t remember my own shit, let alone anniversaries and birthdays and favorite colors and . . . dog names. Ain’t for me, man. Ain’t for me.”

“It must really suck to be so messed up that you don’t want to have an in-depth conversation with a woman.”

A few weeds are growing through Lorene’s mulch. I walk over and rip them out. “I talk to plenty of women, thank you.”

“I mean more than, ‘Do you want it in your mouth first?’”