While He Built Her Home novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Two Pink Lines

A blood test confirms Valerie's pregnancy, and Jared's partner Clayton arrives at the new studio with the only free truck, saying every other truck is booked to a house that isn't in the company's books.

All night I saw the blue toothbrush in a cup by another woman's sink.

He had lied about a toothbrush, so he had been planning that bed for weeks.

I decided the toothbrush could wait until I knew one other thing.

The clinic opened its lab at eight on Saturday, and I was first in line.

The nurse tied the band around my arm and asked if I was nervous.

"I've done this four times," I said. "I'm tired."

She smiled and filled two tubes. "We'll call you by noon."

I sat in my car in the lot for an hour with the radio off.

The call came at nine-twenty.

"Mrs. Vaughn? It's positive." I could hear the nurse smiling.

"It's a strong number for how early we caught it. Congratulations."

I put my forehead on the steering wheel.

I cried once, hard, with my mouth shut so no one in the lot could see.

Then I wiped my face with the sleeve of my sweater and drove to Mill Street.

I made myself a rule on the way.

Nobody would know until I knew who stood next to me when they found out.

The new studio smelled like sawdust and fresh paint.

Phoebe was on her knees in the front room, cutting open a box of lampshades with a pair of scissors.

She is twenty-four and has worked for me for three years.

She wears a nose stud, work boots and an apron she won't let me wash.

"You look like a ghost," she said without looking up.

"I slept badly."

She put the scissors down and looked at me.

"Half the town posted that ribbon photo last night. I'd like to clap him with a shovel."

"Phoebe."

"I'm just saying I own a shovel."

I laughed. It came out thin and cracked, but it was a laugh.

She went back to the lampshades.

I stood in the middle of the room that would be my store in two days, and nothing was ready.

The display wall was still in a crate in the hall, all six hundred pounds of it.

The racks were in boxes.

The lighting was in the back of Jared's truck, still parked outside my house when I left at six.

A loud engine turned onto Mill Street.

Phoebe went to the window. "Valerie. That's a Vaughn and Quade flatbed."

I thought it was Jared, here to carry the first load and play the hero.

I went to the door with my arms crossed and my speech ready.

It wasn't Jared.

The man who climbed out of the cab was taller than Jared and wider in the shoulders.

He had dark hair going gray at the temples and a carpenter's pencil behind his ear.

He walked up the sidewalk without hurrying.

Three men in company shirts got out behind him and started unstrapping a pallet jack.

"Mrs. Vaughn," the man said. "I'm Clayton Quade."

"I know who you are. You and Jared have shared a name on a truck for nine years."

"Eight and a half."

He took a folded paper out of his back pocket and held it up.

"Jared's keys are with me now, so I have the crate key. I heard you asked for it."

"I asked Jared for it."

"He called me at one in the morning," Clayton said. His voice stayed even.

"He said, 'Valerie's mad at me, and she'll want the walnut wall. Go set it for her.'"

"That's all?"

"That's all he said."

"He couldn't call me himself?"

"He wanted to, I think. He's good at wanting to."

Phoebe made a noise she turned into a cough.

I looked at the flatbed, the pallet jack and the three men who were already carrying the first lamp box inside.

"Jared told me the trucks were mine all week," I said.

"That's what I heard."

"Then why are you the one here?"

Clayton took the pencil from behind his ear and turned it over.

"When I got to the yard this morning, our dispatcher told me every truck we own is booked to Jared until next Sunday."

He met my eyes.

"Jared's own job, he said. A Linden Court project. Twelve trucks, one house."

"Brynn's house?"

"I don't know whose house it is, Mrs. Vaughn."

"Valerie."

"Valerie." He nodded.

"What I know is there are twelve trucks in my yard with nobody to drive them."

He paused.

"And a signed work order for a house that isn't in our books."

The flatbed idled behind him.

"I took this one off the board myself," he said.

"It's the only one I could find that nobody had assigned."

← Chapter 2 · All chapters · Chapter 4 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend