1
The rideshare’s engine whined as it climbed the last stretch of the hill, like it wasn’t convinced it belonged up here.
Lena kept her fingers wrapped around the frayed strap of her canvas bag and watched the world outside the window change in fast little jumps. First the Harborview streets she knew by heart—old brick buildings, cramped balconies, tangled power lines, corner bodegas with hand-painted signs. Then the road widened, the asphalt smoothed out, and the shops thinned into houses with yards and trees. Those slowly gave way to gates, hedges trimmed into perfect shapes, and stone driveways that glowed pale in the morning light.
By the time the car turned onto Crestview Drive, it felt like a different planet.
The driver whistled under his breath. “Big day for you, huh?” he asked, eyes in the rearview mirror.
“Just a job,” Lena said, because that’s all she could afford to let it be. “Left at the next gate.”
Her own voice sounded a little smaller than usual. She hated that. She straightened her spine, adjusting the weight of her bag in her lap, and made herself look directly ahead, past the windshield, as the house came into view.
Calling it a house felt wrong.
Crestview Estate sat on the slope like it had been poured there instead of built. White stone, clean lines, big rectangular windows that caught the sky. Two stories in the front, three in the back where the hill dropped away toward the water. A long driveway drove up the center of the property, flanked by neat rows of trees and grass so emerald it looked edited.
The kind of place where a broken tile wasn’t an inconvenience, it was a scandal.
The car rolled to a stop next to the tall black gate. Cameras blinked from the posts. The guard in the booth leaned forward, studying the car, then her, like he was decoding a problem.
He pressed a button; the gate slid open in a smooth, quiet arc.
“Damn,” the driver muttered. “You sure you don’t wanna switch lives with whoever lives here?”
Lena snorted, pulled a few worn bills from her bag, and passed them forward. “I’d have to switch brains, too. Don’t think that’s in the app.”
He laughed, took the cash, and wished her luck. The car rolled back down the hill and disappeared around the bend, leaving her standing at the edge of the Crestview driveway with her bag on her shoulder and her heartbeat tapping quick against her ribs.
The air felt different this high up. Cooler, less crowded. She could smell cut grass, damp earth, and a faint trace of the ocean. When she glanced to the right, the city sprawled below—Harborview’s jumble of roofs and alleys, Downtown’s glass buildings catching the sun, the white line of the shoreline beyond.
Her own building was out there somewhere, a smudge among a thousand others.
Lena tightened her grip on the bag strap. Her kurti was a deep steel blue, sleeves rolled up to expose her forearms. Black leggings, scuffed sneakers, hair pulled back into a braid that hung down her back. She’d scrubbed the faint streaks of paint and thinner off her hands that morning until the skin went raw.
She still felt like she was tracking in dust.
“Just work,” she whispered to herself. “You’re here to work.”
The front door was a double set of glass framed in dark metal, towering above her. A guard in a navy uniform stood beside it, hands clasped behind him, eyes flat and professional.
He watched her cross the last stretch of driveway, his gaze flicking to her bag, her shoes, her face, in a quick assessment. She’d been on the other side of that look enough times to recognize it.
“Morning,” Lena said when she reached him. “I’m here for the interior work. Renovation crew. Lena, from Harborview Supply.”
He checked a tablet mounted on the wall, eyes scanning a list. “Lena… yeah. You’re on here. Renovation’s in the west wing. Miss Vivian is expecting you. Go on in.”
She nodded, stepped past him, and pulled the heavy glass door open.
Cold air rushed out, smelling faintly of citrus and something floral. The temperature difference pricked goosebumps along her arms.
Inside, the foyer was big enough to fit her entire apartment three times over.
White marble floor, veined with gray, laid in a pattern that pulled your eyes toward a curved staircase sweeping up to the second floor. A chandelier made from hundreds of glass droplets hung from the high ceiling, catching the morning light in a million tiny flashes. To the left, a pair of double doors stood closed; to the right, wide arches led deeper into the house.
For a second, Lena just stood there, the strap of her bag pressing into her shoulder, listening to the hush. Even the sounds of the city felt far away.
“Hey,” someone called from the right. “You must be the Supply girl.”
She turned.
A man in paint-splattered overalls leaned against a shifting stack of drop cloths. He was middle-aged, with a kind face and a short gray beard. Two other workers—one woman with a bandana tied over her hair, another man rolling a cart of paint buckets—moved quietly behind him.
“That’s me,” Lena said. “You’re with the main crew?”
“Yeah. I’m Mark.” He pushed away from the pile and stuck his hand out. She shook it—his palm was rough and still smelled faintly of solvent, even through the citrus of the foyer. “Vivian said your shop’s supplying the materials and sending someone to oversee the technical stuff. Didn’t think she meant sending just one person.”
“One is cheaper,” Lena said dryly. “And more useful, apparently.”
Mark grinned. “Fair enough. She’s in the west sitting room. Straight through there, second arch on the left. You’ll know it when you see it. Looks like a museum they forgot to dust.”
“Got it,” Lena said.
She started forward, her sneakers almost too quiet on the marble. Her gaze caught on a framed photograph hanging near the staircase, and for a second the air left her lungs.
Ethan.
He stood in the picture in a black suit, a hand tucked into his pocket, bow tie slightly askew. His dark hair was shorter in the photo than it had been at school, combed neatly back from his forehead, but the same sharp lines were there—angular jaw, straight nose, the kind of smile that lit up the whole frame.
Beside him, a tall man in an older, grayer, looser version of the same face. His father, she knew without being told. Their shoulders were pressed together, the man’s hand firm on Ethan’s back. Both of them were laughing, not quite at the camera but toward someone to the side.
There was nothing on the plaque at the bottom except the event name and year. No mention that the older man was dead now. No hint that one night on the highway had turned the photo into a ghost.
Lena’s eyes lingered on Ethan’s face a beat too long.
She remembered him differently: school uniform, open collar, sleeves rolled up, basketball in one hand as he leaned against the chain-link fence around the court. A group of girls a few feet away, giggling too loudly. The way he’d throw his head back when he laughed, thinking the whole world would always open for him.
The flush that crept up her throat annoyed her enough to make her look away.
The west wing hallway was quieter than the rest of the house. The sunlight that poured through the tall windows looked softer here, filtered through older glass and heavier curtains. The paint on the walls had yellowed slightly at the edges, and the crown molding showed hairline cracks.
It was the sort of thing most people wouldn’t notice. Lena’s eyes locked on each flaw automatically.
The door to the sitting room stood open.
Vivian stood near the windows with a tablet in her hand, scrolling through something. She wore a pale camel-colored pantsuit, the jacket cinched at the waist, heels that matched the color of her lipstick. Her hair fell in smooth waves over one shoulder, just the right amount of volume, like it had been told to behave and obeyed.
She looked up as Lena stepped in, eyes traveling quickly from her braid to her sneakers.
“You’re Lena,” Vivian said. It wasn’t a question; more like she was checking that the name matched the file.
“Yes,” Lena said. “From Harborview Supply.”
“Right.” Vivian’s gaze flicked to Lena’s bag, then to the tape measure clipped to her belt. “You’re younger than I expected.”
Lena shrugged one shoulder. “My grandmother says stress keeps you preserved.”
The corner of Vivian’s mouth ticked, not quite a smile, but not nothing, either. “We’ll see how preserved you are when we’re done here.”
She waved the tablet in the direction of the room. “This wing was my husband’s first wife’s domain. He never touched it after she died. I let it sit for a long time, but it’s time to stop living with ghosts. We’re redoing the entire west wing—this sitting room, the hall, the master suite, the dressing areas, the bathroom. New paint, new finishes. Cleaner, lighter, nothing too trendy. I want it to feel expensive without screaming about it.”
Lena stepped further into the room, letting her eyes roam in a slow circle.
The space was large. High ceiling, heavy drapes swallowing half the light, a fireplace with a carved wooden mantel, furniture straight out of the eighties—formal sofa set in dark green, huge coffee table, side tables crowding the corners. The wallpaper was floral in a faded way, peeling in spots behind the frames. Dust lay like a film over everything, softening edges.
On the wall opposite the windows hung a painting of the bay at sunset. The sky was done in thick strokes of orange and burgundy, but time had dimmed the colors.
The room smelled slightly stale, like a closet that hadn’t been opened in years. Under that, Lena caught a faint trace of perfume, too old to name.
She could see it, though—the after. White walls, lighter floor, the furniture swapped out or reupholstered. Light pouring in unobstructed.
“We brought the low-odor primer you requested,” Lena said, letting the work voice take over. It grounded her. “And the chemical cleaner for the mold in the bathroom tile grout. It’s stronger than what’s usually on shelves, so we’ll need ventilation when we use it.”
Vivian lowered the tablet. “As long as the mold is gone. I don’t want to see so much as a gray shadow in that shower.”
“We’ll kill it at the root,” Lena said.
“Good.” Vivian checked the time on her tablet. “The crew started prepping the hallway already. You’ll coordinate with them, make sure they’re using your products correctly. I have meetings downtown and a lunch. I’ll be back this afternoon to check progress.” She glanced toward the doorway. “You’ll stay until we’ve finished the primer coat in here at least. If it runs late, I’ll have the kitchen send up meals.”
Lena did the math in her head: primer, two coats in a room this size, plus the bathroom treatment, plus hallway prep. They’d be here past sunset. Her stomach knotted once—Noah’s meds, Nana Ruth’s knees, dinner—but she pushed it down.
“Understood,” she said. “I can call my grandmother from the break to let her know.”
Vivian nodded like that detail was none of her concern but not her problem either. “Ask the staff if you need anything that isn’t paint-related. Don’t let my son distract you.”
“Your son?” Lena asked, before she could swallow the question.
Vivian’s expression didn’t change much, but the air around her cooled a degree. “Logan. You’ll probably run into him at some point. If he offers to help, tell him no. He has a talent for turning help into a disaster.”
“I’m used to disasters,” Lena said. “I work with contractors.”
That earned a real smile, brief and sharp. Then Vivian tapped the tablet back on and started moving toward the door. “I’m trusting you with this wing, Lena. Don’t let me regret it.”
Lena met her eyes. “I won’t.”
Vivian left, her heels clicking on the hallway floor until the sound faded.
Silence moved back into the room.
Lena set her bag down on a bare spot beside the fireplace and exhaled for what felt like the first time since she’d stepped through the gate. The fabric at her shoulders still held the ghost of tension.
Mark appeared in the doorway a minute later, lugging a roll of plastic sheeting under one arm and a stack of painter’s tape under the other.
“So?” he asked. “We hate it? We love it? We quietly curse whoever invented floral wallpaper?”
“It’s like walking into a soap opera from before I was born,” Lena said. “But we’ll make it work.”
He chuckled, dropped the plastic in the center of the room, and spread it with his boot. “Vivian seems pleased with you.”
“She doesn’t know me yet,” Lena said.
“She doesn’t like anyone,” he said. “Pleased is the best you get.”
They started covering the furniture. Plastic rustled as they pulled it over the sofa and wrapped it around the carved coffee table. The crew moved with easy coordination, each person sliding into a role they’d played on a dozen jobs before: taping baseboards, setting up ladders, hauling primer buckets from the cart in the hall.
Lena took out her notebook and walked the room with a measured stride, jotting down the exact square footage of each wall, how many gallons they’d need for each layer, where structural flaws needed patching before any paint touched them.
This part, at least, felt like solid ground.
She found comfort in the crisp scratch of her pen, the scratch of sandpaper on old paint, the sound of rollers being unwrapped, the chemical smell of primer drifting up from newly opened cans.
As they worked, she picked up more details about the house.
From the sitting room window, if she leaned close to the glass, she could see the backyard: an infinity pool stretching out toward the city, the edge visually melting into the horizon. Lounge chairs lined the deck, the cushions an expensive-looking cream. The view made her throat feel tight for a second—the city spread below, hazy under the early sun, the harbor a strip of silver beyond.
Somewhere out there, Noah was at the kitchen table trying to maneuver his chair just so while Nana Ruth nagged him about breakfast. Somewhere out there, Harborview Supply’s old metal shutter clanged open as one of the regulars rattled it up and shouted good morning into the street.
Up here, the loudest thing was the roller sliding up a wall.
At one point, Mark popped his head back in from the hall. “Bathroom’s a war zone. You wanna see it before we scare you with pictures?”
The bathroom had once been a showpiece. Large, with stone walls, a walk-in shower, a big tub under a window. But dampness had had time to do its quiet work: dark patches in corners, mold threading along the grout lines like delicate black vines.
Lena pulled disposable gloves from her bag and snapped them on.
“This is why people need to buy the good stuff,” she said. “Not that fake lemon-smelling garbage that just makes mold feel fresh.”
She opened the container of cleaner she’d brought from the shop. The harsh chemical scent cut through the bathroom’s damp like a knife. She showed Martha and one of the other workers how to dilute it, where to use it, how long to let it sit before scrubbing.
“And don’t splash it on your skin,” she added. “It’ll burn. If it gets in your eyes, you’ll hate me forever and sue my grandmother.”
“Noted,” Martha said, pulling a mask up over her mouth and nose. “No suing Nana.”
Lena smiled despite herself and went back to the sitting room.
Time stretched and contracted around the work. The first strip of old wallpaper peeled away in her hands with a sound like Velcro, revealing yellowed plaster beneath. Primer went down, covering the age and the stains with a blank, clean layer.
The crew fell into an easy rhythm and the tension in Lena’s shoulders eased. Here, with a roller in hand, she knew what she was doing. Here, it didn’t matter that the house could probably fit half of Harborview inside it. A wall was a wall. Peeling paint was peeling paint. Mold was muck, no matter how expensive the tiles.
Someone put music on low from a phone in the hall—classic rock, something her dad used to play when she was little and still sober enough to sing along. It threaded into the day like a memory.
At some point, when Lena stepped out into the hall to check on the tape lines, a framed photo on a side table caught her eye.
Ethan again, but different this time. Younger. No suit, no formal backdrop. Just him on a basketball court, wearing a sleeveless jersey, hair damp with sweat, a grin splitting his face as he arced a shot. His father stood in the background, blurred, clapping.
Her stomach pulled the way it used to when she’d watch games from the far end of the bleachers, pretending she was only there because she liked the air.
She remembered his laugh when one of the teachers had scolded some guys for dunking too hard. The sound of his sneakers squeaking on the gym floor. The way the sunlight coming through the high windows would catch the sweat at his neck.
And—more vivid than anything—the feel of his palm against her back at the masked dance. The music had been too loud, bass thudding in her chest. Her thrift store dress had itched at the seams. The cheap mask on her face had smelled like cardboard and glue. She’d been pressed against a gym wall, sure she’d made a mistake coming, ready to slip out—
—and then his hand had slid into hers, warm, confident, pulling her onto the floor.
He’d worn a black mask over the upper half of his face. She’d known his voice but hadn’t trusted herself. He’d moved closer, their bodies swaying out of sync at first, then finding a rhythm together. At some point, the rest of the room had blurred out. It had been just his breath, his cologne, his chest under her palm.
When he’d kissed her—soft, sudden, not asking—every nerve in her body had lit up. Not like the movies, not fireworks in the sky, but something deep and dangerous in her stomach, spreading up.
Later the next week, hidden in the noise of locker doors slamming, she’d heard his friends laugh about how he’d “made out with some mystery girl in a thrift dress” at the dance. The words had stuck under her skin.
She hadn’t kissed anyone since.
“Hey.” Mark’s voice pulled her back. “You okay?”
She realized she’d gone still, fingers resting on the edge of the picture frame.
“Yeah,” she said quickly, letting go. “Just making sure the frames don’t fall when we move furniture.”
“Those things cost more than my truck,” he said. “Let’s not test gravity.”
She forced a small smile and followed him back inside the sitting room.
Late morning, the sound of footsteps echoed faintly through the hallways. Lighter tread than Vivian’s heels, less rhythm. Someone dragging their feet a little.
The crew kept working, but conversations thinned. In houses like this, everyone’s instinct was the same: stay uninteresting when family members walked through.
The footsteps came closer. A door somewhere down the corridor creaked, then slammed. A muffled curse followed.
Then a figure appeared in the sitting room doorway, squinting against the light.
Logan.
Lena recognized him from gossip before she even fully processed his features. She’d seen him once or twice near school back when she and Ethan still lived in the same universe, but he’d been younger, shorter, still tucked partly behind Vivian’s skirts.
Now he stood barefoot on the threshold, wearing black sweatpants and a faded gray T-shirt with a band logo cracking across the chest. His dark hair stuck up on one side like he’d slept on it wrong and given up. His eyes were slightly puffy, the whites veined with red, the universal stamp of half the city’s nightlife.
He looked around the room in a slow sweep, taking in the plastic-wrapped furniture, the ladders, the workers. His gaze slid over everyone until it hit Lena and held.
He straightened a little, like he’d been slumping and suddenly remembered he had an audience.
“Wow,” he said. “The crypt is finally getting an exorcism.”
Martha snorted behind her hand. Mark focused intently on his roller, like the paint had become the most interesting thing he’d ever seen.
Lena kept her stance relaxed, one hand on the roller tray, the other pushing a stray hair back from her face with the inside of her wrist. Sweat had loosened a few strands from her braid, and they clung to her temple.
She could feel Logan’s eyes on her. Not just on her face. On the paint marks on her wrist, the way her kurti skimmed her hips, the scuffs on her shoes.
He stepped into the room, ducking a little to avoid the plastic draped from a chandelier arm. The faint smell of leftover cologne and cheap club smoke came with him.
“You’re new,” he said. “I’d remember you.”
Lena’s lips twitched. “It’s a big house. Maybe I was hiding behind a wall.”
“Trust me,” he said. “I’d notice if someone like you were hiding in my house.”
There it was, the smooth charm he was clearly used to having land. For a second, she saw the sixteen-year-old version of him underneath, the one who’d probably watched Ethan swagger around and learned it like a language.
Lena reached for the roller, dipped it into the tray, and pulled it up, letting the excess run off in white drips. “I’m just here for the paint,” she said. “Your mom hired my shop.”
Logan tipped his head like he was trying to remember. “Harborview something?”
“Harborview Supply.”
“Right.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets, shoulders slouching lightly. “I’ve seen your place. It’s got that blue door with the peeling number, right?”
“Congratulations,” she said. “You can read.”
Martha choked again. Mark made a desperate attempt to turn a laugh into a cough and nearly painted his own shoe.
Instead of being offended, Logan’s eyes sparked. “You’re funny,” he said.
“I’m busy,” she countered.
He took another step inside, then winced and brought a hand to his temple. “God. The light in here is aggressive.”
“We’re planning to use it to fight crime,” Lena said. “And mold.”
He blinked at her, then started to grin. It was a good grin, the kind people got away with trouble on. She’d seen it on Ethan a thousand times in school hallways.
Lena turned back to the wall, rolling a fresh strip of primer up in smooth vertical passes. She could feel Logan still in the doorway.
“Have you eaten?” he asked suddenly.
The question made her pause. “What?”
“Food,” he said. “You know, the thing that goes in your mouth so you don’t pass out on my mom’s antique carpet.”
“We’re fine,” she said. “We brought snacks and water.”
“That’s not food,” he said. “That’s survival. I meant real food.”
“Real food takes time,” Lena said. “We’re on a deadline.”
He straightened again, squaring his shoulders as if rising to a challenge no one had given him. “I’ll make you something.”
Mark made a soft, strangled sound that might have been “oh no.”
Lena turned slowly. “You’ll make us something,” she repeated.
“I can cook,” Logan said, with the confidence of someone who had likely never actually had to prove it. “I’ve cooked before.”
“In a microwave doesn’t count,” she said.
He set his jaw. “I’m not completely useless.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You implied it very loudly,” he said, but there was more amusement than injury in his voice. “Look, you’re gonna be here all day, right? Mom’s not exactly famous for remembering the hired help exists. I’ll take care of lunch.”
“You don’t have to—”
He shook his head once. “Too late. I already decided. It’s my house. If you’re working in it, I can at least feed you.”
Lena met his gaze for a long second. His eyes were lighter than Ethan’s, more hazel than dark brown, with that tired edge of too many late nights. Under the smirk, there was something else there—an earnestness he probably didn’t realize was showing.
She sighed. “If you set the kitchen on fire,” she said, “I’m not repainting that for free.”
“Deal,” he said. “You’ll see. It’ll be great.”
He spun around and almost walked into a ladder, catching it just before it tipped. “Totally fine,” he muttered, and disappeared into the hallway, bare feet slapping softly on the floor.
The moment he was gone, the tension in the room cracked like static.
“Kid’s got it bad,” Martha murmured, rolling her roller back and forth in the tray, eyes wide.
“He’s a kid,” Lena said. “He loves anything that looks at him for more than three seconds. By this afternoon, he’ll be in love with the neighbor’s dog.”
“Still,” Martha said. “He offered to cook. That’s some real commitment.”
“He strikes me as the type who thinks scrambling eggs is a personality,” Lena muttered.
Mark finally let his laugh out. “You two are gonna make this a very interesting job.”
Lena dipped her roller again, fighting the heat she could feel creeping up the back of her neck. Attention from rich boys was a problem, not a compliment. That was a lesson she’d absorbed the hard way over years of watching Ethan collect hearts like it was a sport.
She reminded herself of that with every stroke up the wall.
An hour later, when the smell of slowly cooking onions drifted faintly down the hall, her stomach betrayed her by growling. Loudly.
Martha snickered. “Guess we’re about to find out if the prince can use a stove.”
Lena pushed a loose strand of hair from her cheek with the back of her wrist, leaving a faint streak of white across her skin. “He’s probably just burning toast.”
But when Logan reappeared, he didn’t smell like smoke. He smelled like garlic and butter and something roasted.
He hovered in the doorway for a second, looking oddly unsure, then cleared his throat. “Lunch is… ready. If you want it.”
“What did you do?” Lena asked.
“Pasta,” he said. “With chicken. And… some salad thing I kind of improvised. I watched a video once. Don’t worry, I tasted it. I’m not dead.”
Mark set his roller down. “We’re taking a break anyway. Lead the way, Chef.”
The kitchen was on the east side of the house, through two more hallways and past a living room that looked like a furniture catalog. The kitchen itself was huge—two islands, double fridge, six-burner stove, polished stone counters, glass-front cabinets displaying rows of perfect dishes.
Lena paused at the threshold, feeling like she’d walked into the behind-the-scenes of a cooking show.
Logan had, in fact, cooked.
A big pot of pasta sat on a back burner, steam rising lazily. A pan of chicken in a creamy sauce rested on a trivet. On one of the islands, he’d assembled a large bowl of salad—greens, chopped tomatoes, something that looked like toasted nuts, and a dressing that clung in pale gold streaks.
He looked oddly proud and vaguely terrified.
“Whoa,” Martha said. “Okay, rich kid. Respect.”
“You actually did this?” Mark asked, picking up a wooden spoon.
“Is that so shocking?” Logan said.
“On a scale from one to yes,” Lena said, “it’s a solid absolutely.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” he muttered.
They ate at the smaller breakfast table near the windows, sunlight pouring over the polished wood. The city looked miniaturized in the distance, like a backdrop.
The food… was good. The pasta was maybe a bit overcooked, but the sauce had flavor. The chicken was tender. The salad was surprisingly balanced. Lena took a cautious bite, then another, then had to admit her body was grateful for something warm and real.
She watched Logan out of the corner of her eye. He didn’t really sit; he hovered near the stove, as if ready to throw himself between them and the food if it exploded.
“You’re not eating?” she asked.
“Waiting to see if you drop dead first,” he shot back.
Martha raised her fork. “If I die, tell my sister she still owes me fifty bucks.”
Mark shook his head. “If you die, I’m taking your drill.”
“Asshole,” she said affectionately.
Lena’s lips twitched. “Relax, Logan,” she said. “It’s good.”
He looked up sharply at that. Her face was neutral enough, but her gaze held his for an extra heartbeat.
“Yeah?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said, and took another bite. “You get, like… eighty percent of a real cook.”
He let out a breath she hadn’t realized he was holding and dropped into a chair across from her. “I’ll take it,” he said. “Eighty is a solid B.”
He watched her eat more than he ate himself, his gaze sliding to the paint flecks on her fingers, the way she shoved her sleeves up without thinking, the little crease between her eyebrows that only smoothed when she forgot someone was looking.
“So, Harborview, huh?” he asked after a minute. “You always lived down there?”
“Pretty much,” she said. “Why? That offend you?”
“Not at all,” he said quickly. “Just… haven’t really spent time there.”
“Bet you haven’t,” she murmured.
“Hey, I’ve driven through,” he protested. “I know your shop. Blue door, right near that old chapel. There’s a taco truck that parks across from it some nights.”
She eyed him. “You remember the taco truck but not the people inside the building.”
“Hey, tacos are important,” he said. “Besides, I remember you now.”
He said it like a promise.
Lena shifted in her seat, the back of her knee bumping the table leg. Something jittery buzzed under her skin. She wasn’t used to being the center of anyone’s attention, especially not someone like him. The entire time she’d gone to Northside High, she’d practically been wallpaper.
The only time she hadn’t been invisible was that masked dance. And even then, the moment had belonged more to Ethan’s world than hers.
“Logan,” she said, chasing a bit of chicken around her plate with her fork, “I appreciate the food. Really. But you don’t have to… fuss over me. I’m just the paint girl.”
He frowned. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“It’s not a bad thing,” she said. “It’s just not a permanent thing in your life. We’re here for a few days. Then we’re gone. You’ll forget my name the second the walls dry.”
He leaned forward, forearms braced on the table. His voice dropped, the usual joking tone softening at the edges. “I don’t think I will,” he said.
Something warm crawled up her neck again. She stabbed a tomato a little too hard.
Mark cleared his throat, reading the shift in the air. “Alright, kids,” he said, standing. “Break’s over. Before Vivian shows up and finds us eating instead of making her walls pretty.”
They wrapped up lunch, rinsed dishes, and left them in the dishwasher. Logan insisted on doing the rinsing himself, sleeves pushed up, water splashing his T-shirt. He looked almost normal that way, less like a trust fund baby and more like some college kid washing up after a party.
On the way back to the west wing, he walked beside Lena, hands sliding into his pockets again.
“So,” he said, “how many days is this renovation thing?”
“Depends on how many secrets your walls are hiding,” she said. “A week, maybe more.”
“Then I’ve got time,” he said.
“Time for what?” she asked, even though she was pretty sure she knew.
“To convince you I’m not just some kid who burns toast and goes to clubs,” he said. “And that this house isn’t as awful as it looks.”
Lena let out a breath that was half laugh, half something else. “The house is gorgeous,” she said. “That’s not the problem.”
“What is?”
“The part where it’s not my world,” she said, then walked a little faster, forcing him to lengthen his stride if he wanted to keep up.
He did.
The room looked different when they returned. The primer had dried on half the walls, brightening the space. The old wallpaper patterns were faintly visible under the fresh coat, like ghosts being pushed back.
The hours after lunch blurred into a pattern of movement and small noises.
Rollers shushing up and down. Brushes scraping in corners. Ladders shifting. The occasional murmur of voices when someone asked for more tape or pointed out a crack that needed patching.
Lena worked with her usual stubborn focus. Sweat gathered at the back of her neck; a fine dusting of dried primer clung to the hair along her hairline. Her braid grew messier, strands escaping to stick to her cheek.
Every now and then, when she turned too fast, she caught Logan leaning in the doorway, watching. Sometimes he’d come in and offer to hold a ladder or move a drop cloth. Sometimes he’d try a joke. Sometimes he’d say nothing at all, just look at her like she was something he’d discovered and wasn’t sure what to do with yet.
At one point, she climbed up onto a stepladder to reach the top corner where the wall met the ceiling. From that angle, she could see more of the room—and beyond, down the hall, into part of another space.
A doorway stood partly open, revealing a glimpse of what had to be a home office. Dark wood desk, large monitor, leather chair. On the wall facing the hallway, a framed set of blueprints or architectural drawings was visible.
Even from up on the ladder, she recognized the clean, precise lines.
That, she thought, must be Ethan’s space.
The idea stirred something low in her chest she didn’t want to name. Pride wasn’t the right word. Anger wasn’t, either. It was just… strange, seeing evidence of his adult life, his work, his success—an entire reality he’d built while she was mixing paint and hauling boxes.
Her hand faltered on the roller. A tiny drip of primer slid down toward the plastic-covered floor.
“Careful,” Logan said quietly from below. “You okay up there?”
“I’m fine,” she said, forcing her attention back to the wall. “Just thinking.”
“About what?”
“Angles,” she lied. “If we don’t get this line straight, it’ll make your mom crazy.”
He laughed softly. “She was born that way.”
The afternoon light shifted slowly across the room, inching from one wall to the other. Outside, the sky went from pale blue to something deeper. From the windows, Lena watched the city below slip into a hazy mid-afternoon glow.
Around three, Vivian returned.
Lena knew before she saw her. The sound of heels on marble approached like a warning. Voices in the hall dropped in volume, the same way they had when Logan had wandered in, but with more caution.
Vivian stepped into the sitting room and stopped, assessing.
Her gaze swept over the walls, the taped edges, the neatly stacked supplies. Then it landed on Lena, who was wiping sweat off her forehead with the inside of her wrist, leaving another faint streak of white on her skin.
“Progress,” Vivian said. “Good.”
“We got two coats of primer on these walls,” Lena said, gesturing with her chin toward the finished section. “The mold in the bathroom is under treatment. We’ll be ready for actual color by tomorrow morning.”
“And the hallway?” Vivian asked.
“First pass on repairs is done,” Mark chimed in from near the door. “We’re patching cracks tonight, sanding in the morning.”
Vivian nodded once. “And you’re still okay staying late?” she asked Lena. “We can have a car take you home.”
Lena’s muscles protested already, but she ignored them. “I’ll manage,” she said. “We can at least finish this room’s primer tonight.”
Vivian noted it, then turned as if to leave—only to pause when she noticed Logan propped in the doorway.
“What are you doing?” she asked. No hello, no softening.
“Helping,” he said. “And feeding.”
“She made you cook?” Vivian asked, one brow arching.
“I made them food,” he said. “Eighty percent success rate, apparently.”
Vivian exhaled something that might have been the ghost of a laugh. Then her gaze flicked from him to Lena and back, something quickly calculating behind her eyes.
“Don’t get underfoot,” she said. “You have classes, remember? And… other responsibilities.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered.
She turned back to Lena. “You’ll need to eat again if you’re here late,” she said. “Come to the dining room at seven. The staff will set an extra place. After that, we can go over the master suite plans.”
It took Lena a second to process that. Dinner. At the main table. In this house.
Her first instinct was to refuse. She didn’t belong there. Workers ate in the kitchen, or in the yard, or not at all.
“I don’t want to be in the way,” she said.
Vivian waved that off. “You’re leading the work in this wing. You’re not in the way. Seven.”
It wasn’t really a request.
Lena swallowed. “Okay.”
Vivian gave the room one more critical once-over and left, heels ticking back down the hall.
As soon as she disappeared, Logan leaned against the doorframe, arms folded. “You got promoted,” he said. “Most contractors don’t get invited to dinner. I never get invited to dinner.”
“You live here,” Lena said.
“Exactly,” he said. “I’m old news.”
Lena tried to laugh, but her brain was already racing ahead, imagining the dinner table, the place settings, the way she would stick out no matter how still she sat.
She pushed the thought aside and focused on finishing the last section of primer before evening.
They worked until the light outside shifted from bright to the softer glow of early evening. Lamps clicked on in the hallway. The shadows in the corners of the room deepened.
By the time the old wall was fully coated in fresh primer, Lena’s arms felt like they weren’t entirely attached to her shoulders anymore. Her lower back ached in a familiar, dull way. A faint line of pain throbbed behind her eyes from fumes and focus.
She checked the time on her phone: 6:35.
“Go,” Martha said, noticing where she was looking. “If you’re supposed to be at fancy dinner at seven, you can’t go smelling like mold killer.”
“I still smell better than your boyfriend,” Lena said.
“Rude,” Martha said, grinning. “Accurate, but rude.”
“Text me if anything seems weird with the cleaner in the bathroom,” Lena said. “And don’t let Mark fall off a ladder.”
“I only fall gracefully,” Mark called from across the room.
Lena left her roller taped upright in a bucket, peeled off her gloves, and wiped her hands with a rag until the worst of the primer was gone. She tugged her braid loose, finger-combed her hair as best she could, then twisted it back up, tighter this time.
In the hallway mirror, she looked like exactly what she was: a tired girl in a paint-smeared kurti, face lightly dusted with white flecks, cheeks flushed from work. Her eyes, dark and steady, gave nothing away unless she let them.
She considered splashing cold water on her face in the bathroom, but the cleaner smell was still sharp in there. Instead, she just took a long breath, squared her shoulders, and followed the sound of clinking dishes down the hall.
The dining room was on the east side, with tall windows overlooking the city. By the time she found it, the sky outside had gone streaked—orange fading into purple, the first city lights flickering to life below like scattered fireflies.
The table itself was long, polished wood, set with placemats, plates, and silverware that probably cost more individually than everything in her kitchen combined. Three places were set: one at the head, two along the sides. A fourth place had been added near the middle, clearly for her.
Lena hovered in the doorway for a second, not sure if she was supposed to walk in on her own or wait to be formally brought. Before she could decide, Logan appeared at her elbow.
“There you are,” he said. “Was starting to think you bailed.”
“I got lost in the mold,” she said.
He snorted. “Come on.”
He led her in, gesturing at the empty chair. She walked carefully, conscious of the way her sneakers squeaked faintly on the polished floor, the whisper of her clothes, the weight of the room’s silence.
Vivian was already seated at the head of the table, a glass of white wine in her hand. She’d changed into a dark green dress, something simple but obviously expensive. Her hair was pinned up now, exposing the line of her neck and a pair of small diamond earrings.
Chloe sat halfway down the table on the opposite side, scrolling lazily through her phone. She wore a black tank top tucked into a short skirt, makeup lined sharp around her eyes. A delicate chain wrapped twice around her neck. She barely looked up when Lena entered.
Lena slid into her seat, acutely aware of every centimeter of distance between her and the polished wood.
Vivian nodded once in her direction. “Good evening,” she said. “How’s the progress?”
“We should finish the sitting room primer tonight,” Lena said. “Bathroom treatment is halfway done. We’ll need to ventilate it overnight.”
Vivian nodded. “Good.”
A server appeared—a woman Lena had glimpsed earlier in the kitchen—carrying a dish of roasted vegetables and a platter of something that smelled like lemon and herbs. She moved efficiently, placing food on the table, refilling glasses of water from a chilled pitcher.
“Logan cooked lunch for the crew,” Vivian said, turning her wine glass by the stem. “Did you survive?”
“He did fine,” Lena said, surprising herself by sounding sincere. “It was good.”
Logan, who had just dropped into the chair across from Lena, glanced at her, a quick flick of grateful surprise moving across his face.
“See?” he said. “I’m not totally useless.”
“Don’t let it go to your head,” Chloe muttered without looking up from her phone.
“Hi, to you too,” he said. “Nice to know your thumbs are still functioning.”
She gave him a flat look, then finally let her gaze skim over Lena. It was quick, assessing, more interested than hostile.
“So you’re the paint girl,” Chloe said.
Lena forced herself not to flinch at the label. “Something like that,” she said. “We handle supplies, not just paint.”
“From the harbor?” Chloe asked. “I used to get pier fries there when I was a kid. Thought the whole place smelled like fish and old french fry oil.”
“That’s… not entirely wrong,” Lena said.
Chloe smiled faintly. “It’s kind of charming in a gross way.”
“I’ll tell my neighborhood committee you said that,” Lena said.
Logan snorted into his water.
The server finished placing everything and retreated quietly. For a minute, the only sounds were the clink of cutlery and distant traffic through the open window.
Lena focused on her plate—crest of mashed potatoes, slice of grilled chicken, roasted carrots that glowed orange in the warm light. The food was good. Too good. Every bite made her uncomfortably aware of what she was used to eating most nights.
Vivian watched her over the rim of her glass. “How long have you worked at Harborview Supply?” she asked.
“Since I was fifteen,” Lena said. “My family owns it, so… a while.”
“Family business,” Vivian said. “Is that what you always wanted to do?”
The question caught Lena off guard. She swallowed carefully, the mashed potatoes suddenly dryer. “Want and get are different things,” she said. “I like working with my hands. I like fixing things. Paint and plaster are more honest than most people.”
Logan’s gaze sharpened at that, like he recognized himself in it somewhere.
“Do you plan on staying there?” Vivian asked. “Or is this temporary?”
“Life is temporary,” Lena said before she could stop herself. “The shop is… what we have. My grandmother raised us in the back room. My little brother’s medical equipment gets paid from that counter. So yeah. For now, I’m staying.”
The silence that followed that had a different flavor, heavier, more aware.
“Medical equipment?” Logan asked quietly.
“Noah’s in a wheelchair,” she said. “He was born with some complications. It’s… hard. But he’s stubborn. He draws better than anyone I know.”
The image of Noah at their rickety kitchen table flashed in her mind—the way he hunched over his sketchpad, pencil smudging the side of his hand, tongue sticking out slightly in concentration. The way he’d look up when she came home, eyes bright even when his body betrayed him.
Something in her chest tightened unexpectedly.
“Do you have any of his drawings on your phone?” Chloe asked suddenly, leaning forward a notch. Her expression had softened slightly, as if something about the mention of art had caught her interest.
“Uh… yeah,” Lena said. “Some.”
“Can I see?” Chloe asked.
The shift surprised her. But she pulled out her phone anyway, thumb flicking through her gallery until she reached the folder labeled NOAH. She slid the phone across the table, screen turned toward Chloe.
The girl studied the images—charcoal sketches of the harbor, a detailed drawing of their building’s stairwell, a study of their grandmother’s hands. Her painted mouth parted slightly.
“He did these?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Lena said.
“These are… good,” Chloe said. The word sounded genuine, not polite. “Like, actually good. He should post them or something.”
“We don’t really have time for… posting,” Lena said. “He sketches between appointments and when he’s not exhausted from physical therapy.”
Chloe’s focus stayed on the screen for another few seconds. “You should show Ethan,” she said quietly, almost to herself. “He’d like these.”
The mention of Ethan’s name hit Lena like a quick, small blow. She tried not to show it.
“He’s out of town,” Logan said. “Again.”
“Of course he is,” Chloe said, rolling her eyes. “The great hero of Crestview, making deals and saving the estate one merger at a time.”
Vivian’s lips thinned. “Your brother is doing what your father taught him to do,” she said. “Somebody has to take responsibility.”
The undercurrent there was sharp enough that even Lena, an outsider at this table, could feel it.
“Anyway,” Logan said, a little too loudly, as if trying to redirect the energy. “We should all go to Harborview sometime. Get those pier fries. Buy paint we don’t need. See where the magic happens.”
“Your idea of fun is so weird,” Chloe said, but there was a hint of a smile in it.
“You wouldn’t dare set foot down there,” Vivian said. “Paparazzi would have a field day.”
“We don’t have paparazzi,” Logan said. “We have bored teenagers with TikTok.”
“Same thing,” she said.
Lena ate quietly, letting their conversation wash over her. She picked up fragments—jokes about Logan sleeping until noon, Chloe’s complaints about “stuffy charity galas,” hints about Ethan’s travel schedule. Deals in Chicago. Meetings in New York. Late-night calls with lawyers and accountants.
Ethan, whose existence used to be defined by school hallways and basketball courts and his father’s silver car suddenly pulling up outside the gates.
Now he was a ghost who moved through cities she’d only seen on TV, his name on contracts and company newsletters, his life measuring itself in miles and zeros.
At one point, Chloe said, “He texted earlier. Said his flight got delayed. Again.”
Vivian’s fingers tightened slightly around her wine glass stem.
“He’ll get here when he gets here,” she said. “He always does.”
Logan didn’t say anything, but something bitter flashed across his face so quickly Lena almost thought she’d imagined it.
After dinner, when plates had been cleared and the sky outside was fully dark, Vivian stood.
“Come with me,” she said to Lena. “Let’s go over the master suite.”
Lena’s stomach fluttered once. Logan looked like he wanted to say something but didn’t.
She followed Vivian down the hall, up a short set of steps, and through a door that felt heavier than the others.
The master suite was another world entirely.
Soft rugs muffled their footsteps. The walls were painted a deep, rich color—once elegant, now a little suffocating. Floor-to-ceiling curtains framed a set of glass doors leading to a private balcony. A king-sized bed sat in the middle of the room, made with military precision, pillows arranged in an artful pile.
On the far end, a sitting area with a small sofa, two armchairs, a low table with a vase of fresh flowers. Opposite that, a doorway to a walk-in closet—a forest of clothes in color order, shoes lined up in rows like soldiers.
The air smelled like leftover perfume and brand-new fabric.
Vivian walked into the center of the room, turning slowly as if seeing it for the first time, too.
“I can never decide if I love this room or hate it,” she said.
“What do you want it to feel like?” Lena asked.
Vivian looked toward the balcony, where the city lights shimmered in miniature. “Less like a mausoleum,” she said. “More like… a place I actually live in, not one I borrowed from someone else’s past. My husband never changed anything much after his first wife died. When I moved in, he said there was no point. Said I’d probably leave eventually.”
She said it lightly, but something sharp moved under the words.
“What do you want?” Lena asked again, choosing her words carefully.
“For once?” Vivian said. “I want the room to look like mine.”
They walked through the space together.
Vivian gestured at the heavy drapes. “Lighter. Something that lets in more light.”
Lena nodded. “We can reframe the window with trim that doesn’t feel so boxy. Maybe paint that doesn’t swallow the light.”
Vivian’s fingers skimmed the edge of the dressing table. “I’m tired of this color. It looked good in the early 2000s. Now it just looks… like it’s pretending.”
“We can sand and restain,” Lena said. “Or replace. Depends on your budget.”
Vivian’s mouth curved. “Budget is not your concern. I want to know what will make it look right.”
Lena’s nails dug lightly into her palm. The idea of “budget is not your concern” was so far from her daily life it almost made her laugh.
She walked slowly around the perimeter of the room, imagining different tones, mapping them against the way the lamps cast their light, the way morning would come through the glass.
“You have a lot of vertical space,” she said. “We can play with that. Maybe a lighter ceiling color to open it up. Something warmer on the walls, not too bright. The kind of tone that makes shadows look soft, not harsh.”
Vivian watched her, eyes narrowed, as if she were more interesting than the room for a second.
“You really like this, don’t you?” she said.
“Painting?” Lena asked. “Sure. It’s the one part of most things you can undo if you screw it up.”
“I meant… turning things,” Vivian said, making a vague gesture, “from what they were into something else.”
Lena thought about Harborview—the cracked plaster patched with care, the way a fresh coat of paint could make even a crumbling stairwell feel like a promise again. She thought about her grandmother’s hands, permanently stained with dye and soap.
“I like when something doesn’t have to stay broken,” she said quietly.
Vivian’s gaze flicked to her face, softer now. “You remind me a little of Ethan,” she said.
Lena’s heart did an odd double beat. “What?”
“In the way you talk about work,” Vivian said. “He gets that same look when he’s talking about deals or restructuring or whatever it is he does all night. Like he can see the future of something when the rest of us are just complaining about the present.”
It was a strange thing to hear from her. Stranger still: the tiny filament of pride that lit in Lena’s chest at being compared to him in any way.
“Does he… like his work?” she asked before she could stop herself.
Vivian took a breath, then let it out slowly. “He likes being in control of something,” she said. “He likes feeling like he can fix what his father left him. Whether it will fix anything else is another question.”
She checked the time on her watch. “It’s late,” she said. “You should get back to the crew. Finish what you can tonight; we’ll pick up in the morning. I’ll have the car drop you home when you’re done.”
Lena’s legs ached at the thought of more hours on her feet, but the idea of stepping back into the cool night air with this place behind her—at least for a few hours—pulled her forward.
Back in the sitting room, the crew had made good progress. The walls gleamed with fresh primer, transforming the once-heavy space into something blank and expectant.
“Not bad for day one,” Mark said, stretching his neck until it popped.
“Not bad at all,” Lena said.
They pushed to finish the last corner, the room smelling stronger now that the windows had been closed for dinner and a chill was creeping in outside. Lena’s head felt fuzzy at the edges from the fumes and fatigue, but she kept her movements precise.
By the time they cleaned the rollers and sealed the paint cans, it was after nine.
Logan reappeared, leaning in the doorway with his arms braced against either side of the frame.
“You look like you’ve been in a fight with a snowstorm,” he said, eyeing the white flecks on Lena’s clothes and in her hair.
“I won,” she said. “Barely.”
He stepped further inside, close enough that she could see the faint constellation of freckles across his nose, the way his lashes cast small shadows on his cheeks when he blinked.
“The car’s waiting out front,” he said. “I’ll walk you.”
“You don’t have to,” she said automatically.
He shrugged. “I want to.”
She considered refusing again, the instinct to keep distance humming in her chest like a warning. But her legs were turning to lead, and the idea of navigating the winding front steps in the dark alone wasn’t appealing.
“Fine,” she said. “But if you fall down the stairs, I’m not carrying you.”
“Fair,” he said.
They walked slowly down the hall, lights dimmed to a softer level now. The house felt different at night, less like a museum and more like a sleeping animal, breathing quietly around them.
At the top of the staircase, Lena glanced down at the foyer. The big photograph of Ethan and his father glowed faintly in the low light, the glass catching just enough reflection to blur their faces.
Her chest tightened in a way she didn’t have words for.
“You knew him from school, right?” Logan asked quietly, as if he could follow her gaze.
She almost missed a step. “What?”
“Ethan,” he said. “You went to Northside. I saw the yearbooks once. You’re in them. You were in his year.”
“Lots of people were in his year,” she said.
“Did you guys ever… talk?” Logan asked.
Memories flickered—passing in hallways, the one time he’d said “nice shot” when she’d accidentally sunk a three-pointer in gym, the masked dance, the kiss.
“Not really,” she said. “He had his crowd. I had… mine, I guess.”
“Your crowd or your corner?” Logan asked gently.
She didn’t answer.
Outside, the night air hit her skin like a shock. Cool, with a trace of dampness from the bay. The city below was sprinkled with lights, a scatter of constellations upside down.
A black sedan waited at the foot of the steps, engine idling quietly. The driver stood by the rear door, holding it open.
Lena turned to Logan.
“Thanks,” she said. “For lunch. And the escort.”
He gave her that lopsided grin again, but it was softer now, less cocky.
“I meant what I said earlier,” he said. “You being here… it makes this place feel less like a trap.”
“Feels like a trap to me,” she said.
“Then we can be trapped together,” he said.
She rolled her eyes, but her lips curved despite herself. “Goodnight, Logan.”
“Goodnight, Lena.”
She slid into the back seat. The leather was cool against the backs of her legs. As the car pulled away, she looked out the window at the house.
From this angle, Crestview Estate looked like a postcard—perfect, distant, untouchable. Light glowed in a few of the upstairs windows. Somewhere in one of those rooms, a bed waited for a man who was still in a different time zone, a brother who carried half the weight of that place on his shoulders.
The thought of Ethan being out there, not in a memory but in motion—walking through some airport, checking his watch, boarding a plane back toward this house—made her stomach flutter in a way that had nothing to do with the day’s work.
She leaned her head against the cool glass, watching the estate shrink in the side mirror, the trees along the driveway sliding past in a blur.
Down the hill, toward Harborview, the lights grew closer together. The air changed, warmer, heavy with exhaust and the smell of the docks. Her world reassembled itself around her—the narrow streets, the noise, the chipped paint on the door of Harborview Supply.
But something had shifted.
She’d spent the whole day inside Ethan’s world—even without him there.
Paint on her hands. His family’s voices in her ears. The weight of his absence hanging above his father’s picture. Logan’s gaze, hungry and young, tracking her like she’d suddenly become the most interesting thing in his line of sight.
It felt like walking across a frozen lake, hearing cracks form underfoot but not knowing yet where the ice would give way.
When the car stopped in front of her building, she stepped out into the familiar grit of her street, the sound of a neighbor’s TV blaring through an open window, someone arguing in Spanish down the block. The sedan pulled away, its polished black body catching the lamplight and then disappearing into the dark.
Lena stood there for a second, the strap of her bag cutting into her shoulder, the faint ghost of the estate still clinging to her skin like the echo of someone’s perfume.
Then she climbed the stairs, each creak underfoot real in a way marble could never be, and went inside.
She didn’t know yet that the next time she walked into Crestview Estate, the sitting room would smell like police tape and Vivian’s master suite would be a crime scene.
For now, all she knew was the steady ache in her muscles, the way Noah’s face lit up when he saw her, and the persistent, uncomfortable awareness that somewhere out there, a man she’d kissed once behind a paper mask was on his way back into her orbit.
And that the house she’d just spent all day trying to repaint was hiding more than mold in its walls.
