The Cunning Thief (Stolen Hearts #6)(7)

Working alone didn’t bother her. She got to blast her music and get lost in the job. Before she knew it, the sun would be setting and she’d be binging on Netflix until she fell asleep. There was a special kind of joy in doing something you loved for a living. Wasn’t it a saying? If you do what you love, you never work a day in your life? Considering the various aches and pains in her body during any given day, she would say that was not so accurate, but there were parts of it that rang true.

The house was cold because she would leave all the windows open to let the dust from the vinyl escape, but once she worked long enough, the home would warm up. Even winter in Florida was warm. The sooner she got started, the sooner it would be finished.

Shae started back for the house and took her attention off her new neighbor. If she worked as much as she wanted to, she probably wouldn’t see him again. The house she was renovating, currently nicknamed Seaside Escape, was still pretty from the outside, even if it was basically falling apart. The house had a wraparound porch that had covered all four sides of the house, so the view of the ocean could be appreciated from almost anywhere. The house was two stories tall, and pretty much the entire back wall was floor-to-ceiling windows so the ocean could be seen. There were no curtains, and she didn’t think she was going to add any. She didn’t want to do anything to obscure the main selling feature of the home. It was shit for privacy if there were any boats on the ocean, but who cared when the view was that nice? She just about reached the back porch when she realized that her neighbor hadn’t disappeared into the McCormick house. He was walking over to her.

She turned and for the first time got a good look at the man. Immediately, she felt she was thrown back in the closet and the stranger was next to her, promising that he would be right back. Shae blinked the image away and tried to bring herself back to the present. No, that man was long gone. John, or whatever his name had been, wasn’t really showing up at her doorstep.

Besides, she’d never even seen him. His entire body had been silhouetted when the door had been open, and then the room had plunged into utter darkness. Her mind was playing tricks on her.

She tried to get her social face on. She probably looked a mess considering she hadn’t gotten home until well past two in the morning, and after that little mini kidnapping, sleep had been evasive. She tried to ignore her makeup-less face and the circles under her eyes as she plastered on a smile for the approaching neighbor. “Hey there,” she said in the most charming tone she could muster. “I hope I wasn’t too loud for you this morning. I didn’t realize there was anyone staying at McCormick Place.”

As she looked up at the man, she became suddenly so much more embarrassed that she wasn’t wearing any makeup. This guy did not belong in the sweet little seaside community. He belonged on the sexy beach scene of Miami. He belonged in the streets of New York City. He belonged on a movie screen in LA. He was tall and lean, with gorgeous black hair that was pushed back carelessly. She didn’t even think he had gel in it. It just happened to lie perfectly.

His cheekbones were model perfect, and the little bit of stubble along his jawline somehow only made him look more charming. He wore a pair of dark-wash jeans that looked as though they’d never seen a day of work in their life and a black T-shirt. Not exactly the shorts and sandals beach look she was used to seeing, but damn if he didn’t wear it well. Shae knew she could clean up okay when she wanted to, but she wasn’t anywhere close to being cleaned up right now.

She kind of wasn’t even on the same planet as this gorgeous man in front of her. Which made her all the more curious about why he was in front of her right now. He held out a hand, and she cautiously met it in a handshake. Still waiting for the other ball to drop.

“I wanted to introduce myself,” the man said.

Even though she already ruled him out as the man she’d been trapped in the closet with last night, she still listened closely to his voice. The man from last night had had a deep, confident voice. This seemed... happy-go-lucky? Dammit, why couldn’t she think straight? It could’ve been the same one. Everything from last night happened so fast. It never occurred to her that she’d have to memorize what his voice sounded like. She’d been scared and jumpy. To be honest, she still was. For all she knew, this was one of Damask’s men sent to spy on her. The suddenly paranoid thought had her straightening and looking at this man with newly critical eyes. That’s why some super-hot man would be talking to her. For all she knew, this was the same guy who threw the brick into her window. It wouldn’t be hard for Damask’s men to rent the house next door. In fact, it would be a smart way to keep tabs on her. A way to get rid of her....

“Are you okay?” the man asked with a puzzled expression.

Shae blinked and tried to swallow down her fear. She wasn’t convinced her paranoia was unjustified, but he didn’t need to know everything she was thinking. “I’m okay. It’s still early for me.”

The man looked at his watch. “Twelve o’clock?”

“It was a late night,” she said without offering any other explanation. “Can I help you?”

He let out a laugh. “Sorry. I came over to introduce myself and haven’t even told you my name yet. I’m Tristan.”

Tristan, not John. Not that it would be hard to say a fake name. But if he were the guy in the closet with her, why would he lie about it? The whole thing was too off to her. She missed her vinyl flooring. The flooring didn’t make her paranoid. Vinyl flooring made sense.