It was obvious his offer gave her pause.
“You’ll get more done,” he said.
“Stop making sense.”
He fought a smirk. “I’m only forced to do that because you’re so stubborn.”
“I’m not stubborn. I’m independent.”
“Noah?” Caleb called over his shoulder. “Would you rather have Jules help you or me help you?”
“You have any idea what you’re doing?” Noah asked.
“Yes.”
“Then you.”
“I’ve got Noah’s vote,” Caleb said to Jules.
“Since when is this a democracy?”
“He’s right,” Melissa called from the patio. “We’ll get more done if Caleb helps us.”
Jules kept her gaze on Caleb while she answered. “He’s up to something. Watfords don’t help you. They stab you in the back.”
Caleb blew out a breath of frustration. “You honestly think I had time in the past five minutes to come up with a master plot to do you some kind of harm by roofing?”
“You’ve got the cunning gene.”
He pulled out his phone. “Tell you what. I’ll sweeten the deal.” He pressed Matt’s speed dial. “I’ll get us another guy and speed things up even more.”
“Who are you calling?” she asked, but Caleb was already speaking to Matt.
He quickly sketched out the problem and ended the call. “Matt’s heading over,” he told Noah.
Jules’s face had gone a shade darker with her anger. She was even prettier if that was possible.
“You are an unbelievable bully,” she told him.
He leaned in close, lowering his voice. “Now that I’ve seen that beautiful body, I can’t bear the thought of anything happening to it.”
She sucked in a breath of obvious shock.
He pulled back and put a hand on her shoulder. “Please get down off the roof, Jules. It’s more dangerous than you know. And I truly don’t want you to get hurt.”
“He’s right,” Noah said. “Facts are facts. We’ve got two capable volunteers, it makes sense they should do the work up here.”
“Okay,” Jules said tightly, clearly reluctant to give in to logic and reason. Then she leaned close to Caleb’s ear. “Don’t you dare bring that up again.”
She was right to be annoyed. He truly wanted to keep his promise to leave San Francisco in San Francisco. But he wasn’t sure if he could. They’d made love. He couldn’t undo it, and he sure couldn’t forget it.
She was in his head and under his skin. He liked her, and he desired her. In his weaker moments, he found himself contemplating a relationship with her. But that wasn’t about to happen. They were locked in a battle only one of them could win.
She climbed down the ladder and disappeared inside with Melissa.
“I wasn’t sure which way that would go,” Noah said to Caleb.
“Neither was I.”
“She definitely doesn’t trust you.”
“Yet, she trusts you.” Caleb glanced around to see shingle bundles and strips of flashing.
“I’m not trying to destroy her business.”
“I’ve never killed anybody.” As soon as the taunt was out, Caleb regretted it.
But Noah seemed to take it in stride. “Put that on your résumé, do you?”
“That was out of line.”
Noah gave a shrug. “Nothing I haven’t heard before.”
Caleb hesitated over his next words. But because it was all wrapped up in Jules, he dived in. “I’ll understand if you don’t want to tell me what happened.”
Noah extracted a blade from his tool belt and headed for a bundle of shingles. “It was my stepfather. He attacked my sixteen-year-old sister. I stepped in and stopped him, and he grabbed a knife.” Noah raised his bare forearm. “I got a scar, and he hit his head on the way down.”
“So, totally self-defense.” Caleb couldn’t understand why Noah had gone to jail at all.
“My sister mentally blocked the attack, so I didn’t have a witness.”
“Did she ever remember?” Caleb was thinking Noah might be able to get his record expunged.
“I hope she never does.”
“Okay, now I trust you, too.”
Noah gave a wry smile. “Not my priority, but I’ll take it.”
“I’m trying to find a way through this, you know.” For some reason Caleb wanted to explain himself to Noah.
“Nothing to do with me,” Noah said, shifting the bundle of shingles.
“She’s better off with Neo down the street than being out here all on her own.”
“You mean they’re better off?”