“Figured you’d be digging or something.”

“I have been. I left Roy and Gabe clearing and leveling the walkway. Stone and sand coming this afternoon. I can’t get some of what I want from Best Blooms, so I have to head out to one of the bigger garden centers. I want a good-sized weeping dogwood, for one thing.”

He tipped down his sunglasses. “You’re going to fit a tree in that car?”

“No, I’m buying a truck on the way there.”

And just kept studying her over the tops. “You’re buying a truck on your way to pick up a tree.”

“I ordered it over the phone this morning.”

“You ordered—I have to stop repeating what you say just because what you say is weird.”

“It’s not weird. They had what I want, they’re starting the paperwork. I go in, boom, boom, drive off and get the tree, and so on. Anyway, are you still my lawyer?”

“I … could be.”

“I need a quick minute. Let’s pull over.”

Since she did, he, baffled, followed suit. Got out as she did.

She wore brown cargo pants, strong boots, an unzipped red hoodie over a pale yellow tee.

“Okay, the Hubbards accepted my offer. I signed the contract this morning.”

Zero to sixty, he thought again. “You’ve had a busy morning.”

“Best kind. So, can you contact the Realtor? Lakeview Realty, Charmaine’s handling it. And do what lawyers do? That’s a really excellent car, by the way. I don’t really know cars, but I can see that’s a blow-up-your-skirt kind of car.”

“Whose skirt?”

“Since I’m not wearing one, whoever.”

She shifted to study his sleek, silver Porsche. “Yep. That’s an excellent single guy’s car.”

“I’m a single guy.”

“Yeah, I need a truck. But if I could also have an excellent car, that one would be top of the list. Anyway, can you handle this deal?”

“I can, conditionally.”

Now she tipped down her sunglasses, peered over them with suspicious eyes. “Do you take after Emily?”

He’d liked her, Zane thought, because she’d made Emily so damn happy. Now, he realized, he just liked her.

“Maybe she takes after me. Here’s the deal. I do it pro bono.”

“I don’t need—”

“I do. I’ve spent the last eight years as an ADA. I haven’t done much general law. You’d be practice, and I need it. A simple settlement’s an easy way to slide in. I just finished getting office space in town. Haven’t even hung out my shingle, so to speak. I need the practice, kind of like you had to get your foot in the door with Walker Lakeside Bungalows. So it’s pro bono.”

“Maybe.”

“And you can pay me back with a free consult.”

Now those suspicious eyes—and they were kind of fabulous—showed some interest. “On what?”

“I’m figuring on buying a house. I’m also having a busy morning, heading out to look at one. I looked at one already, and that’s probably it, but I’m looking at a couple more first.”

She held up a finger. “It’s going to be the one way up on the ridge on this side of the lake. The one that’s like it’s built into the hill. All the glass, that sloped, uneven ground with the big drop-off in front, the view people would commit murder for.”

Well, he thought, son of a bitch. “Why?”

“Because, not unlike your car, it’s amazing. I looked at it myself—just to look, because it wasn’t what the business needs. It may have pulled at my guts, but I need the spread of land, the location nearer town. Plus, there’s the stickiness of the price. They’re only selling because he accepted a transfer to London, their kids are grown, she’s an artist who can work anywhere, and she has cousins in Brighton.”

“How do you know all that?”

“They told me. People do that, tell me. Am I right?”

“Maybe. Probably. I’m thinking about it.”

After tapping her sunglasses back up, she beamed at him. Megawatt-style. “You should buy it so I can landscape the crap out of it. It’s got nice work now, but I could make it as magical as the view. Anyway, consults are free all the time, for everyone.”

“Do you make everyone dizzy?”

“I don’t think so. I’ve got to go. Charmaine, the same one who’s handling the house you should buy. We’ll figure out the rest later.”

“Darby?”

She paused, one hand on the car door.

“How’d you break your nose?”

“Ex-husband. You?”

He usually lied if someone noticed and asked—a knee-jerk thing. Said line drive or some other fantasy. But the word came out of his mouth. “Father.”

She let out a sigh of air. “You win that one.”

She hopped in, drove off.

Apparently people did tell her, he thought. And more, she was right. He should buy the house. Screw looking at a couple more when that one had—right again—pulled at his guts.

It looked like he’d be handling two settlements.

He pulled out his phone, stood right there on the side of the road, and made Charmaine’s day.

* * *

He went back into town, signed the contract, picked up some pizza, and took Britt to lunch in the empty office space of the building he’d bought right on Main Street.

They sat on the floor, drank Cokes, ate pizza.

“We can do this a lot more, at an actual table, once you’re really in here. It’s a good spot, Zane. Smack on Main Street, front entrance, the little porch. More than enough room for your office, a receptionist, a law library, and maybe a conference room upstairs. You even have the little kitchen.”

“It’ll work. We’ll see if I will.”

“Our great-grandfather was a town lawyer,” she reminded him. “Another Walker family tradition.”

Sitting in her bare feet, her quietly professional gray dress, she glanced around. “And you bought a building. And a house! That’s the one I can’t get my head around yet.”

“Me either. I don’t do that.”

“Buy houses?”

“Go on impulse. The building, that’s different. But I just bought an entire house, a fricking big-ass house, on impulse.”

“It’s a great house, or it looks great from down here. I’ve never been up there.”

“It’s amazing, but still. It’s a lot of house for just me.”

“It’s not just you.” Before she pointed, she licked sauce off her finger. “You come with a big family, and we expect you to entertain us lavishly and often.”

“Ha. I don’t think I’d have done it if I hadn’t run into the landscaper.”

“Darby? I like her. She’s…” Searching, Britt circled her Coke in the air. “Infectiously appealing.”

“That’s one way to put it. Accurately,” he decided.

“But what’s she have to do with it?”

“Nothing, really, but she starts talking and you start seeing what she’s saying. Or you don’t but you’re nodding along in your head. She bought the Hubbard place this morning, asked me to handle the deal for her, and before I know it, I’m telling her about this place, and the house, and she’s convincing me I should buy the house. She’s buying a truck on the way to buy a tree.”