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she’d moved her mom into Mossy Oaks, Phil had started to neglect this house, seeing it more as a burden than a part of her history. It took losing it to appreciate what she’d had.
    Phil followed Jamal into the formal dining room. And stopped cold.
    “Drywall?” she said. “You’re putting up drywall? ”
    “Only one section of the wall was cracked, but I figured I’d just redo the entire room.”
    “With drywall? ”
    He measured her with a curious stare. “What do you have against drywall?”
    “You mean besides the fact that it has no business in an 1870s Victorian? It also greatly reduces the resale value of the house.”
    He waved off her concern. “I’m not concerned about resale value right now.”
    This is no longer my house, she reminded herself. Jamal owned it; he could do whatever he wanted with it. Even if it meant putting up freaking drywall.
    “Just...show me the rest,” she said.
    “Here’s one of the things I’m putting into your capable hands,” he said, pointing to the pocket doors that recessed into the walls between the dining room and kitchen. “They’re pretty banged up, but if at all possible, I want to keep them.”
    “Of course you want to keep them. They add too much character to this house to think of getting rid of them.”
    Phil glided her hand along the smooth mud where the panels of Sheetrock met. She could not believe the man was replacing the classic plaster walls with drywall, but at least he’d done a good job.
    “You did this work by yourself?” she asked.
    Jamal nodded. “Have I impressed the guru?”
    “Stop calling me that.”
    “Why not? Everyone else does.”
    “First, I’m not a guru,” Phil sad. “My dad deserved that title, not me. And secondly, I work mostly in wood and wrought iron, so I’m not the one to properly judge drywall installation.”
    “That’s too bad,” he said. “I was hoping you’d be impressed.”
    Phil looked over at him and was caught off guard by the sexy smile pulling at the edge of his lips. She knew flirting when she saw it, and she was definitely seeing it in action right now.
    That would not be good. She could not handle a sweaty, sexy, flirting Jamal Johnson.
    “So, besides the doors, what else is there?” she asked.
    “I’ve got my blueprints out here,” he said, motioning for her to follow him outside.
    Phil stopped short. “If you’re not doing a renovation, why did you draw up blueprints for a house that’s already built?”
    He shrugged. “You work in wood and wrought iron, I work in blueprints. It just makes it easier to have a map of the house so I can pinpoint each thing that needs to be addressed.”
    She accepted his explanation with the same amount of guarded skepticism in which she took everything else he told her. Outside, the blueprints were spread out on the top of a folding table, held at each corner with pieces of leftover wood. She stood next to Jamal as he pointed out various jobs that needed to be done throughout the house. She tried to ignore the combination of sweat, sawdust and man that flooded her senses. Ignoring a ten-piece brass band blowing in her ear would have been easier.
    “My biggest headache right now is fixtures,” Jamal was saying. “I’d love to get something comparable to what’s in the downstairs bathroom and kitchen, but I can’t find anything even close.”
    Phil ordered herself to focus on the job at hand, and not on his scent. Or the muscles rippling underneath his T-shirt. Or the way she’d clung to them when they’d danced months ago.
    “You won’t find them in hardware stores,” Phil said. “Your best bet will be companies that specialize in reclaimed fixtures. They salvage pieces and sell them to people restoring older properties. I’ve got several contacts I can check for you.”
    When he didn’t comment for several moments, Phil glanced over at him. That smile was back, the one that made her heart beat just a bit quicker.
    “I knew I’d come to