Built to Last (Harlequin Heartwarming) Read Online Free PDF

in the 1890s, baring and polishing and laying hardwood floors, those he enjoyed.
    But for his sister and Emma, he’d do anything. And why not? Now that his kids had moved a couple thousand miles away with their mother and her new husband, his weekends and evenings would be empty if it weren’t for Kathleen and Emma. What they hadn’t realized was that he needed them more than they needed him.
    By the time he got back Jo had managed to remove the entire subfloor and replace parts of it with thick plywood. She’d left the plumbing and glimpses of the downstairs ceilings exposed. As he dropped his first load, he heard the distant sound of a saw, but didn’t see her.
    Heading back downstairs for another load of PVC pipes, he grimaced. He’d had better things in mind for this weekend. Indian summer, the end of September, the day glowed with golden warmth that had chased away the night’s chill. He’d intended to start with a run around Green Lake, then pick up the apples rotting on his lawn and finally mow it, he hoped for the last time this fall.
    Well, maybe plumbing didn’t sound so bad after all. Especially not with an interesting woman popping into the bathroom to check on him. Maybe bringing him a can of soda, commiserating if he scraped a knuckle, admiring his muscles—he thought he’d caught her doing that already.
    He’d wondered about his sister’s taste in roommates after meeting Helen Schaefer and her sad little girl. Pity and kindness had a place, but he figured Kathleen had enough to handle with Emma. Did she have to take on a befuddled, grieving woman and her painfully insecure child, too?
    “Wait until you meet Jo,” Kathleen kept saying. “You’ll like her.”
    Jo. The name sounded masculine enough that he’d pictured a man/woman, like the high school vice-principal who’d scared every kidwho’d ever considered pulling a prank, if not worse. Jo, he now realized, must be short for something feminine and French, like Josephine.
    Five foot four or so, she wasn’t unusually short, but her bone structure was delicate. Yet she crackled with energy and intelligence, making him wonder if she ever completely relaxed. Her big brown eyes, assessing and judging, were the furthest thing from pansy soft. Her hair, a deep, mahogany brown, was thick and straight and shiny, cut in a bob below her jawline. She had a habit he guessed was unconscious of shoving it back with impatience that seemed characteristic.
    He didn’t mind that about her. In fact, Ryan preferred smart, strong women. Funny, considering how his sister irritated him. Nonetheless, when married he’d have rather his wife had yelled at him than wept.
    So how had he ended up married to a woman who seeped tears more easily than he adjusted the angle of a saw cut?
    Old news. Old failure. Mouth set, he dumped a load of pipes and fittings and started back for more. Why thinking about Jo Dubray and the sharp, interested way she looked at him had evolved into selfrecrimination about an ended marriage, Ryan didn’t know. Couldn’t he imagine kissing a woman without relating it to his marriage?
    He worked all day, taking a brief break for a sandwich. He had to cut a hole in the wall in the downstairs bathroom, which had Kathleen shrugging.
    “We have to wallboard anyway.”
    “This floor is probably rotting, too,” he said.
    She stared at the toilet with the expression of someone who’d just seen a tarantula scuttling out of sight. Or someone who’d imagined herself sitting on a toilet when it plummeted through the rotten floor.
    “I guess we could go ahead with this room, too,” she decided, deep reluctance in her voice. “Next weekend. If, um…” The words stuck in her throat. “If you can help.”
    He grinned and slapped her on the back. “Didn’t think you could spit it out.”
    “Ryan!” she warned.
    Laughing, he said, “Yeah. I’ll be here Saturday morning.”
    He didn’t see Jo again until he was ready for the new toilet