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slightly.
    Zoe typed a couple more notes and walked into the living area until she was standing about three feet away from Aidan. She met his eyes briefly before turning around and facing the entryway from a new angle. With a tilt of her head she stopped and frowned. “It’s out of plumb on the garage side of the entryway. If you stand here, you can see the curve in the wall.” She didn’t wait to see if he’d look; she had a feeling he was already well aware of all the problems.
    Doing a slow three-sixty turn, she stopped and typed, then faced the living area. “The color is wrong in here.” Lifting her head, she looked directly at him. “Granted, I don’t know what color you were going for, but this is too yellow. You can see those beautiful, dark chocolate-colored cabinets in the kitchen from here. Between those and the dark floors, the walls are all wrong.”
    “Tell me why,” he said deeply.
    “You’ve got some amazing colors going between the floors, the cabinets, and the stone in the fireplace. This color on the walls doesn’t do any of it justice. It’s a yellowish beige, and it’s boring. You want something that is going to complement everything that you’ve done. You want a color that people are going to walk in here and go wow .” Looking around again, Zoe shrugged. “This doesn’t inspire. This is the weekend-warrior-handyman special.”
    As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Zoe regretted them. Maybe he liked that yellow. Maybe he’d chosen it and it was the one color Sarah hadn’t substituted. Why couldn’t she just keep it professional? She’d never had trouble focusing with any of her other clients.
    She turned and looked at him and noticed that the smirk was gone. He looked pissed. Okay, there were two ways she could play this. She could immediately apologize and grovel a bit, or she could move on and hope she was just blowing it out of proportion.
    “I think we can do something better with the furniture.” And option two it is! “The sectional is fine, but we can jazz it up once we change the colors in here.” Moving to the kitchen, she went on for about five minutes about the things she saw that weren’t quite right—brush strokes in the paint, crooked glass tile in the backsplash—and decided to stop there. His silence was killing her. She typed a few last notes on her tablet before putting it down and leaning against the countertop.
    “Do I pass?” she asked.
    “Excuse me?”
    “I take it that this is a test to determine if I can see that the problem is in the details. Let me assure you, Mr. Shaughnessy, that I do. I have a real problem with craftsmen who rush through a job and put out shoddy work. I think the home owner deserves a house that has been put together perfectly. And as for the finishes and decorating,” she said as she stood a bit taller, “we want potential buyers to come in here and not only want to buy this house, but to want their own to look as perfect as the model. If not better.” She paused and shrugged. “Not that it will be possible because the model will be perfect on steroids.” There , Zoe thought, he can’t be pissed at me if he knows that I’m a perfectionist too.
    He quirked a dark brow at her. As much as Aidan hated to admit it, he was impressed. And he wasn’t impressed easily. Zoe Dalton had not only seen everything he’d wanted her to see, but she had even picked up on an issue or two that had escaped him.
    Not an easy thing to do.
    Aidan continued to stand there and look at her, so Zoe figured she’d better nudge him along. “Are we ready to hit the upstairs? I have a list of problems with that staircase.”
    And in that moment, Aidan Shaughnessy thought he just might have met his match.
    * * *
    Driving back to the office, Zoe had no idea if she had won Aidan Shaughnessy over or just signed her own termination papers. As they’d walked through the rest of the model home, Zoe had continued to do the bulk of the talking.