The evening air is thick and warm. Beads of sweat form along my forehead as soon as I exit the car. Scents of freshly hewn wood, oil, and the stench of cement permeate the air as I walk to the construction site.

“Hey, Ellie!” Bernie, the site superintendent, greets me with a wide smile. “I was wondering if you were coming tonight.”

“I had a few things creep up at Halcyon. Sorry I’m late.”

“Don’t apologize! We’re glad you came.” He walks by my side as we head into the little trailer they use for an office. “How’s the shop going? You about ready to open?”

“We’re getting there. It’s so much work.”

“If anyone can do it, it’s you.”

“Thanks,” I grin. “Where do you need me tonight?”

“We’re actually clearing a little area on the north side of what is going to be the house pad.”

“Oh, Bernie. Don’t use words like north to give me directions. You know better than that.”

He laughs heartily. “I’m sorry. Head to the pad and walk around it. You’ll see some people dragging out the final trees and big stones, things like that.”

“Great. I’ll head that way.”

I check-in on the clipboard, find my hardhat, and head back out onto the site. Out of all the charities I love, this is one of the closest to my heart.

When I was a little girl, our house burned down. I must’ve been five or six at the time. I remember watching orange and blue flames screaming out of our roof, windows, and where the front door used to be. I didn’t worry about my clothes or baby dolls or teddy bears. I remember being terrified about where we would live.

Shelters for Savannah is one of the reasons why my family wasn’t homeless. Through their generosity, we had a warm, safe place to regroup and because of their extraordinary kindness, we were able to rebuild. That house, constructed with so much love, sweat, and tears, is the home my father still lives in to this day.

Rounding the corner, I see the team of volunteers clearing an area just like Bernie said.

“Hey, everyone!” I say, pulling my gloves from my pocket. “Where do I start?”

They all say hello as Wendy comes forward and asks me to fill a wheelbarrow with debris and haul it to the waste bin.

I get to work, picking up rocks, trash, and debris and loading them into the cart. My boots sink a little in the soil. My heart, on the other hand, is lighter than air.

I haven’t felt this happy in such a long time. Although a part of me wishes I had gone to dinner with Ford, a bigger part of me feels so much joy being here. Giving back. Repaying the favor we were shown.

“You never fail to amaze me,” Wendy says.

“And why is that?”

“We don’t see a lot of girls your age out here getting dirty.”

“Ah, I guess it’s in my genes,” I shrug. “I was never much of a girly-girl.”

“That’s good for us, I guess.”

With a spring in my step, I take the full wheelbarrow and begin pushing it across the ground. The weight of it causes it to sink into the earth and it makes it super hard to get to the trash. Volunteers whiz by me like a beehive, everyone doing their part for the greater good.

I pull up to the garbage and begin transferring my haul. Twisting to grab a metal can that fell off the side, my hand pauses in the air.

A tall, lanky figure is on the other side of the site. He’s shoveling a pile of gravel into a trench.

Forgetting all about the can, I stand and watch him. He’s dressed in a pair of ripped jeans and has a purple t-shirt on with ARROWS emblazoned on the front. A white hat is pulled low on his head.

His body moves in long, graceful strokes. Even from afar, I can see his muscles under the sheen of sweat soaking through the back of his shirt.

It’s sexy as hell.

And it’s Ford.

I laugh in disbelief. He’s here. Here. At a Shelters site on a random day for a random family in a random neighborhood. Why?

“Hey, Wendy,” I call out as she pulls a tree beside me. “Is he here often?”

“Who, honey?”

“Him.” I point to Ford. “Is he here a lot? I haven’t seen him before.”

Her head cocks to the side as a smile takes over her full lips. “He’s never been to this one particularly, to my knowledge. I worked with him a couple of times on the south side of town over the last year or so.” She quirks a brow. “You know who that is, don’t you? He’s a Landry.”

“I know,” I whisper, watching him work.

“You don’t see that much—a man like that out here with the rest of us. Gives us some hope for humanity, huh?”

“It sure does.”

Wendy goes about her task and leaves me standing with my wheelbarrow.

A shovelful of rocks falls off the end of Ford’s tool, and as if he feels my eyes on him, his head slowly rises to mine. It takes no time at all for our gazes to lock. Like a band is pulling us together, we both walk towards one another.

“What are you doing here?” I ask as we meet in the middle.

“Same thing as you, I guess.” He takes his gloves off. One hand comes to the side of my face and he brushes it gently. “Every time I find you in the wild, you have something on your face. The first time I saw you, you had mud everywhere too. Remember that?”

“Yes. I almost feel into the lake that day.”

“If that shirt would’ve been wet when I found you …” He wiggles his brows. “We are both probably better off you just always have dirt on your face.”

“Maybe it’s always there so you have to touch me.”

“I don’t need a reason to touch you, sweetheart.”

We exchange a soft grin, like there’s a secret between us.

“If you would’ve told me you were coming here, I would’ve brought us a picnic,” he chuckles. “We could’ve done this and then had dinner. I’m easy, you know.”

“That’s what I hear,” I joke. “Do you do this often?”

“Yeah,” he confesses with a slight shrug. “Sometimes. A girl I knew once upon a time went on a rant about how you should get your hands dirty and all this nonsense.”

“Did she?”

“She did. She was a smart one.” His eyes darken. “And so fucking beautiful … even with dirt on her face and paint still stuck in her hair.”

“There is not,” I giggle.

“Oh, there is,” he laughs. “But it brings back such great memories I think you should just leave it there permanently.”

I kick a rock, watching it roll across the soil. Forcing a swallow, I try to untangle the thoughts twisting together in my mind before I do something stupid.

Unfortunately, it’s one of those moments when my libido works faster than logic and I hear the words from my lips before my brain knows what’s happening.

“Did you hear that?” I ask.

“What?”

“That was my stomach rumbling.”

A cheek-to-cheek smile spreads across his handsome face. “I did hear that, actually. You should let me fix it after we’re done here.”

With a flutter in my chest, I return his smile. “I’d like that.”