There was music playing here. Tough and gritty rock, poorly accompanied by a laborer in an off-key tenor.
Mikhail’s door was open, and Sydney streaked through. She nearly tumbled over a graying man with arms like tree trunks. He rose gracefully from his crouched position where he’d been sorting tools and steadied her.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t see you.”
“Is all right. I like women to fall at my feet.”
She registered the Slavic accent even as she glanced desperately around the room for Mikhail. Maybe everybody in the building was Russian, she thought frantically. Maybe he’d imported plumbers from the mother country.
“Can I help you?”
“No. Yes.” She pressed a hand to her heart when she realized she was completely out of breath. “Mikhail.”
“He is just outside.” Intrigued, he watched her as he jerked a thumb toward the window.
She could see him there—at least she could see the flat, tanned torso. “Outside. But, but—”
“We are finishing for the day. You will sit?”
“Get him in,” Sydney whispered. “Please, get him in.”
Before he could respond, the window was sliding up, and Mikhail was tossing one long, muscled leg inside. He said something in his native tongue, laughter in his voice as the rest of his body followed. When he saw Sydney, the laughter vanished.
“Hayward.” He tapped his caulking gun against his palm.
“What were you doing out there?” The question came out in an accusing rush.
“Replacing windows.” He set the caulking gun aside. “Is there a problem?”
“No, I…” She couldn’t remember ever feeling more of a fool. “I came by to check the progress.”
“So. I’ll take you around in a minute.” He walked into the kitchen, stuck his head into the sink and turned the faucet on full cold.
“He’s a hothead,” the man behind her said, chuckling at his own humor. When Sydney only managed a weak smile, he called out to Mikhail, speaking rapidly in that exotic foreign tongue.
“Tak” was all he said. Mikhail came up dripping, hair streaming over the bandanna he’d tied around it. He shook it back, splattering water, then shrugged and hooked his thumbs in his belt loops. He was wet, sweaty and half-naked. Sydney had to fold her tongue inside her mouth to keep it from hanging out.
“My son is rude.” Yuri Stanislaski shook his head. “I raised him better.”
“Your—oh.” Sydney looked back at the man with the broad face and beautiful hands. Mikhail’s hands. “How do you do, Mr. Stanislaski.”
“I do well. I am Yuri. I ask my son if you are the Hayward who owns this business. He only says yes and scowls.”
“Yes, well, I am.”
“It’s a good building. Only a little sick. And we are the doctors.” He grinned at his son, then boomed out something else in Ukrainian.
This time an answering smile tugged at Mikhail’s mouth. “No, you haven’t lost a patient yet, Papa. Go home and have your dinner.”
Yuri hauled up his tool chest. “You come and bring the pretty lady. Your mama makes enough.”
“Oh, well, thank you, but—”
“I’m busy tonight, Papa.” Mikhail cut off Sydney’s polite refusal.
Yuri raised a bushy brow. “You’re stupid tonight,” he said in Ukrainian. “Is this the one who makes you sulk all week?”
Annoyed, Mikhail picked up a kitchen towel and wiped his face. “Women don’t make me sulk.”
Yuri only smiled. “This one would.” Then he turned to Sydney. “Now I am rude, too, talking so you don’t understand. He is bad influence.” He lifted her hand and kissed it with considerable charm. “I am glad to meet you.”
“I’m glad to meet you, too.”
“Put on a shirt,” Yuri ordered his son, then left, whistling.
“He’s very nice,” Sydney said.
“Yes.” Mikhail picked up the T-shirt he’d peeled off hours before, but only held it. “So, you want to see the work?”
“Yes, I thought—”
“The windows are done,” he interrupted. “The wiring is almost done. That and the plumbing will take another week. Come.”
He moved out, skirting her by a good two feet, then walked into the apartment next door without knocking.
“Keely’s,” he told her. “She is out.”
The room was a clash of sharp colors and scents. The furniture was old and sagging but covered with vivid pillows and various articles of female attire.
The adjoining kitchen was a mess—not with dishes or pots and pans—but with walls torn down to studs and thick wires snaked through.
“It must be inconvenient for her, for everyone, during the construction.”
“Better than plugging in a cake mixer and shorting out the building. The old wire was tube and knob, forty years old or more, and frayed. This is Romex. More efficient, safer.”
She bent over his arm, studying the wiring. “Well. Hmm.”
He nearly smiled. Perhaps he would have if she hadn’t smelled so good. Instead, he moved a deliberate foot away. “After the inspection, we will put up new walls. Come.”
It was a trial for both of them, but he took her through every stage of the work, moving from floor to floor, showing her elbows of plastic pipe and yards of copper tubing.
“Most of the flooring can be saved with sanding and refinishing. But some must be replaced.” He kicked at a square of plywood he’d nailed to a hole in the second-floor landing.
Sydney merely nodded, asking questions only when they seemed intelligent. Most of the workers were gone, off to cash their week’s paychecks. The noise level had lowered so that she could hear muted voices behind closed doors, snatches of music or televised car chases. She lifted a brow at the sound of a tenor sax swinging into “Rhapsody in Blue.”
“That’s Will Metcalf,” Mikhail told her. “He’s good. Plays in a band.”
“Yes, he’s good.” The rail felt smooth and sturdy under her hand as they went down. Mikhail had done that, she thought. He’d fixed, repaired, replaced, as needed because he cared about the people who lived in the building. He knew who was playing the sax or eating the fried chicken, whose baby was laughing.
“Are you happy with the progress?” she asked quietly.
The
