After six years, Evelyn was once again facing the man who’d broken her heart. Turning down the offer to remodel Ryder Bingham’s home would have been smart. Yet here she was.

She’d managed to forget how good he looked.

He was standing in the large open-plan living/dining room on the first floor of his new house, all tall, muscular body and sexy aura. His amber eyes were the first thing she noticed, and for a brief, searing second, she could pretend no time had passed. The awareness that shot through her at the sight of him took her breath away, and she struggled to find her next words.

She hadn’t signed anything yet. Backing out was still an option. Except that idea didn’t hold up. Not if she wanted her business to survive.

Evelyn took a deep breath and tried for a smile. He waited, his arms folded, and watched her with the intensity she’d also told herself she’d forgotten. Yet deep inside, she had lied to herself. “Your manager said you were expecting me.” A muscle jumping in the back of his jaw was her only clue that he might also be unnerved by their meeting.

“I was. I am. Howdy, Evelyn.”

His amber eyes were shaded and darker somehow, holding a multitude of indefinable emotions. Then he ducked his head, a gesture she was all too familiar with. The gesture made his hair—now a shorter, multilayered cut that brought out the highlights in the ash-brown locks—fall over his forehead. Back then, she had loved running her fingers through the thickness of his mane. He’d hit the gym at some point, visible muscles pulling at his T-shirt, which nicely stretched across his chest. His six-feet-three-inch frame had always been imposing.

Never more so than when… Never mind, Evelyn.

She had managed to avoid hearing too much about him in the last six years. Although she loved music, she’d deleted country music stations from her radio and found ways to dodge ads about him. Once, a promotion in a window advertising an event where the “local boy” would be doing an in-person appearance the next week had caught her attention. Evelyn had stopped dead and stared, transfixed at the image of her former lover.

The man who had betrayed her.

“Ryder.” She cleared her throat, her mouth dry from the anticipation of this meeting. “Welcome back.”

She should have declined when his manager reached out. The negative word had echoed inside her mind with such force that she could have sworn it bounced through her tiny office.

What spoke louder were the unpaid bills crowding her email with reminders sent via regular mail. Her precarious situation kept the negative response to herself. For now.