Free Love by Design (Crystal Falls Book 1) by Lynette Lee

every faith in you that you can pull this off by the deadline.”
    She said the last bit slowly and he got the hint, the same one she’d been dropping throughout the project. She wanted the cabin done exactly on time. And he would do that for her, no matter what he had to do to make it happen. He just hoped he’d be able to catch Lily again before the cabin was complete.
    “I’m sorry, Christina, but I’ve got to run back to town now. I’ve got another meeting. But I’m sure I’ll see you again soon,” he told her as he ducked out of the room, hoping to dodge any more unwanted affection. He breathed a sigh of relief as he slipped out the door but frowned as he got into his truck. Still no Lily.
    If this kept up, he might just have to go hunt her down.
     
    Lily kicked off her flip flops and rolled her yoga mat out on the studio floor beside Angie. The two of them had started going twice a week a few months before, right around the time of Lily’s breakup. When Angie had first proposed it, Lily had been skeptical, but after only one week, she was hooked and she’d managed not to miss a class yet. Somehow the gentle stretching and pulling of her body had helped her to ease the pain and tension of the breakup and the stress of starting Daly Design. She wouldn’t give it up for the world.
    “Still no Rachel, huh?” Angie leaned over and asked her as she sat on her mat and pulled her legs up into a pretzel.
    “Nope. She’s adamant - no yoga. Maybe you should work on her.”
    “Ha, you don’t think I’ve tried?”
    Lily shrugged with a smile. “Maybe someday.”
    “How are things with the job?” Angie asked.
    Just then the instructor began to speak and Lily gave Angie a shrug and whispered, “I’ll tell you later.”
    Lily began to go through the stretches, following the instructors moves, and let her mind wander, turning quickly to Angie’s question. Overall, the last week had been pretty fantastic. She’d gotten approval for all her design choices from Lydia and she’d stopped by the cabin late one night to find that the master bedroom had already been completed. It was truly beautiful and a total thrill for her to see her own work come together so perfectly. She was just waiting on the bedroom furniture she’d ordered with Lydia to arrive at The Bungalow and she could get the room completely set up, just the way she wanted it.
    Of course, there was still plenty of work to do. She hadn’t yet ordered the furniture for the main living spaces and most of the kitchen design elements needed to be chosen and approved. But she thought she was getting the work done nicely and would be finished with the project well before the deadline, which should make her unpleasant client at least a little bit happy.
    So far she’d managed to avoid Noah as well. Every time she arrived and workers were at the site she stopped to talk to them and ask them if Noah had been around. It got to be a joke with them so that when they saw her coming they would laugh and kid her about her crush. Little did they know. She knew it was probably silly, trying to keep the space between them, especially when their work coincided so closely with one another’s, but after the night with the blueprints she just hadn’t been up to facing him.
    “Okay people, downward facing dog,” the instructor called and she heard a few groans around her. She bent and placed her palms on the floor, feeling the blood rush to her head. She leaned into the stretch and felt some of the tension in her shoulders relaxing.
    Whenever she let herself think back to his finger on her lips or the way he’d smelled that night she grew weak. It wasn’t something she was prepared for, how much her body would betray her. She’d tried to convince herself several times that he was nothing but a liar and a cheat who’d broken her heart, but her intellectual reasoning stood no chance against the pains of longing for his body. Even the memories of the breakup were