“Ha. Another real-estate-agent word. ‘Historic,’ not ‘old.’” Liv stepped to the left and aimed her camera at the second story and all its peeling-white-paint glory. “I have faith in you, though. You could sell hair products to a bald guy. I’m sure you’ll find someone who finds it…quaint.”

“I think Bethany will love it.” Bethany Winterbourne was moving to the area from Austin and wanted the perfect fixer-upper to create her “superadorable, glam dream palace away from the city” after her divorce. The woman had watched too many home-design shows and thought small-town Texas would be chock-full of big houses that would be cheap and fall into her lap.

Kincaid had been on the hunt for Bethany for six months now with countless smaller houses in nearby Wilder discarded out of hand. Now finally, she’d come across this prospect in Long Acre, which had the square footage Bethany wanted. Plus, it hadn’t come onto the market officially, so no one had seen the house yet. Maybe she could get a good price for Bethany without competition.

Ferris had given her a heads-up because he knew Kincaid was more than ready to get Bethany out of her hair. Plus, after a particularly dry year where Kincaid had only made a few sales, Ferris knew she needed a win. This could be the answer.

However, now that Kincaid was looking at the old house, she got a spoiled-milk taste in her mouth at the thought of it being filled with Bethany’s style, which, given the decor of Bethany’s current condo, would be white lacquer furniture and pink-sequined pillows that had sayings like Shine Bright on them.

Kincaid could appreciate unique tastes. She was currently wearing underwear with purple llamas on them, so who was she to judge? You do you, girl. But this house had old, beautiful bones—hopefully not the attic kind like Liv was talking about—and was begging to be restored to its former glory. She could almost feel it shudder at the thought of a sequin passing its threshold.

Kincaid let her gaze travel over the facade, her mind smoothing over the peeling paint and the warped windows, imagining what the grand house must’ve looked like when it was first built right outside town. Nothing for miles around, the Texas wine country not yet rolling with grapevines and tourists, and the land rich with possibility. It was the kind of house where she’d dreamed of living when she’d walk home from school through the nicer neighborhoods on her way back to the broken-down rental house she’d shared with her mom. Houses with warmth and laughter and good smells coming from the kitchen. Houses that didn’t have a dry-rotted hole in the floor of the bathroom, dingy tan walls, and nothing but boxed macaroni and cheese and Vienna sausage in the cabinets—food her mom knew a kid could cook for herself since she was rarely home at night.

Liv sidled up next to Kincaid, pushing a lock of hair that had escaped her loose bun away from her face. “Don’t worry. I’m just giving you a hard time. I’ll be able to make the place look really cool in my photos. It’s all about the angles and lighting. Plus, worn and damaged can look beautiful to the right person. I mean, Finn sees what I look like in the morning and still wants to sleep with me.”