“Fuck you. It’s hot,” I ribbed back.
“Oh, you know what? I think you’re right.” Ben, a grizzled man who’d worked construction all his life, started pulling atthe collar of his T-shirt, exaggerating how hot he was before he started gyrating his hips. “It is hot.” He grabbed the bottom hem of his T-shirt and started rolling it up over his protruding beer belly.
“Oh man, I’m overheating.” He pulled his shirt completely off and started swinging it around. His belly jiggled as he twirled his shirt over his head like he was headlining the worst Chippendales act in history.
Another guy from our crew took the opportunity to empty a bottle of water over Ben’s head. Collectively, we laughed. Ribbing and a little ball busting was all a part of the job.
“Are you idiots done getting naked?” Cal’s irritated voice thundered through the open doorway as he leaned in.
“I don’t know, boss,” Jackson mocked as he slowly started to unbuckle his belt. “I’m feeling so ...” He opened the buckle. “Sosteamy.”
When Cal threw his hands in the air and walked away, we all dissolved into a fit of giggles like a gaggle of hens. I watched as he trailed after Elodie and Selene, who were heading toward the small cottage at the edge of the property. I caught Selene turning, just a flick of her head over her shoulder—but it was enough. Our eyes met for half a heartbeat, and I swore the world narrowed to that look. I held it. Grinned like a bastard. Then dragged my shirt on—slow as hell—just to let her watch.
I didn’t know whether she could still see it clearly, but I shot a wide grin just for her.
Later that afternoon,my back ached and my muscles screamed at me from lifting lumber overhead for the better partof the day. I glanced at my watch and used the impact driver to place one last screw into a support beam.
“Gotta go, boys.” I hung the tool on my belt and turned toward the crew. My shirt clung to my back, damp with sweat, and the sun had baked my neck a shade darker than I meant to. I rolled my shoulders, trying to shake the ache from a long-ass day of lifting lumber like I didn’t still have to wrangle a five-year-old.
“Everyone say goodbye to the hottest manny in Michigan,” Jackson teased.
A chorus of goodbyes and chuckles floated over me. I shot them a middle finger over my shoulder and didn’t bother hiding my grin. They were assholes, but they weren’t wrong. Without bothering to respond, I packed up my gear and walked along the edge of the pumpkin patch toward the Drifted Spirit Inn.
The pumpkin patch stretched out in crooked rows, green vines curling across the dry earth, dotted with young orange orbs just beginning to swell. In October, it’d be chaos with kids and cider and hayrides, but now it was quiet—blooming with potential. I liked it better like this—when the world was quiet and full of possibility. It was easier to believe in things when you saw them the way Winnie did.
I bet Winnie would pick out a weird-looking one—something misshapen or full of those wartlike bumps just because it was funky and different. It was one of my favorite things about that kid. She liked things simply because she liked them, not because they were perfect.
In fact, I was pretty certain that perfect in the eyes of that particular five-year-old was entirely too boring. Maybe that was why she liked me at all. I wasn’t shiny. I was just ... there.
The Drifted Spirit stood like it had been pulled out of a postcard—three stories of clapboard and freshly painted trim, with flower boxes spilling over in red and yellow blooms. A widewraparound porch circled the front, like the building had always been waiting for someone to sit a while and stay.
When I had agreed to help out Selene, Cal had suggested I save time on going home to shower before picking Winnie up on days when I couldn’t get away from the job early. Today was definitely one of those days.
As I entered the inn, I wiped my boots on the mat and tried not to look like a man who’d spent the last several hours sweating his ass off in sawdust. I stepped up to the concierge desk and drummed my fingertips on the solid oak surface. “Afternoon, Miss Helen. Any chance I could sneak in a shower?”
Her long bony fingers clacked on the keyboard of the computer behind the desk. “The Mariner’s Room is all yours,” she said. “Fresh towels, peppermint soap, the works.”
Since Star Harbor was such an active tourist destination, the Drifted Spirit Inn was unique in that, even after guests checked out in the morning, if they planned to explore or sightsee, they could come back to the inn to rest or shower or freshen up before their drive or flight out of town.
I often used it as an opportunity to not be so rank when picking up Winnie after school.
“Thanks, Helen. You spoil me,” I teased, flashing her a grin. “Pretty soon I’ll be impossible to live with.”
“No problem,” she answered with a smile. “Though it sounds like you might be off the hook before too long.”
I stopped, craning my neck in her direction. My hand froze mid-reach for the key. “What?”
“The way I heard it, Selene had a pretty amazing childcare candidate come through today. She’s new in town. Sweet girl. Polished and smart. Did her degree in early childhood development. Selene said she was perfect. Dale the mailman’s niece came up from Ann Arbor to ‘find herself,’ and she found Selene instead. After college she’s spending the summer in StarHarbor. She was looking for work and was pointed in Selene’s direction.” Helen shrugged as though she hadn’t just delivered a swift punch to my gut. “If it works out, she can start shadowing next week. Seems like it works out for the both of you.”
An experienced childcare worker with a degree. Polished.
I looked down at calloused hands streaked with grime and rubbed them together. I was all rough edges and second choices. A guy you picked when your first plan fell through.
“Yeah,” I said, “that’s great news.” My voice sounded like a stranger’s. “That’s ... just great.” The words burned like a scraped knuckle. I turned away before she could see how much it had hit me. I walked back to the Mariner’s Room with the painful reminder that I was never supposed to be permanent stinging in my veins.
From my perspective, we had settled into a comfortable routine. I had hoped I was making progress with Winnie and Selene, but of course she would pick the one who makes sense.
Hell, I wouldn’t pick me either.
