“Thank you. The name is Rain. Rain Everest.”
“Nice to meet you, Rain Everest. I’m Bennett. Bennett Duke. My father owned this motel and passed it down to me.”
He turned the ledger around and made me sign my name and the time I checked in. Old school.
“That’s nice.”
The old man lifted his nose in the air and sniffed. I turned around, wondering what he smelled but when I turned back, he was grabbing a key from the rack and handing me a stack of towels. White. Fluffy, to my surprise. Smelled like bleach. Bleach meant clean.
“Haven’t seen you around here before.”
“I live in the country. Or I did. My house got struck by lightning. Burned down. I’m staying here until I can get something else built.”
“Bad luck.” He cocked his head to the side. “Or good luck.”
I scoffed. “How would it be good luck?”
He winked at me. Not creepy, just an older man thing. “Sometimes bad things happen for a reason. Can lead to something better.”
“Maybe so. I’m going to go now. And three across is lenient.”
Bennett eyed the puzzle and let out a cackle. “Damn it! You are right. Come back in if you get bored. I can never solve 100 percent of these dadgum things.”
I parked my car in front of room six and went in, whispering a prayer that the inside was better than the outside. I was blown away. The place was sparsely furnished, the TV and furnishings older than me, but everything was clean, and it smelled nice. Nota hint of cigarette smoke or anything else questionable. I walked past the queen bed and checked out the bathroom. Pale blue and white tiles floor to ceiling. All of it clean. The mirror and shower curtain spotless.
I ran my hand under the water from the shower and laughed out loud at the decent pressure and temperature.
This place was a diamond in the rough—the rough being its own exterior.
I wondered why they called it the Mates Motel, though. Maybe I would visit Bennett and ask why his father named it that.
After a long, hot shower, I put on some clothes I’d purchased at the local supercenter and lay on the bed, tight muscles easing.
At least I had a good place to stay while I waited for my house. There was some silver lining that day. All I had to do was keep searching for it day by day.
Chapter Four
Lux
Another day, another fifty deliveries. Things were getting busier, and some days, I was concerned I wouldn’t finish everything, so when I saw the big box for the motel, my temper spiked. “We just brought them out a case of bleach,” I spluttered. “I don’t mind going there, but it seems odd they’d get another one. Usually that quantity lasts them six months. It looks like a mistake.”
The supplier this came from had a record for duplicate or mistaken orders, and the motel was well out of the way of the rest of my deliveries for the day.
But the dispatcher shrugged. “Your job is just to deliver, not to question.” He was a recent hire after the previous guy retired, and I had a feeling Bobby’s mom had nothing to do with this guy’s tenure. She had a great eye for people who would be an asset to her son’s company. “And you’re killing time. If you don’t get going, you’ll be on overtime.”
Something Bobby wouldn’t mind at all. He knew my work ethic, but he’d asked me to give the new dispatcher a chance before demanding he be fired. “Fine.” I could be a team player. “But I still think you should check with the motel before I go all the way out there.”
“We get paid even if it’s rejected.”
Yeah, we did, but that wasn’t the point. I couldn’t afford to waste time—which I was doing as we spoke. Without another word, I grabbed the case and carried it out to my truck. At least it would be interesting to stop at the motel and hear about their cast of characters and fascinatingly quirky guests. With all the shifters they got there, it was no wonder. Our people were a vastly different bunch, even among similar animals. Nobodywould ever mix a polar bear shifter with a black bear, of course. Or one big cat with another. Not if they didn’t want a major kerfuffle to break out.
With all the rest of my stops in the opposite direction, I turned the truck toward the motel. I’d get that delivery out of the way then head off to do the rest in an organized fashion. Back with the previous dispatcher, I’d never have been expected to make a single delivery so far out of the way, but the new guy was learning. He’d get it eventually. Hopefully. And if not, I’d make it work.
As I left the warehouse, the temperature was a cool 22 Fahrenheit with not a cloud in sight. The sky a gorgeous blue bowl overhead and winds at about three miles per hour out of the west. Wind mattered in a slightly top-heavy truck like mine, so I kept track of those things. But today, it was just enough to ruffle my hair as I drove down the highway.
I might have been cranky about the bad route planning, but it was hard to stay that way on such a beautiful morning. Especially with the motel on my list. Not an efficient run, but I would have the opportunity to visit a minute or two, and a certain take-out place with the best fried chicken in five counties lay along the way. I’d treat myself on the way back—even if it was too early for breakfast. Technically.
Arriving at the Mates Motel, I stood up and grabbed the case from behind my seat then climbed down the couple of steps to the ground. The smell of the chlorine bleach clung to my nose, even though it was in plastic jugs inside the box. Shifter senses were an asset sometimes, but not this one. The parking lot held at least twenty cars, a higher number than usual, so business must be good. Nobody came out to greet me this time, Geoff probably still slumbering away in his comped room, so I headed for the office to unload my burden.
