“It’s been a long day,” Brian said, pushing himself out of his chair. Stella lifted her head again, but she didn’t get up. Rob knew she’d wait to see if any of the other humans moved, because if Brian was hitting the bathroom or grabbing a snack and then coming right back, she wasn’t about to give up the warm, comfy spot she’d nestled into.
Then Danny stood and folded his chair. “Last one in gets the camp cot.”
That got Joey moving, but Rob took his time. As the youngest, he already knew he was getting the camp cot because there weren’t enough beds in the fixer-upper house that had come with the campground. With three older brothers, he’d gotten used to making do with whatever was left.
Rob knew the argument for the queen bed would get heated—Joey was the oldest but Danny had put up the most money—and he didn’t want to hear it. Instead, he took his time dousing the campfire, using the pile of snow they’d dug out of the ring so they could fill it with wood. Then he took his chair and the chair Joey had knocked over and left in his rush to get to the house and set them on top of Stella’s bedding. Then he put that pile in the shed with Danny’s and Brian’s chairs.
Before he went inside, he took a last look around the quiet, empty campground he now owned a quarter of. His finger itched for his camera’s shutter button, but he’d already taken at least a hundred photos today.
This was it. This was the day his life changed and he stopped being the irresponsible youngest Kowalski boy who’d had three different jobs in the last four years and just wanted to take pictures. Today he became a business owner, and his partnership with his brothers would give him the opportunity and freedom to finally take his photography to the next level. Maybe he wouldn’t be able to support himself with his camera, but he wanted to be taken seriously.
His family didn’t take him seriously. They never had, but that was going to change.
They had less than two months to get this campground ready for the campers to move in and there was a lot of work to be done. If everything went according to plan, Danny would go back to his desk and write more books. And Joey would spend most of each week in the southern part of the state with his wife and stepdaughter, leaving Brian and Rob to coordinate their schedules and do most of the heavy lifting.
But if there was one thing Rob knew, it was that when it came to the Kowalski family, things very seldom went according to plan.
Chapter One
Two months later
With a groan, Rob sat up and swung his legs off the ancient twin bed. Figuring out long-term accommodations and buying a decent bed were leapfrogging up the to-do list. They’d been so busy getting the campground ready for campers, they hadn’t had the time or energy to worry about themselves.
Today was the official opening day for their incoming seasonal campers, so all four of them had spent the night in the small house. And while he’d graduated from a camping cot to the twin bed, it—like most things in his life—had been a hand-me-down and the mattress barely met the definition of the word anymore. The house had two small bedrooms, one of which was mostly taken up by the queen bed and a dresser. It had only taken a couple of nights back in March before Brian won that bedroom. Or Stella did, really. If she didn’t have room to stretch out next to her human, she grew restless and none of them slept well.
They’d managed to get two twin beds into the other bedroom, though Rob and Joey had to share a dresser. Once they’d been able to turn the water on to the bathhouses, Danny had used the small cabin whenever he stayed over. But the old, broken-down beds in the cabins had been thrown away and the new ones hadn’t arrived yet, so he was stuck with the couch in the house. It was in about as good a shape as the mattresses.
He’d floated the idea of buying a used camper—or borrowing their parents’ very nice one—and taking one of the sites for their own use, but Danny had shot him down. Unless Rob wanted to pay the full seasonal fee for the site, he could sleep in the house with the others.
A few more weeks, he told himself as he shuffled to the only bathroom. Once the campground was fully open to the public and they’d gotten the rhythm of it, he and Brian would be the only ones actuallylivingthere. Joey would show up for weekends, more than likely. And Danny even less.
First, though, they had to get through today, he thought as he joined his brothers in the kitchen.
He walked in just in time to see Brian closing the fridge with a snort of disgust. “I’m not sure what it says about us that we did the shopping and we have a stockpile of camper light bulbs and an apocalypse-worthy stash of toilet paper, but we have nothing for breakfast.”
“I brought coffee, sugar and milk when I came up last night,” Danny said. “What else is there?”
“Eggs, maybe,” Brian suggested. “Bacon. Toast. Home fries.”
“Humor’s totally lost on you.”
“Oh, that was humor? I guess I missed that because it wasn’t funny.”
It was too early for brotherly bickering—Danny was the quietest while Brian was a button-pusher, and they had a long history of not getting along—so Rob decided to distract them with the promise of food none of them had to cook. “Let’s go to Corinne’s because we’re going to burn through some calories today.”
Corinne’s Kitchen was the only restaurant within a reasonable driving distance. Luckily, the food was good and the prices were decent, because they’d become regulars over the last couple of months. That hadn’t been part of the plan and the meals couldn’t be paid for with the campground’s credit card even if they talked about the business, as per Danny, but when you spent an entire day digging trenches to upgrade the electrical system, you just wanted somebody to set a plate of already cooked food in front of you.
“Who’s buying?” Brian asked, opening the door to let Stella out.
Joey snorted. “I vote for separate checks. I’ve seen you eat.”
Twenty minutes later, they were ready to go, but had to wait while Brian let Stella inside so she could have the first of her many daily naps while they were gone. Then they headed for two of the vehicles, but Rob stopped, phone in his hand.
“Wait. We need a photo.” As if he’d pressed a sound effect button, all three of his brothers groaned in unison. “Just one, in front of the sign, to commemorate the day.”
“You say just one, but it’ll take you an hour to set up the shot,” Joey protested. “I want breakfast.”
“And more coffee,” Danny said.
