“None other. It’s a little much for me. Take it in, though. The best is yet to come.”
I followed him to his office. The walls here weren’t maroon but dark-paneled wood bearing oils with a fox-hunting theme. Names like Turner and Kilburne came to mind, but the claustrophobic feel of the room quickly squeezed them out.
“Well,” I said, “they do say something about the founder of the Inn.” None were Edward’s style—or mine—but they were textured and rich. I approached a large one. “These have to be originals.”
“Yup.”
“Sell a few, and you’d have money enough to buy tablets for every employee and then some.”
“Can’t sell. It’s part of the contract that’s passed from owner to owner, but that doesn’t mean I have to look at them. I may turn some of the larger guest rooms into theme suites and hang them there.”
“Isn’t there a theft risk?” Some of the pieces were small enough to fit into luggage.
“Funny you ask,” he said, scratching the back of his head in a sheepish way. “The computers may have lacked security, but the art has always been sensor-protected. Everything that we display is for sale—except the ones in this office,” he tacked on with resignation. “Obviously.”
My gaze slid to the desk. It, too, was of an age and had the same heavy look as the rest of the room. The fact that its work surface held a large iMac, a smaller laptop, and overlapping piles of papers that had to be in some sort of order, though I couldn’t see what, brought it firmly into the present.
An arm on my shoulder turned me away. “Don’t look there. It’s depressing.”
“Confused,” I blurted without quite knowing if I meant the desk, the whole office, or his touching me.
“Isn’tthata statement,” he muttered and steered me to the far end of the room. It was anchored by a large leather sofa, a pair of tartan club chairs, and a low coffee table, on one end of which were our lunches.Caesar salad for you, tuna sandwich for me.Some things never changed.
Escaping his warmth, I sank into one of the club chairs. My hand settled on its chubby arm, finger checking out the faded plaid.
“Yup,” Edward said before I could. “It’s seen better days.” He slid the salad toward me, along with a plastic sleeve of utensils. “The last few owners were rarely here. Once they realized the foxes had to stay, they didn’t care to redo the rest.”
“Will you?” I asked and opened the lid of my salad. Taking a fork from the sleeve, I speared a piece of chicken. He wasn’t eating yet, wasn’t even seated. Manners dictated that I wait. But this wasn’t a date. It was a work lunch. Eating first was my statement.
He didn’t answer. Wondering if he planned to, I looked at him. It was the first time I had, and intentionally so. Sweater, slacks, loafers—he was amazing. I was getting used to the longer hair and the beard, which was just dense enough to lift it above scruff. Neither hurt.
“I’m not sure,” he said, seeming surprisingly ambivalent. The Edward I had known preferred his office shiny and sleek. He was a clean, chrome, and organized guy, or used to be. But that was why I was here, wasn’t it—to put a new face on the old one so that I’d be less threatened each time I saw him?
“Lots of papers,” I said, indicating the desk with my chin. “Is there an order to those?”
He snorted a quiet, “I wish.”
“What are they?”
“Reports on more departments than you’d think existed, contracts with more vendors than you’d think needed contracts—food, laundry, soap, gifts, pool personnel, poolupkeep, grounds upkeep, roof upkeep, linen replacement, insurance policies for fire, theft, weather damage, deranged-person damage—”
“Seriously?”
“It’s an issue,” he said. I heard defensiveness in the three words, but resignation—reality—quickly followed. “Someone breezes through the front door and opens fire in the lobby with a semiautomatic, and you got tragedy compounded by litigation, but hell, what’re we supposed to do, arm the bellboys?” Standing there with his hands on his hips and his eyes on that cluttered desk, he looked suddenly weary. “There are times…” he began, but his voice trailed off. He chafed his beard with his knuckles.
“What?”
“Nah. Nothing.” He sat on the sofa.
“You said I should get to know you. Tell me what you were thinking.”
He unwrapped his sandwich, then sprawled back without touching it. His eyes met mine, shooting me into the past, but only briefly. The worry I saw there was all here and now. “I’ve done other on-site work since I left the firm, but nothing like this,” he said. “There are times I wonder if I’m up to the job.”
“Of course you are,” I said.
“There are so many details.”
“Plus a hacking scandal you inherited. It’s trial by fire.”
