Chapter 10
CHAPTER 10
O n the morning of December seventh, Lucas got ready for his first day as the new management. He felt odd about putting on a suit and tie for work instead of his police uniform. Ties were uncomfortable and required you to keep your top button done up. Maybe he could ditch the tie after the first month or so. He at least needed to look like a qualified manager until then.
Last night, he’d moved his things into the owner’s apartment on the top floor. It was quite the change from the apartment he’d shared with friends which had always been a mishmash of belongings and styles. Or rather, a lack of any style.
Here, even though the place was mostly empty, the ornate ceilings, crown molding, and thick wood doors hinted at the building’s illustrious past.
Lucas didn’t have much to put in the rooms. His old apartment had come with lots of furnishings—cast-offs from former tenants—so he’d never gotten around to buying his own stuff.
His bed and dresser seemed forlorn and small in the large bedroom, and only his parents’ old couch and coffee table surveyed the arched roof of the living room. He’d bought a kitchen table and had it delivered. It looked mismatched—new wood, smooth and without dings—next to the shabby living room furniture.
The carpet had seen better days, but the top floor had the best view in the building. Large windows graced three of the walls. There were no window coverings—something that had made it hard to sleep this morning and even harder to dress. He’d had to take his clothes into the bathroom to change there.
Trees spread around the area, giving way to the riverbank on one side. Another side showed the far-off lights of Lark Springs.
He wondered if Riley had ever been inside the owner’s apartment to see the view. Perhaps it was one of the reasons she wanted to buy the place. He could imagine her here, flitting about, decorating it until it looked warm and cozy.
He straightened his tie, then straightened it again. He shouldn’t feel nervous about taking over as manager. Carson had assured him that during the winter season, there wouldn’t be much for him to do. Learning the ropes, that’s what he’d be doing for the next few months. Working with Riley would be awkward at first, but they’d get past it.
This job couldn’t be harder than being a police officer.
He headed down the stairs. The first item on his agenda was a meeting with Mr. Ross. The previous owner was coming to teach him how to use the computer system, go over the supply chain spreadsheets, and that sort of thing.
Riley would also be downstairs at the front desk for the seven to four shift. The thought of her made his mind buzz. He would take one look at her, remember what it had been like to kiss those lips, and he’d either be tongue-tied or say something stupid. That was generally what he did when he saw her these days.
He tried to imagine her looking at him with a smile and telling him good morning. It wouldn’t happen. At least not today. She would be cool and aloof and do nothing but primly sit and watch to see if he failed. He was not about to give her that sort of satisfaction.
He went down the three flights of stairs. There was a small elevator in the back, but it only went to the third floor, and it was slow, so there wasn’t much point in using it.
Mr. Ross met him in the lobby and introduced him to the staff on hand. They were a mixture of ages, mostly women.
As a police officer, Lucas had gotten good at reading people, and he could tell that this group had a knack for making someone feel like they were either being mothered, interrogated, or set up for something. The group was sharp, warm, and just nosy enough to keep him on edge.
It was quite a change from the officers he was used to working with—mostly men who spent their free time at the gym.
JoAnn, one of the inn’s two cooks, passed around cinnamon rolls she’d made. With a round, friendly face and gray threading through her brown hair, she looked like she was on the fast track to becoming someone’s grandmother.
“You’ll breathe new life into the place,” Wendy, the housekeeper, told him. She was in her thirties with long dark hair pulled into a ponytail and a look about her that said she took pride in a job well done.
Kathy, who helped in the dining room, shook his hand vigorously. She was petite with a pixie cut and an abundant amount of energy for a woman who was on the other side of forty.
Lucas also met Oscar, who did maintenance and landscaping. He was a weathered, unshaven man who either didn’t speak much English or was just the quiet type.
Riley was there as well, her tight, unhappy smile speaking volumes. She wore the same perfume she’d worn while they dated, and a whiff of it nearly did him in. He tried not to remember the way she’d been before, the woman who’d been warm, open, and always made him laugh. The woman who could make his breath hitch with one look at him through lowered lashes. That Riley was gone, replaced by coldness and edges.
Once Mr. Ross finished the introductions, he took Lucas past the front desk and down a short hallway to his office. “The inn is busier this month than usual, but that’s a good thing. Paying customers, that’s what keeps us in business.” Mr. Ross said all this with forced cheer as though he had to sell the benefits of the extra load. Lucas supposed that was because Mr. Ross had been looking forward to things being slow before his retirement. This would be his last day at the inn.
Well, Lucas had never been afraid of hard work. He could handle things.
Lucas spent the next three hours going over every spreadsheet and program that had anything to do with expenses, vendors, repairs, and payroll. “Riley knows all of it,” Mr. Ross said. “If you have any questions, she’ll help you.”
Lucas went over the spreadsheets again, familiarizing himself with them and asking Mr. Ross clarifying questions. The fewer things he had to ask Riley about, the better.
When Lucas was satisfied that he understood everything, he turned his attention to a large box sitting beside the desk. “Is that more stuff we have to go through?” He hoped not. He needed a break from records.
“No. Those are the curtains for the owner’s apartment. The real estate agent had me take them off because she thought the place showed better without them. I had housecleaning wash them and never got around to putting them back up. If you want them, you’ll need to reinstall the rods. Those are behind the box.”
Well, it was good to know he wouldn’t have to keep changing in his bathroom.
After giving this piece of information, Mr. Ross walked out the door with the spring to his step of a man who could leave the Montana winter for a beachfront cabana in Florida.
Lucas didn’t want the box cluttering up the office, so he carried it upstairs to his apartment and put it inside. On his way back down, he came across Wendy on the second-floor landing. Her head swiveled back and forth from the hallway to the staircase. “You didn’t happen to see a wallaby anywhere on the third floor, did you?”
That must be some house-cleaning term he didn’t know. “What’s a wallaby?” he asked.
She looked at him in surprise that he didn’t know. “It’s a little kangaroo. They jump around.”
He stared at her, still unsure of the question. “You want to know if I saw an actual kangaroo in the inn? I thought we had a problem with rats.”
Wendy peered down the stairs, wringing her hands together. “It’s Mrs. Lewis’s pet, and it tries to make a break for it every time I clean her room. I’m not going into room ten again. I’m not. The thing is impossible to catch.” Without waiting for his response, she hurried down the hallway, checking behind potted plants and the decorative hutch that sat in the middle of the passage.
Okay, so that was strange. Lucas had thought the inn had a no-pet policy. Why had they allowed someone to bring a miniature kangaroo to their room?
Lucas continued down the stairs toward the lobby to let Riley know about the situation.
Was it even legal to have a pet wallaby? At the very least, the owner needed to have a permit for exotic animals. He was thinking about this so intently that he didn’t pay attention to the man coming up the steps until the guy gasped at him and said, “What are you doing here?”
Lucas’s gaze snapped to the man. He was thin with a hooked nose and hunched shoulders. He looked familiar, but Lucas couldn’t place him. That was the problem with being a policeman in a small town. People remembered him.
“I’m going downstairs,” Lucas said in a friendly tone. “How about you?” He was fishing for information. Had the man been someone Lucas helped or someone he’d given a ticket?
“I have every right to be here,” the man insisted, drawing himself up. “My room is paid for. You can ask the front desk. They’ll tell you.”
Ah, now Lucas remembered him. Lark Springs only had a few hotels. About a month ago, one of them had called the police because a homeless man had come inside and was sleeping underneath the stairs.
Lucas always felt bad making homeless people go out into the cold, but he had to enforce trespassing laws. He’d taken the man to a nearby McDonald’s and bought him a meal so he could stay there for a while.
The man hurried past Lucas and went up the stairs, still muttering that the cops couldn’t make him leave. The guy was cleaner than he had been, with hair and beard trimmed, but Lucas was still uneasy about the man’s presence here. Did he actually have a room this time or just a more convincing story?
Lucas continued down the stairway and across the front room. Riley was standing over a printer, plucking pages as they came from the machine. Her auburn hair fell in waves around her shoulders, and she wore black pants and a white flowing shirt that hugged her figure, emphasizing her slender waist.
He really shouldn’t notice details like that about her.
“I just spoke to Wendy,” he said. “Did you know that we have a wallaby loose in the inn?”
“Yes,” she said calmly. “I’ve called its owner, and she’s on her way back to the inn. She’ll be able to calm Tippyroo down and catch him. Until then, I locked all the exterior doors, left a note on the back doors telling people to come to the front, and I’m watching the front door so no one inadvertently lets Tippyroo out while they’re coming or going.”
She said all of this like it was normal procedure, just another zoo creature on the loose.
He ran a hand over his chin. “First off, it’s illegal to lock exterior doors when the inn is occupied. If there was a fire, locked doors are a serious hazard. But the point of my statement wasn’t about the doors. It was to ask why we have a wallaby here.”
A faint flush colored her cheeks. “Since the carpet in room ten is already stained, I decided to throw down a rug and allow pets in that room until we put new carpet in. It’s a win-win. At least until the wallaby escapes. Tippyroo can jump right over the pet gate in the doorway.”
Yeah, which was why housing a wallaby was a bad idea. He rubbed his jaw again. “Does the owner have an exotic animal permit?”
Riley’s hand hovered over the printer, and she blinked her dark eyes at him. “I don’t know. We don’t usually ask to see people’s permits when they check in.”
Maybe Lucas was too used to thinking like a policeman. He would let the permit issue drop for the moment. “Second thing,” he cocked his head, “is there a homeless man staying here?”
Riley continued adding pages to her stack. “Three, actually. Pastor Curtis paid for their room through the first week of January because the homeless shelter is full.”
“Is that something the inn normally does—act as an overflow for the homeless shelter?”
She shifted uncomfortably and hesitated before meeting his eyes. “No, but the pastor guilted me into taking them. It’s Christmas time. I couldn’t tell him there was no room at the inn, especially since there are non-discrimination laws.”
Lucas put his fingers to his temples, his mind immediately going to every issue he’d run across as a policeman dealing with the homeless. “Okay, religious analogies aside, I’ll need to run a background check on them. We can’t have anyone dangerous staying here.”
Riley looked up from the printer. “Is running background checks on guests legal?”
“Maybe not, but you’ve already set a precedent of illegal activity by locking the doors. I won’t write you up for that this time, so we’ll be even.”
She pursed her pink lips. “Would you actually write me up for locking the doors for an hour? What are the chances of a fire breaking out today?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Probably greater than having a wallaby bounding around the place. I’m not sure we should tempt fate.” He moved behind the desk so he could see the computer. “How do I access the men’s personal information?” Somehow, he’d already forgotten this detail. Thoughts of loose kangaroos, locked doors, and homeless men with grudges against police officers had wiped his memory clean.
Riley kept adding papers to her stack, her perfume stirring up all sorts of memories that it shouldn’t. “As soon as I’m done with the printer,” she said, “I’ll bring up the reservation.”
Lucas clicked on a tab that turned out to be the wrong one. “Shouldn’t the papers just stack on the printer without your help?”
“Ideally, yes, but the little plastic thing that does that job broke off last week, and Mr. Ross refused to purchase a new printer when this one works just fine. Honestly, since Carson agreed to purchase the place, Mr. Ross hasn’t spent a dime that he didn’t need to.”
Lucas’s attention was drawn away from her by a group of men congregating at the front door. Although it was coat weather outside, they wore towels around their waist, water shoes, and nothing else. The scene was a little surreal, like the inn was being visited by a bunch of middle-aged men who’d gotten lost on their way to a sauna.
They rang the doorbell and waited, half jogging in place to keep warm while their breath clouded around them.
Riley gestured to the keys on the desk. “Can you let the polar club men inside?”
“Are they guests or just passing streakers looking to get out of the cold?”
“Guests.”
Of course they were. Apparently, Carson had bought an inn that doubled as the island of misfit toys.
Lucas strode over to the door, opened it, and smiled in what he hoped was a managerial way. “My apologies for the inconvenience. We have a lost animal somewhere in the inn.”
“We know,” one of the men said. “We saw the sign on the back door. If we find the wallaby, do we get to keep it?”
They all laughed uproariously at this suggestion.
Lucas figured they were joking but had to say, “If you see the animal, please let one of the staff know.”
“Sorry for dripping in the lobby,” another of the men said in passing, and they all shuffled off toward the stairs.
Lucas returned to Riley. He tapped his fingers against the countertop waiting for an explanation. She didn’t offer one. Of course she didn’t. Her brown eyes were focused solely on the printer.
“So what’s the deal with the men in towels?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Some health thing. They take a plunge into the river twice a day, then stop by the front desk to try and convince me of the benefits of nearly freezing to death. So far, I’ve remained unconvinced and happily surprised that I haven’t had to call paramedics to revive them. It’s become our daily ritual.”
Lucas’s fingers tapped harder. “Please tell me they’re wearing swimsuits underneath those towels.”
“I haven’t asked. Although they do go on about the nude beaches in Spain, so the possibility of no swimsuits is high.”
This was what he’d given up his police career for. This . Lucas went back to the computer but couldn’t pay attention to the screen. “You realize that the river is a public place. Nudity there falls into the category of public indecency. I’d really like it if none of my police officer friends stopped by to arrest anyone during my first week.”
“You and me both.” She shrugged again. “At this time of the year, not many people are at the river to see them and complain.”
Lucas felt a pressure behind his eyes that could quickly turn into a headache. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I was told things would be slow here until spring. Instead, our guests include a woman with an escaping wallaby, three homeless men, and six exhibitionists who may at some point need intervention to get them out of the river.”
“They might be wearing swimsuits,” Riley said brightly. “Just because we haven’t seen them doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Of course, I’ve told myself the same thing about unicorns, dragons, and honest politicians. So, you know…”
He leveled his gaze at her. “Is all this craziness your way of getting back at me for becoming your boss?”
“You would think that, wouldn’t you? But the sad answer to that question is no.”
He swept his hand in the direction of the stairs. “All of this is normal?”
She had the grace to blush, and her voice dropped. “I ran a special with lowered rates to get more winter business, and this is the clientele that showed up. In retrospect, that may have been a mistake.”
“Yeah, make sure the manager approves the specials from now on.”
She sighed. “Yes, sir.”
The printer finally stopped spitting out papers. Riley gathered the stack and tapped the bottom on the desk to straighten it.
“What is all of that?” he asked. He was fully expecting her to tell him it was some horrible and tedious report that he would have to read.
“Mrs. Nickle, the guest in room five, needed something printed. Granted, I hadn’t expected it to be three hundred pages, but we’re all about serving our guests, especially when Carson is paying for the paper.”
Lucas eyed the stack. It was hefty enough to be used as a step stool. “The front desk doesn’t have limits on how much you’ll print for guests?”
“We do,” Riley admitted, “but I was worried about wallaby containment and forgot to ask her how many pages it was.” Riley’s gaze went to the stairs, and her voice dropped. “Here’s Mrs. Nickle now.”
An elderly woman descended the last of the steps and headed across the lobby to them. She was gesturing behind her to the staircase in blinking bewilderment. “Either a half dozen naked men are chasing a little kangaroo around the second-floor, or I’m having a nervous breakdown.”
“You’re not having a breakdown.” Riley picked up her phone. “We have a marsupial situation. I’ll let housekeeping know where they can find the wallaby.”
“Oh, good.” The woman stopped gesturing towards the stairwell but left her finger in the air. “And why aren’t the men wearing clothes?”
Riley punched in a number. “We’re all wondering that.” With the phone pressed to her ear, she handed the stack of papers to the woman. “I’ll have the manager talk to the men about the inn’s dress code.” She swept her hand toward Lucas. “This is Mr. Clark, the manager.”
Lucas nodded, resigned. “I’ll talk to the polar club.”
Mrs. Nickle tucked the stack of paper into her arms. “Thank you.” She held out her hand to shake Lucas’s. “Glad to meet you, Mr. Clark. You have a lovely inn, and when I say it’s the perfect place to kill someone, I mean that as the highest compliment.”
Somehow the comment didn’t even surprise him.
The woman turned on her heel and headed back to the stairs. Lucas watched her go for a moment, then walked around the desk to head to the second floor. “Are you going to explain her statement,” he asked Riley, “or just let me wonder if she’s a serial killer?”
Wendy must’ve answered her phone because Riley ignored him and began telling the housekeeper that the wallaby was spotted on the second floor.
Sure, Riley wasn’t trying to get back at him. She’d probably booked every criminal in Montana, and now he was going to have to do background checks on the lot of them just so he’d be able to sleep at night.
Ex-girlfriends.
Riley.
Heaven help them both. He laughed and shook his head. Man, he’d missed her.