21. Kristin
21
KRISTIN
T he housekeeping cart squeaked as I pulled it down the hallway of the Taylor Creek Inn. My phone buzzed where it rested on the stack of individually wrapped toilet paper rolls. The screen flashed with an incoming text from Will.
Will
I used to enjoy work trips, but now all I can think about is going home and being with you. Tell me again how much longer it is until I get to see you?
Kristin
Two more days. I miss you. How’s Virginia?
Will
You know what they say, Virginia is for Lovers.
Kristin
Hmm. Maybe when you get back, we’ll finally check the “lovers” box of this relationship.
Will
At the risk of sounding like a complete asshat, please tell me you filled your prescription this morning.
Kristin
Filled, taken, and I have a daily reminder on my phone, so I won’t forget.
Will
Damn, I love that you’re an overachiever. It’s sexy. Also, exactly how long can I kidnap you for when I get back? I plan on keeping you in my bed for as long as possible. I’ll stock up on Gatorade and protein bars.
Kristin
Not long enough. After the week I’ve had, I’m ready to hide from the kids for a solid 48 hours. Does that make me a terrible person?
Maria cleared her throat. “Are we going to clean, or are we going to stand in the hallway all day and text our boyfriends?”
I rolled my eyes and pocketed my phone. “Oh, please. I can text with one hand, turn rooms over with the other, and still finish faster than you.”
If I couldn’t work by myself, cleaning with Maria was my next favorite thing. She was such a sweet woman. After a full domestic life as a mom of six and grandmother of ten, she came out of retirement to work at the inn.
In her words, she got bored easily.
She wore her wispy gray hair pulled back in a staunch bun. The lines around her eyes framed a twinkle of amusement in her dark irises.
“Have you heard anything about the new management?” she asked as she refreshed the minibar while I started stripping the bed .
The tension among the staff had lessened since news first broke that the inn would be sold. It still lingered in the back of everyone’s mind, though. The company signing our paychecks changed, but other than that, everything stayed the same. It should have been a relief. After all, they could have cleaned house and brought in their own staff. I counted putting up with Rich the Dick as a blessing.
A very, very small blessing.
Rumors of new upper management persisted, but I would believe it when it happened. For the time being, I had to make myself as indispensable as possible. The two-dollar-an-hour raise I received had been a welcomed change. I could put up with an army of general managers if my checks kept looking as nice as they did, especially with all the overtime I pulled.
“No. Why?” I asked as I dropped the pile of sheets into the housekeeping cart. “Have you heard something?”
Maria flashed a devilish grin. “You know how it goes. The help knows everything.”
It was a blessing and a curse. Maids could move through the inn and be seemingly invisible. People actively overlooked us to avoid thinking about the backbreaking work involved in keeping all the rooms in tip-top shape. No one wanted to think about someone picking up after them.
Someone had to do it, though.
The work was thankless most of the time, but the gossip made up for it. Guests ran their mouths freely because—well—we were just the maids.
It was pretty damn entertaining.
The number of people having affairs staggered me. It wasn’t just summertimers, either. Locals used the inn for daytime hookups, too.
Certain levels of management also tended to overlook the housekeeping staff. Sure, we got railed if something was out of place or a guest complained. But, other than that, Rich the Dick and his minions didn’t want to think about the dirty details.
“Well? Are you going to spill the tea or keep me hanging?” I asked, laughing as I tucked the corners of a fitted sheet around the mattress.
Maria paused as she sprayed glass cleaner on the balcony doors. “Why is it always tea that’s spilled? Why not coffee or wine?” She spritzed a little more and wiped the glass. “Saying spill the juice would make the most sense. After all, doesn’t tea mean gossip? And gossip is juicy. It’s the juice that should be spilled.”
I put my hands on my hips. “Will you get to the point already?”
Maria hooked the spray bottle's trigger on the edge of the cart and tossed the paper towels in the garbage bag. “Karina put in her notice.”
I nearly choked on my tongue. “ What? ”
Karina Miller worked as the assistant manager at the inn. She had overseen the day-to-day of the inn for longer than I could remember and had clear aims for the general manager position if Rich ever left.
One could dream.
Truthfully, Karina had always been too good for this place. She lived and breathed hospitality, and busted her ass to do it. Unlike Rich, she had never been afraid to get her hands dirty. Even if it meant unpleasant tasks like overnight deep cleans or laundering endless loads of linens, Karina never hesitated to get down in the trenches with the rest of us.
“You’re joking,” I said, shaking my head. Part of me wanted to stomp down to Karina’s office and tell her to pull her head out of her ass.
She couldn’t leave us on our own with Rich.
Maria nodded. “I said the same thing. But I heard Rich talking about the new management company and how they wanted Karina gone.” Then, muttering under her breath, she added, “Don’t know how he missed the firing squad.”
“So, she quit before they could fire her?” I asked as I folded crisp corners on the flat sheet. “That doesn’t make sense. If they fired her, she’d at least get a severance.”
Tying off the ends of the trash bag by the desk, Maria shrugged. “I don’t know. If she’s giving up a severance, she must have a good reason for leaving.”
“You’re not leaving, are you?” I asked, forcing a laugh as I smoothed down the comforter and laid the emerald green decorative runner across the foot of the bed.
When it came to staff turnover, the good ones usually left first. The inn paid decently, but a person could only tolerate so much bullshit.
“Not unless they tell me to go,” Maria said, as she turned off the lights and backed the cart away from the door.
I knocked, called out the housekeeping greeting, then yanked on the master key clipped to my badge reel to open the next room.
“This is a hobby for me,” she said as we swapped tasks. Maria took the bed this time, and I took the bathroom and amenities. “But you have the little ones to think about. So maybe put your résumé out there. See if you can find something better.”
I snorted. “My résumé is one line long: Kristin Boyd: college dropout and maid. End of résumé.”
“ Head housekeeper ,” Maria said sternly. “Nothing pets my peeves more than people talking down about themselves.”
“You sound like Will.”
“Or Will sounds like me,” she tut-tutted. “How are things with your boyfriend? Has he proposed yet?”
I tossed my head back as a bellyaching laugh ripped free. “Proposed? We’ve barely been together for a month.”
“My Antonio proposed to me with a gumball machine ring after two weeks. We were married forty-six years before he passed on,” Maria said. “You kids these days wait too long, thinking you need to have your whole life figured out before you let yourself fall in love. The point is to fall in love, then figure the rest out together.”
That was another thing about turning over rooms with Maria. She had a way of being the snarkiest trash talker around. Then, three seconds later, she would casually drop the heaviest, life-altering truth she could muster.
I loved her, but I didn’t particularly appreciate her calling me out like that.
Even if she was right.
“Marry him and have babies,” Maria said, spouting off like that was the answer to everything.
Okay, so she wasn’t always right about everything.
I snorted. “The first is a long way down the road, and the second will never happen.”
“You’ll change your mind.”
“No, I won’t.”
I loved Maria, but the woman was dead set on playing hop-scotch all over my last nerve today. Why did people think it was okay to tell a woman that she would change her mind when it came to having kids? Some people didn’t feel the need to see mini versions of themselves running all over the damn place and that was perfectly acceptable.
“I don’t know if Will wants kids either. We haven’t talked about it.”
Maria wrinkled her nose. “Ask him.”
“Will isn’t exactly young. He’s a lot older than me.”
Seeds of doubt took root in my mind. What if he did want kids? He seemed unfazed by the age difference, but numbers were what they were. Even if I came around to having kids eventually, would he be willing to wait that long?
“How much older?” Maria asked .
“Thirteen years,” I said as I checked the minibar. It was untouched, so I swiped a dust rag across the slick surface and tossed it back on the cart. “He’s thirty-eight.”
Maria laughed as she karate chopped the tops of the pillows. “Same age as Antonio was, but I was eighteen when I married. Now, twenty years— that is an age difference. Yours isn’t a gap. It’s only an age ditch. A little hop.”
“Seriously? Twenty years?” I shook my head as we moved on to the next room. “I bet your families had a few choice words about that.”
“Did they ever,” she snickered. “Don’t bother yourself with the opinions of unimportant people. Unimportant people are quick to criticize and slow to support. It's a pity that people are so concerned with cramming love into a one-size-fits-all box instead of just celebrating it.”
“Will and I aren’t in love,” I said all too quickly.
“Yet,” she said with a wink. “You aren’t in love yet .”
I held on to that thought as we cleaned two floors full of rooms. By the time I clocked out, I’d all but forgotten about the management drama.
That was, until I saw Hannah Jane talking to Karina in the lobby.
I started toward them to get some answers, but my phone buzzed with a selfie from Will. He’d been out of town for meetings that required security clearance and a stack of signed statements promising he wouldn’t tell a soul about anything. Those nondisclosure agreements didn’t say anything about selfies, though.
Will looked bored out of his mind.
I still didn’t have a clue what he did. He dabbled in a lot of things. I knew he had money. Hell, he lived in a freaking waterfront mansion. That thing had to be as pricey as Maddie and Luca’s place, and Luca was loaded.
I knew Will wrote software and built things like computer chips for defense companies, but it seemed more like a hobby—like Maria and housekeeping. She just did it to have something to do. Will was the same way.
I had been in his home office, though. There were file folders piled up on his desk that belonged to at least twenty companies. I didn’t know if those were the ones he worked with or if he owned them.
Neither would have surprised me.
The picture he sent put a goofy smile on my face, so I saved it. He had dressed up for the meetings. The collar of a button-up shirt peeked out from under his favorite half-zip pullover, and he had styled his hair rather than hiding it under a ballcap.
God, I adore the lines around his eyes. They came out when he smiled, and his glasses couldn’t hide them.
Kristin
Miss you!
I made a beeline for Hannah.
“Hey,” I said, butting into her conversation with Karina. “You got a sec?”
Hannah glanced at the watch on her wrist. “You know, I’d love to stay and chat, but I have a client doing cake tasting with Maddie. So, I should probably head across the street and pop in.”
Interesting. At the bonfire on Monday, Maddie told us about a competition she and Luca would be judging at the community college’s culinary arts department. According to her, it would be an all-day thing.
“I thought Mad was off today,” I said as I pulled my phone out to check the date. “She and Luca had that thing in Morehead before he leaves town tonight.”
Hannah paled. “Well, would ya look at that!” She pressed her phone to her ear and definitely faked a phone call. “Isaac, honey! Hi! ”
She wiggled her fingers in a fancy wave as she practically ran down the hall to her office.
“Am I imagining things, or was that weird as hell?” I asked Karina.
Karina tossed her silky blonde hair over her shoulder. It was a stark contrast to the charcoal gray pencil skirt and blazer combo she wore almost daily. “No. It was weird.”
Hannah Jane had been really weird lately. It felt like she had been avoiding me. She wasn’t the only one. Maddie, Hannah Jane, and their men had made up excuses to disappear any time I tried to strike up a conversation or bring Will into a discussion. After a while, I’d just given up and hung out with Steve, Erica, Mel, and Chase.
Bridget missed the bonfire, claiming that she and Kyle needed to take care of some wedding details.
“So, is it true?” I asked. “Did you really put in your notice?”
Karina sighed and cut her eyes over to the front desk where Rich’s incompetent brother-in-law manned reception.
Brantley.
The guy could barely open an email, much less use the booking software. He was combative with guests and lazy with everything else. Worst of all, he was a damn snitch.
The whole thing screamed nepotism.
“They’re on a witch hunt,” she said through gritted teeth. “I don’t know who or what they’re looking for, but people are going to drop like flies.”