Finn
“Dad.”
I blinked up at the ceiling, confused.
“Dad.” The word registered with me this time.
I jumped up to find Merry standing in the doorway, silhouetted by a dim light coming from down the hall.
“Everything okay?” I said, trying to force my eyes to adjust to the dark room.
“I can’t go to camp tomorrow.”
“Okay, sweets,” I said, still waiting for my brain to boot up. “Are you sick? I’ll find the thermometer.” In four strides, I was standing on the cold tile floor of the bathroom and flipping on the harsh fluorescent light. Shit, that was blinding.
“No. I’m not sick.”
She followed me, looking so small and scared in her unicorn pajamas with her dark hair a mess.
I ushered her out and toward the kitchen, where I got each of us a glass of water. “Wanna tell me what’s up?” I asked, taking our drinks to the living room. I settled on the couch quietly, giving her some time to respond.
Parenting a tween was not for the weak, and I had learned the hard way to give her time and space to put her concerns into words.
She plopped onto the cushion and curled up against me. “I don’t want to go. The kids there are so mean. And Bella’s family is on vacation, so I have no friends at all.”
That statement was punctuated by a dramatic hair toss.
Pulling her closer, I murmured, “Mom mentioned things were tough.”
“People are so mean. Kids don’t wanna be my friend because of Grandpa Mitch. Some of them laugh at me. They say that I’m gonna be a jailbird too.”
My heart lurched, and I had to keep myself from going rigid. She didn’t need to see how angry I was at kids her age. While asshole kids had always existed and always would, this was poking at a very raw, very fresh wound for both of us.
“Abby Ward said our whole family is going to hell.”
I rolled my eyes and huffed. The Wards were all dicks. I supposed that kind of shit was genetic.
“Things were so different,” she said. “Before.”
I pulled her closer and dropped a kiss to the crown of her head. “I know, baby. And I’m so sorry. I want to fix this for you so badly.”
“Mom says it will blow over.”
I closed my eyes, praying that it would. But this town had a long memory. I wasn’t certain it ever would.
Stroking her hair, I took a moment to gather my thought so I could give her a dad pep talk. But then she did the thing. The thing I can’t handle. She cried.
Seeing any woman cry, no matter her age, made it almost impossible to think rationally. And when the person crying was my little girl? Every instinct in my body screamed “fix this,” and I couldn’t function rationally.
So that was how I ended up agreeing to let her skip camp.
After finally getting her back to bed in her room, I paced the living room. Not that there was much room for pacing. And I had to be careful. We were on the third floor of an old brick building, so sound traveled. And the guy who lived below me, Dylan, was not my biggest fan.
I had nothing against him, but he was Remy Gagnon’s best friend and brother-in-law.
Since the day I moved in two years ago, he had kept his distance.
I’d never had a beef with him, and for most of our lives, we’d coexisted pleasantly.
These days, though, he was one more Lovewell citizen who hated me.
I checked to make sure Merry was truly asleep before killing all the lights.
Her bedroom was tiny. Like barely big enough for a twin bed.
But I’d let her decorate it herself. That was how we’d ended up with a giant glittering chandelier, yellow ruffled bedding, and framed Taylor Swift posters covering almost every inch of wall space.
I couldn’t give her the kind of home Alicia and Mike could, but she seemed content when she was here.
Tonight, we had made tacos. Then we’d danced around to our fave T-Swift songs—hers was “Anti-Hero,” and mine was “Love Story.” What could I say? I was sentimental. Then we fit in a few games of chess before bed.
Working through the restlessness that had reemerged even though it was the middle of the night, I continued my quiet pacing.
What would I do with her tomorrow? I was set to start installing the drone mapping software on the computer system and I needed to get the survey plotted out first thing.
It would take a week or two, and then I’d get the drones up in the air.
I would have preferred to be in the air myself, but the drones were cost effective and quick. Once we’d mapped out the new land, I’d get up there and take some photos so we could identify areas that needed repair and others where we could pursue further development.
It wasn’t glamorous work, but it was an improvement from what I’d been doing at Hebert Timber.
Before Dad was arrested, I’d spent most of my work hours shuttling guys back and forth to the camps.
It could be entertaining at times, but it was monotonous.
I itched for something new, a chance to push myself, but I feared I’d left all those opportunities behind when I left the Navy.
Could I bring her to Gagnon? She was ten, and she could handle herself. She went to Alicia’s office frequently. We could make it work. I had only started, and I didn’t want to make a bad impression, but my baby girl was hurting.
I came to a stop and closed my eyes, mostly worried about one person’s opinion.
Would Adele be mad? Would Merry like her? And why did I even care?
We rolled into Gagnon Lumber early with donuts. I had confided in Merry that the folks at my new job were not exactly thrilled to have me there. I didn’t want her to be caught off guard if we encountered someone who was unkind.
“Dad, bring food. Everyone likes the guy who brings snacks,” she’d declared, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
So we hit the bakery on the way in, grabbing two dozen designer donuts that I hoped would keep my coworkers happy while I staged an impromptu take-your-daughter-to-work day.
Did Adele like donuts? Probably not. If that ass was any indication, she ate chicken breasts and barbells for breakfast, not fried dough stuffed with sugar and cream. But it didn’t change how excited I was about the prospect of watching her lick icing off her fingers.
Inside the main office, Merry said hello to each and every person she encountered and offered donuts all around before we finally made it to the shop. Charlie and Estrella were already working, and the sound of a popular boy band song from the ’90s echoed through the massive garage.
“This place is cool,” Merry said. She was wide-eyed as she took in the carefully labeled tools, parts, and bins that lined the walls.
A tractor took up the space in the middle of the work area, the hood open to reveal the engine inside. It was as big as most cars and probably more complicated.
My knowledge of vehicles with wheels was limited, and I did not envy the work this team did. The shop at Hebert Timber was much bigger but far less organized. The walls were plastered with posters of half-naked women, and every surface was covered in cigarette butts and oil stains older than I was.
No wonder Adele was able to get all this work done early and under budget with a limited crew. The workspace she’d created here was clean, efficient, and respectful.
It hadn’t occurred to me until now how much Merry could benefit from spending a little time here.
This was a place where women worked in traditionally masculine positions and did the jobs far better than most men could.
She’d seen the inside of Alicia’s law firm a million times, so I was grateful for the contrast.
Charlie sauntered up when she caught sight of us. She was in her early forties, with a gray streak in her dark ponytail, and was by far the friendliest of the bunch. “Good to see you, Hebert,” she said, offering a hand to Merry.
She was a single mom, and I’d seen her at school functions a few times with her sons, but I didn’t know much else about her. Unlike Estrella, who avoided me, Charlie made an effort, and that meant a lot to me. Being here was hard enough without the constant reminder of how unwelcome I was.
Merry wandered around the open space, munching on a donut and studying all the strange parts and tools in the shop. Her eyes widened when she saw an acetylene torch hanging on the wall, and she stopped in front of it, head tilted back so she could assess it.
Before I could steer her into my office with her books and art supplies, Adele came striding through the shop, ponytail bouncing and eyes narrowed.
I stood up a little straighter, not sure how to greet her after our interaction the previous day.
She ignored me. Instead, she zeroed in on Merry.
Wearing a pair of bike shorts and a baggy Racine T-shirt knotted at the waist, she looked like she’d come from the gym.
Even sweaty, she was insanely gorgeous. Her proximity alone made my heart rate tick up a little.
This interaction felt important, somehow, and I couldn’t figure out why.
I needed today to go smoothly.
Adele squatted down and held out a hand. “Adele Gagnon.”
Merry smiled at her, delighted to be treated like a grown-up. “Meredith LaVoie Hebert,” she said in a very formal voice, but then she added, “everyone calls me Merry.”
Adele smiled at her.
“I hope it’s okay,” I said, stumbling over my words. “She wanted to tag along.”
“Not a problem. My niece and nephew are always running around here. I can’t help it that I’m so much more interesting than Henri.” She shrugged, a hint of a smirk tugging on one side of her mouth.
“So you’re hanging with us today, huh?” she asked Merry, scratching at her chin. “You look a lot smarter than your dad.”
Merry giggled at that, bringing a hand up to cover her mouth.
“Even so,” Adele went on, “I’ll go over the house rules, just in case.”
Straightening up and donning a serious expression, my daughter nodded.
“You can ask anyone any question you want. We’ll teach you whatever you want to learn. But do not touch anything, lift anything, or jump off anything. Got it?”
“Yes.”