3. Chapter 3 #2
My eyes move to my brother, who’s now trying to look anywhere but at the half-naked man standing on my stairs.
Or perhaps he’s just working through the lecture he’s about to give me.
Honestly, hiding Dean from him for a month was a ridiculous idea.
But there could have been one point five million other scenarios that would have been better than this one.
“Can I please get a towel?” Dean asks, the space between his eyes pinching together.
“Yes, sorry, of course,” I tell him before heading to a door across the front entry that leads to the kitchen and the laundry room, and behind that is where I sleep. A small room with a bathroom. It’s not princess themed. It’s me themed. Which means it’s cozy and cluttered.
“How could you forget towels?” I say to myself, as I go through the fairly large kitchen, which is wasted space at this inn. I can feed myself of course, and I do, but I mostly buy ready-made meals. Emma will bring me food sometimes, I think out of older-sisterly duty.
I grab a stack of fluffy white towels sitting on the countertop next to the dryer and hurry back to the lobby.
“Yeah, no problem,” I hear Dom say as I enter, my guest still standing half-naked on the stairs.
But now Dean’s holding the curtain around him with one hand and Dom’s hammer drill in the other.
I look at Dom, and he sees the question in my eyes. “He said he’d take care of it.”
“Oh, you don’t need to do that,” I say, turning back to Dean.
“It’s not a problem,” he says.
“You sure you don’t want me to?” Dom asks.
My eyes move from Dominic to Dean. This may be the first inn I’ve ever owned, but I’m fairly certain the guest shouldn’t be fixing anything. Also, what if he cracks the tile? Something I probably shouldn’t be worrying about right now. I should have let Dom do it. Then we wouldn’t be in this mess.
“I can do it,” he says, then he looks pointedly at me. “It’ll stay better than hot glue.”
My cheeks pink and Dom lets out a snort-laugh that he tries to cover with a cough. I’ve changed my mind. He will not be getting any pastries.
Dean turns around and walks back up the stairs, and I follow behind with the towels.
“I’m so sorry,” I say, trailing a couple of stairs behind him.
“It’s fine,” he says as he hits the landing, the shower curtain dragging on the floor behind him.
It’s not fine, and we both know it. I’ve made too many mistakes already. I should have had Dominic or Emma come stay for a night or two as a trial run. But I worked tirelessly until the moment he arrived, and now I’m seeing all my mistakes.
Seriously, who forgets towels at an inn?
He goes into the open door of his room and sets down the drill on the dresser and then comes back for the towels.
He holds out a large palm, and I set the pile on it and give him my best everything-is-just-dandy smile.
“I’m sorry again,” I say.
He only nods and then shuts the door in my face.
I let out a breath and then head back down the stairs to find Dom leaning up against my check-in desk, his elbow resting on the edge, his toolbox on the floor next to him.
“So, that’s the guest that’s staying here for a month, huh?” he asks, his brows high on his forehead.
“No,” I say, folding my arms. “That’s not him. The real guy’s got a big head and a Scottish accent, with long, pointy ears sticking straight out, and green skin. Super mean guy.”
He pulls his chin back. “Wait . . . did you just describe Shrek?”
“No,” I say. In hindsight, I could have thought of someone more realistic than a cartoon ogre. But it’s all that came to mind.
“Rosaline,” he says.
“Dominic,” I say back.
“Please don’t call me Rosaline. But also don’t tell Emma or Dad, okay? They both would worry too much. Kind of like you are now. Which, now that I think of it, must be a family trait that all of you got and I didn’t. I wonder why that is? Maybe it’s a middle child thing—”
“Rosie,” he cuts me off. He exhales audibly before swiping a hand down his face. “Just call me if there’s ever an issue, okay?”
“You’ll be the first one,” I say, before giving him a closed-mouth smile and a single nod.
“Well, call the police first,” he says. “But then, yes. Call me.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” I say, and give him my best salute. “Shall we get to work? I need you to finish the drywall in the Cinderella room.”
“On it,” he says. He walks over to the pastry box, opens it and shoves a maple bar in his mouth, and then grabs the entire box and takes it with him toward the stairs, his toolbox in the other hand.
I’d object, but since my guest “doesn’t eat carbs in the morning” and I’m not paying Dominic with cash, I can at least pay him in pastries.
I take a deep breath before following him. I have a lot to do today, so listing off all the things I’ve messed up in the past twenty-four hours isn’t going to do me any good.
Now if I could just stop picturing my half-naked guest dripping wet on my stairs, that would be even better.
An hour later, Dom is off to a paying job (man cannot live on pastries alone, which is too bad, honestly) and I’m on my knees in the Cinderella room as I try to figure out how to fit a piece of the vinyl wood flooring into an awkward angle in the corner, when I hear a knock on the open door.
I glance up to see Dean standing there, dressed in work boots that look brand new, dark jeans, and a flannel shirt.
The flannel looks good on him. But he also looked good in a shower curtain, so it might just be him.
“Hey,” he says, the corners of his lips turning up briefly before going back to their normal straight line.
I hardly know this man, but it feels like a disapproving look. He does it often. The straight line of disapproval. That’s what it is.
“Hello,” I say, giving him a cheerful smile to combat his grumpy expression.
“I just wanted to let you know that I’m checking out today,” he says.
“Oh,” I say, my heart dropping into my stomach with a thud. I can’t say I’m surprised, but also . . . I kind of am. This is the only place to stay in town.
I get up from the floor, wiping my hands on my overalls.
“Was it the shower curtain? I can’t apologize enough about that.
I was in a hurry to finish the room because you were going to be here, and then I was worried if I let Dom drill a hole into the tile I worked so hard on that there was a good chance he would break it, and it would put a wedge in our relationship that I wasn’t sure we’d be able to come back from.
Which is dumb in hindsight, but, you see, I had to start over twice on it and . . . I’m rambling, aren’t I?”
It’s rhetorical. I was definitely rambling. I feel my cheeks heat.
“It wasn’t the shower curtain,” he says. “I just need something a little less . . . busy right now.”
Right. I’ll take that to mean something that’s a little less of a hot mess.
Honestly? I get it. I made a lot of mistakes with my first guest experience.
Starting with thinking I could actually have this done in time.
Well, I’ve learned a lot from my less than twenty-four hours with Dean, and I’ll do better when my next guests arrive.
I’ll chalk this all up to a learning experience. The trial-by-fire kind.
“Where will you go?” I ask him.
“I’m going to check out my grandparents’ property and see if it’s livable. If that doesn’t work, I’ll look in Burlington.”
“Well, no worries,” I say, even though I am, in fact, super worried.
I could beg, I suppose, and maybe tell him my sob story. But I’m not friends with Dean Alden. All I know about him is that he’s grumpy and doesn’t eat carbs for breakfast. He also has a fantastic upper body. And he’s leaving me in the lurch.
“Charge me for the week,” he says.
“Oh, I . . .”
I stop myself from objecting because my brain started going off on another tangent about how that’s not really the way I want to do business—charging people for nights they didn’t stay. But I’m not exactly in the position to do that, am I? One week is better than nothing.
It’s a win, I suppose. I get paid for the week at least, and I won’t have to see the straight line of disapproval ever again.
“Thanks,” I tell him. “Well, it was nice meeting you.”
“You too,” he says. He gives me another slight lift of his lips, as if he’s never smiled before and was letting himself give it a try. His smiling muscles have probably atrophied from lack of use.
He kind of is an ogre, after all.
Then he turns around, grabs the suitcase that I didn’t see behind him, and walks down the hallway.
I let my shoulders sag once his footsteps hit the stairs.
I don’t have much wiggle room in my budget for that stupid balloon payment in November.
I’m counting on every penny coming in. But I’ll figure something out.
Who knows? Maybe someone will come to town and need a place to stay before leaf-peeping season. Crazier things have happened.
I turn and see the Cinderella room in various stages of disarray. Right now I’d like to just lie on the dusty half-finished floor and wallow, but there is no rest for the guestless inn owner. I don’t have time to dwell on things I can’t change. I’ve got work to do.