Chapter 12 Alex #2
New York hovered, not quite close enough to be in the way but close enough to catch every word.
“That’s bad. Isn’t it?” she said.
“It’s lazy,” I said. “It’s survivable.”
She wrote that down too but then paused and looked up at me. “Survivable feels… like a low bar.”
“It’s an old building,” I said, sliding the plate back into place. “Old buildings live on low bars.”
She let out a breath that sounded like agreement and stress at the same time.
The sound of heels clicking somewhere behind us reached me.
“Well,” a woman’s voice said brightly, “this just improved my day.”
I turned as Lola came down the hallway toward us, her silk robe loosely tied, drink in hand like she’d dressed specifically for inspections and interruptions. Her gaze landed on me and stayed there, slow and deliberate.
“Do you do private work?” she asked. “Because I suddenly have… concerns. Upstairs.”
New York made a small choking sound.
Lola glanced at her and then back at me. “Strictly professional, of course,” she added. “Unless you’re flexible.”
“I fix buildings,” I said.
Lola smiled wider. “Shame.” She lifted her glass in a casual toast and continued past us, disappearing down the hall like she hadn’t just dropped a live grenade into the conversation.
Silence settled, and I turned back to the fixture.
New York stood still, pen paused midair, with a grin. “She’s a bit of a wild one.”
“No shit.” I stepped off the bench and moved down the hall, already onto the next problem.
We moved toward the stairwell. The exit sign above the doorway was mounted slightly crooked. The green letters glowed, but the casing had yellowed with age.
I checked the date sticker on the side and took a photo.
New York’s pen scratched. “Exit sign.”
“Battery backup matters,” I said.
She nodded quickly. “Battery backup matters.”
I glanced back at her notepad and saw she’d underlined it twice.
She looked up, caught me seeing it, and cleared her throat. “I’m… taking this seriously.”
“That’s good,” I said.
Her shoulders eased just a fraction, like she’d been waiting for permission to care this much.
We climbed to the second floor. The hallway was narrower up here, lined with doors that had been painted and repainted until the hinges looked tired. Wall sconces ran along the length of the hall, each one slightly different, like the inn had been collecting them over decades and calling it charm.
I checked the first one. Solid. Second one. Flicker. Third one. Solid. Fourth one. The switch plate was cracked.
I snapped pictures as I went. Base, plate, wiring access points, anything that looked improvised.
New York matched my pace down the hall, her pad angled toward the nearest light. When she paused to write, her shoulder brushed my arm, close enough that her notes flashed into view between steps.
Ask Maria if she saw water stain.
Check linen closet for extinguishers.
Buy more lightbulbs???
She underlined the last one twice and then added a star in the margin.
We reached a spot where the ceiling had been cut and patched. A thin line of new paint outlined a square that didn’t match the rest. Someone had accessed the wiring there recently.
I stopped.
New York bumped lightly into my back, soft, quick contact before immediately stepping away like she’d touched a hot stove.
“Sorry,” she blurted, her cheeks darkening.
The color made her eyes stand out. Bright. Blue. Sexy. Way too sexy.
I pulled my gaze to the ceiling and lifted my phone to snap a picture of the patch. “Keep moving.”
She nodded, pen ready again. “Yes, boss man.”
My mouth twitched before I could stop it.
We continued down the hall. A door opened at the far end, and Maria stepped out with a basket of linens balanced on her hip. Mid-fifties, short dark hair pulled back tight, the same practical no-nonsense look she’d had for years. She spotted us and slowed, her eyes flicking to me first.
“Hey,” she said, like this wasn’t the first time she’d seen me in these halls.
“Maria,” I replied, just as easily. She’d worked here back when Edna was still alive, long enough to know the building by feel.
Her gaze shifted to New York, quick and curious. “Rooms are nearly done,” Maria said. “Just need towels.”
New York’s expression tightened for a beat before shifting to focused, already moving. “Towels,” she repeated, writing it down. “Okay. Great. Thank you.”
Maria nodded, adjusted the basket on her hip, and headed toward the linen closet like she’d done it a hundred times before.
New York exhaled slowly, and loudly.
“You okay?” I asked because the question came out of my mouth before I could stop it.
She looked at me like I’d asked if she enjoyed breathing. “Yes. Totally. Thriving,” she said and then pointed at her notepad. “Do we have enough towels? No. Do I know how many towels an inn is supposed to have? Also no. Do I want to find out the hard way? Not particularly.”
I nodded once and checked another sconce. The light held steady. “Order more.”
She stared at me. “That’s… an option?”
“It’s the option,” I said.
“Right.” She nodded and scribbled something in her notepad. “Order more towels.”
We reached the end of the hall where the emergency light was mounted above a door leading to the stairs. The casing was dusty, and one of the lenses had a crack.
I tested it. It stayed on, and I snapped a picture of the crack.
“Emergency light cracked,” said New York as she continued to scribble in her writing pad. ”Replace before festival.”
She didn’t say the festival name out loud. She didn’t need to.
Pearls & Pints Bachelor Weekend. A fucking nightmare.
I looked back down the hall—old building, old wiring, old patchwork, a thousand small things that had survived because someone kept them just barely on the right side of disaster.
New York stood there with her pen poised, waiting for the next instruction.
Her hair was pulled back and messy, her face flushed from moving too fast all day and refusing to stop.
She was trying to be invisible, trying to take up less space, trying to avoid being “the woman who didn’t know what the fuck she was doing. ”
It didn’t fit her. Her stubbornness filled rooms, even when she tried to shrink it.
I pointed at the next fixture. “That one. Check the plate. Photograph it. Send it to me.”
Her brows lifted. “I’m… helping now?”
“You’re here,” I said. “Use it.”
She nodded and then stepped closer, careful and focused, her phone in one hand with the pen tucked behind her ear. She raised the camera, snapped a picture, and then looked up at the fixture like she wanted to memorize it.
“I’m going to become an expert in light fixtures against my will,” she breathed.
“Welcome to old buildings,” I said.
She huffed a laugh and wrote something down anyway.
We moved toward the stairs again, the inn creaking under our footsteps and the lights glowing above us, holding steady for now.
Pearls & Pints was one week away.
New York kept writing while she walked, the pen flying, already three steps ahead of the problems she hadn’t solved yet.
The list on my phone kept growing, picture by picture, like the job was already deciding what it wanted from me.
And the problem was… I was letting it.