Page 19 of Marrying the Nanny

“Hey.” Trystan put a hand in the air between them.

Glenda had never let them fight, not physically, which probably accounted for the distance they’d always maintained and still did, glaring at each other from across their dead father’s king-size bed.

“It’s one week,” Trystan said. “Is there still a pullout in the rumpus room? Because I’m calling it. There’s a bed in the baby’s room. Sleep there or move it to the basement with me,” he told Logan.

“You’ll have to move the new kitchen cabinets,” Emma said with a wince of apology. “All kinds of stuff was delivered. I didn’t know where to put it, but there’s a new frame and mattress for this room down there.”

“Yeah?” Logan brightened with a smug-ass grin.

Reid swore. “Does that mean—”

He and Logan leaned forward at the same time. The mattress sank beneath the weight of their touch, swelling and sloshing as they both straightened.

“That’s sexy,” Logan mocked. “Sleep tight. I’ll take the mattress on the floor in the basement.”

One week, Reid thought, but already knew they were dreaming. The house was two months from livable if they were lucky.

The noose of reality was tightening around his neck by the second.

“We should get a look at the lodge and everything else.” Keep this bad news train rolling. Reid snatched up his jacket. “Finish planning the service.”

“How long will you be?” Emma asked. “I could put a frozen lasagna in the oven. It would take about an hour.”

“Sounds good.” Reid left with his brothers, gulping at the cold, damp air outside.

*

Four hours later, all three of them were weaving as they headed back to the house. The flashlight on Trystan’s phone was the only light they had. They were trying to avoid the potholes full of water in the driveway. The rest was slippery grass and mud.

They were all stinking drunk.

Art, Sophie’s grandfather, had made a special trip on his ATV to meet them at the marina. He’d brought a bottle of rye whiskey and opened it to toast their father.

“I thought Wilf would do the eulogy at my funeral,” Art had said as he poured into a collection of cracked coffee mugs inside the cluttered marine shop. The smell of grease and metal and alcohol had pushed into Reid’s sinuses with a sharp sting.

They’d gone upstairs to the office where Sophie had ditched her coveralls to catch up on invoicing. She’d been defensive about the state of the marina.

“I kept telling Wilf we were behind on payments. We’ve been going broke on interest and late fees for months. I wanted to hire another mechanic for this season because I’m having trouble keeping up, but he said Randy is enough. He’s only an apprentice and he keeps going back to Nanaimo for school.”

By the time they had sat down to listen to that grim report, Reid had been exhausted from hours of looking at everything else that was hanging by a thread. The boatyard was an eyesore. The helipad and fuel station needed a facelift, not just lipstick. The ferry slip was okay because it was maintained by the Ministry of Transport, but the sawmill was a giant, overturned box of toothpicks and even the staff housing in the old cannery needed maintenance and repair.

The whole time he’d been taking in what an unmitigated disaster this was, everyone they encountered had shaken their hands and commiserated with them. They shared a shot and a story. “He gave me a hundred bucks that time I was short.” “He helped me salvage my boat when I ran aground.” “He always knew where the fish were biting.” “I never heard anyone laugh harder than Wilf when…”

It was an emotional roller coaster that didn’t let up, especially when they walked through the original lodge called the Boathouse for its nautical theme. It had been built for sport fishermen who didn’t need frills. Two practical single bunks to a room, showers down the hall, and a communal lounge for sharing fish tales over beer.

Tiffany had decided it needed to be remodeled into rooms with double beds and en suites. Curtains and desks, televisions, towel warmers, and charm. Twenty-two rooms had been framed down to a dozen, four of which hadn’t even been started because they were occupied by the crew who were sitting on their thumbs, waiting to hear their payroll was flush enough they could continue what they’d been hired to do.

If that wasn’t maddening enough, the Ocean View Lodge and Spa was a behemoth of half-round logs built in a freshly cleared stretch above a reinforced shoreline. From an engineering standpoint, Reid had no concerns. From a cost standpoint, a lesser man would be curled up crying in the shower.

“Anyone else get the feeling Tiffany brought a pickaxe and pan when she moved in with Dad?” Reid wasn’t sure if his lips felt so numb because he was drunk or because he was soaked to the skin by the steady rain. Sophie had left the SUV when she dropped them at the house, but they’d chosen to walk down to the village for some inexplicable reason. Nostalgia? Not his usual color.

“There’s a joke there about using her sluice box, but I’m too hammered to find it,” Logan said.

“Such a class act.” Trystan spoke on his other side. “But yeah. Sounds like she loved spending money that wasn’t hers.”

“I still can’t understand who the hell she thought was coming to stay here? That’s a real question, champ.” Logan rocked his shoulder into Reid’s, making him stumble to catch his balance. “There are billionaires willing to pay top dollar for heli-skiing and glamping, but they ain’t coming here unless you figure out how to entice ’em.”

“They’re coming by boat,” Reid said with abundant sarcasm. “You saw the brochure.”

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