Page 50 of Forgiving Her First Love

“Reid said we’re likely to make a deal on the MissionaryII.”

“That’s cool.” She swung around on the stool. “How were you thinking of approaching the restoration?”

“As a rule, the right way. Invariably, that’s the expensive way. I need to run some numbers, but I need an office. I’ve been trying to do my design work off my laptop since I got here and it’s hell on my eyes. I bought a desk and a couple of extra monitors, but there’s nowhere at the house to set it up. I keep getting kicked out. I’d rather work here.”

“I sense an eviction coming. Are you going to send me back to doing paperwork behind the counter in the hardware store? Because that’s a lot of interruptions, which means mistakes. Also, sometimes people are listening to calls they shouldn’t be privy to.”

“No, you and I talk too much about day-to-day stuff. I don’t want to have to walk downstairs every time I want your two cents.”

“I have a solution for that.” She waved at the desk. “We have these things called telephones. They’re a primitive technology, but they still work in a pinch.”

“So you don’t mind walking upstairs every time I call and tell you I need to talk to you?”

She walked up and down those stairs a thousand times a day, but point taken. She would kill him if he called her more than once a week.

“What did you have in mind?” She glanced around. “Taking out that coffee shelf isn’t going to give you much room for your own desk.”

“No, but there’s a supply closet on the other side of that wall. It’s for all those reams of paper no one uses anymore.”

“And a photocopier that’s been broken for years.”

“It doesn’t even work?”

“The fax machine part does.”

“That’s useful,” he snorted.

“There’s a recycle place in Bella Bella. I’ve been suggesting for ages that it would make a good school fundraiser for the company to cover the cost of shipping a pallet over. No one wants to pack their old TV across on the seabus, but they’ll pay a few bucks to add it to a pile of electronics that’s already going.”

“That’s a good idea. Make it happen.”

“Awesome.” She had a broken VCR she’d been trying to get out of the house for years. She turned back to finish logging her hours.

He stretched out his arms in a rough measure of six feet.

“I am compelled to point out”—she spun around again—“if your goal is to add expense to the restoration, an office reno definitely nails it.”

“As always, I appreciate your input.” He didn’t look appreciative.

“Well, it seems like a lot of effort unless you’re planning to stick around longer than the end of summer?” Why did that thought unfurl such a sense of promise inside her?

“It’s a workspace, not a homestead.” He pulled the tacks from the corners of the map and started rolling it.

“What’s really eating you?” she asked.

“I need a space that’s mine.” He set the map aside. “I’m leaving your place at the end of the week to go back to a room that wasn’t even mine when I was a kid.”

He retrieved the sledgehammer she used as a doorstop.

“Logan! You have to warn accounting. You’ll scare the hell out them if you crash through that wall like the Kool-Aid guy. You’re not even wearing your goggles. What if there’s electrical inside that wall? Safety first!”

He sent her a deadpan look as he lay the hammer in the middle of the floor, perpendicular to the wall. He stood and stretched out his arms, measuring a rough six feet again, then nudged the hammer a little farther, providing a sense of how far a wall might come out.

“Oh.”

“What do you think? We could put a wall here to separate my desk from yours and a door here. That computer goes into the nook it creates over there.”

“I can see it.” They discussed a few other fine points.

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