Page 5 of Summer with the Single Dad

She was a guest. Nothing more.

She just happened to be one of the most beautiful cabin guests they’d ever had. That shouldn’t change a damned thing though. And for all he knew, she could be in a relationship.

Then why’d she book seven weeks here by herself?

Well, now his conscience was playing devil’s advocate. That wasn’t fucking fair.

Growling, he shoved his fingers back into his hair and tugged until a throbbing ache formed in his scalp. “Get a fucking grip, McEvoy,” he muttered to himself.

A glance at the clock on the wall said it was five twenty. He told the kids he’d be home by six, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to get any more work done tonight. So he closed down his computer, locked the door, and headed up the hill.

Music and laughter from the pub echoed around the property and followed him up the gravel road to where he and his brothers had their homesteads. A newly installed gate made him pause and punch in the code. It clicked open, and he stepped through, enjoying the peace that fell over him as he left his work behind for the night and walked toward his front door.

The smell of turkey tacos made his belly rumble. Alt-rock played from a small portable speaker in the kitchen and he could hear the girls giggling upstairs in their rooms.

“You’re home earlier than you said,” came Jagger’s voice from the kitchen.

Bennett grunted and made his way through the house, finding his youngest brother dicing tomatoes at the counter. “Just couldn’t concentrate anymore.”

“Does that have anything to do with the new, pretty guest that just arrived?” Jagger smirked as he dumped the tomato pieces into a small bowl.

“Who told you about her?”

He glanced at the ceiling. “Two little birds who don’t know how to keep their mouths shut.”

Bennett grumbled and went to the fridge, pulling out a tallboy beer bottle from their brewery. Jagger already had one open on the counter—a tart apple hefeweizen. Bennett chose a classic, crisp lager. “She’s pretty, sure, but she’s not what’s keeping me from concentrating.” He popped the cap and took a long pull, enjoying that first icy hit across his tongue.

“What is it then?”

“I feel like a broken record, but fuck, we really need to watch our spending. We haven’t paid ourselves any decent amount of money in three months. Because every time I think we can, new bills pop up. This month it was a new piece of equipment for the brewery and a new deep fryer for the kitchen. Not to mention the rising costs of ingredients for both. Fucking yeast has doubled in price. And that barley shortage last year hit us hard in the pocketbook. The farmers still haven’t recovered, which meant we had to go north to Canada to get our supplies. And because of the demand increase, the prices went up.”

Jagger grunted. “Yeah, that extra damp season created a fungal shit storm for the poor fuckers.”

“The cost of life in general has increased to a nearly unsustainable level. Add in the fact that we live on a very desirable island in a very desirable part of the country … land prices are insane, which means property taxes are insane. I just don’t know how we can continue without taking a hard look at things and making some cuts. The question is—where?”

Making a non-committal noise in his throat, Bennett’s brother simply nodded and began cutting up romaine lettuce and throwing it into the salad spinner. “I mean … do I need to point out the new elephant on the property? The new loaded millionaire elephant? Maybe we can ask Brooke for a loan or something?”

Bennett took another long sip from his beer so he could think.

Clint would never go for it.

His relationship with Brooke was still new. He’d never be okay with them asking her for money. Even though it would solve all of their problems. They had some debt, and their mortgage on the property was coming up for renewal this year. Interest rates were soaring and their property evaluation had gone up by nearly a hundred grand since last year, which meant their property taxes were going to be higher. Add in the annual cost of living increase they owed their staff, and they were bleeding money.

He slept poorly most nights as it was, but all these money woes were really causing him to lose sleep. He met Jagger’s patient gaze as he took another sip of beer.

“We’ll figure it out,” Jagger said. “Hopefully we’ll get Bonn Remmen’s land and we can expand and put more cabins on it. Make more money.”

Bennett shook his head. “More land, more problems.”

Jagger snorted and took a pull from his own beer. “Naw, bro. That’s ‘mo’ money, mo’ problems’.”

“If we had mo’ money, I can assure you, we wouldn’t have mo’ problems.”

Chuckling, Jagger moved over to the gas stove and pushed the ground turkey around in the cast iron pan. “Well, either way, we’re better off than a lot of people. So look on the bright side.”

Bennett glared at his younger brother’s back. Easy for him to say when he had the fewest responsibilities out of all of them. No dead wife, no motherless children, and besides managing the rental cabins with Bennett and posting about the pub on social media, Jagger had zero responsibility.

Sure, he helped with his nieces and nephews a lot. Fuck, some days the kids saw Jagger more than they saw their own fathers. And Bennett and his brothers couldn’t run the business or raise their children without Jagger.

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