Page 26 of Spring Showers

“What was your favorite part?” Margret said as she pulled Anne away in a not very subtle goodbye.

Thandie waved her fingers at the two friends, knowing exactly what they were up to. Grant cleared his throat, and she met his gaze. His beautiful oceanic orbs pierced into her like Triton’s staff. “Dare I ask what your favorite part was?” she said and felt a butterfly flutter in her belly.

“My favorite part?” Grant leaned into her. His fingers rested gently on her shoulder as he whispered. “When you faked being a yoga instructor.”

Thandie pushed him away. “Oh, you! You are the absolute . . . ”Worst, she would have finished, but remembered her place. Her job was to make him fall in love with the retreat, not her. She put some more space between them and busied herself with the cleanup.

“What am I?” he said and approached her where she was rolling the mats and stacking them. “I said, what am I? Finish your thought.”

“You’re teasing me.”

“I am,” Grant said and helped her load the mats into the cart hitched to her bike.

“I don’t need your help. But thank you,” she said and wrestled the mats away from his grip.

“What am I?” he repeated with a grin that she either wanted to slap off or kiss.

She stopped loading and dropped the items from her hands. She swallowed hard and thought of any answer other than the truth. He was handsome. He was funny. He was driving her as crazy as a squirrel riding on an eagle’s back.

His hand caught hers by her side and he nudged her chin up to see his face better. She wet her lips. Her body was responding to him. It was primal. It was too fast. And it wasn’t real.

Thandie backed away. “You are complicating things for me,” she said, and it was the truth.

He took a step backwards. His wounded pride radiated off his stiff body. Grant nodded as though he understood her, and the pained look on his face tore at her. He combed his fingers back through his wavy hair and looked out into the sun. Into a distant past that she knew nothing about.

“I’ll see you later?” she asked, but he turned up the path without answering her, cold in the squareness of his shoulders. She was left in the gazebo wondering what the heck had just happened. One second, they were playfully teasing, and the next, it was as though he’d seen a ghost.

CHAPTER13

“This is bad. Very, very bad.” Thandie said and smoothed her frizzy curls away from her face.

She paced along the gazebo’s railing, occasionally picking up a mat or a towel and throwing the items into the cart. What was she supposed to do, let him embrace her? And then what? Where would that lead? Thandie stomped on the wooden planks and stood erect. “I am an employee here. He is a guest. No matter how much I like the man, I must keep a professional distance. If not for my sake, then for Leo’s.”

With renewed resolve, she tossed the few remaining things into the cart and headed to the barn, where she hoped Grant would not be. She was embarrassed. Again. Grant’s advance had been inappropriate, given their roles, but she had to admit, it wasn’t unprovoked. Heck, he probably thought all the attention she was giving to him was a kind of flirting!

“This is bad,” she repeated as she mounted her bicycle and began up the path.

Ahead, the darkened barn was like an abyss, waiting to devour her. She pedaled backwards, slowing to a stop. With her feet planted on the ground on either side of the bike, she took a couple of much-needed deep breaths. “If I make it through this week, I’ll need a wellness retreat myself,” she said and resumed her journey back to the barn.

The pressure to do what she had to do to help The Foundry and keep her job was more than she had expected it to be. She wished she had never heard Leo and America discussing the investor situation at all. She could have done her job just fine not knowing that so much was riding on her performance.

While replaying her interaction with Grant over and over in her mind, and dissecting where she had gone wrong, she easily made the half-dozen trips up to the loft. She put away all the mats and the bands she had neglected to utilize during her improvised yoga session. If she got a chance to redo the activity, she would find some way to incorporate more equipment and switch things up.

Back outside, Pa crouched beside her bicycle. He fumbled through a tool bag and what sounded like a pile of metal wrenches and screw drivers banging against one another. Like a magician, he held the thing he needed up in front of his grinning face before hunching over and doing something to the cart.

“Hey, Pa,” she said from the door so as not to startle him.

He looked up over the top rim of his safety glasses. “Did she work?”

“The cart? I hate to admit, but your fix was better than what I had rigged up.”

“Well, she just needs a little tuning up, and if that golfcart is a far way out, I can do a bit of fabricating and get this thing properly connected.” Pa clapped his hands together and rubbed one greasy palm on his worn khaki coveralls, which looked to be an army surplus uniform. “I know you aren’t the kind of woman who needs help, but let me know if anything comes up.”

“I understand,” she said and helped him with his heavy tool bag, though he carried it like it was nothing more than a sack of air. “Pa, can I ask you something?”

“Shoot,” he said and made his fingers into the shape of a cap-gun. He laughed like a jolly Santa mixed with the gruffness of a life hard-lived.

“What is it about this place?” Thandie said. “There’s so much energy and optimism in the air, even among the guests.”

---