At Wild Rose Cottage

“Wow.”

“Wait,” Trent interrupted, then turned to Eduardo. “When you were inspecting the water pipes did you get a chance to evaluate the gas lines?”

Eduardo nodded. “Yep, but I want to double-check everything.”

“Good. We can’t take anything for granted about this house.”

“Absolutely, boss.”

The men departed to their various areas and Trent closed his eyes, drawing several deep, calming breaths. When his temper had flared as a teenager, he’d been tempted to hit walls, the way his father had done so often. Trent had also engaged in a number of monumental fights—generally with bullies, figuring they deserved it anyway. It wasn’t comforting to remember that he’d deliberately sought them out, wanting to punch and be punched.

Over time he’d learned to control the urge, knowing a man who couldn’t manage himself couldn’t be trusted to boss anyone else. But he also hadn’t wanted to be the least bit like Gavin Hawkins. Spending so much time on Meadowlark Lane—Emily’s house—was going to test the man he’d tried to become.

Opening his eyes again, he found Emily watching him, her head cocked, as if trying to guess what he was thinking and feeling.

Fat chance.

No one in thirty-six years had managed it, and he was confident this flaky woman didn’t have a prayer.

* * *

ONCE EDUARDO GAVE the all clear on the gas lines, Emily went into the dining room to assist with removing the old chandelier. She couldn’t provide any serious help, but she handed tools up to Vince and took any small parts that came off, placing them carefully in a box. And when the entire unit came down, she helped lower it.

“I heard about someone who bought a house that had one of these that still worked,” she said.

“It happens,” Trent contributed. He’d been working nearby on the door frame, which had made Emily feel uncomfortable, though she wasn’t sure why. “Last year a man inherited his grandmother’s house and she’d been using her gaslights on a regular basis.”

Emily shivered. “It doesn’t sound safe.” She patted a wall. “Don’t worry, baby. We’re going to make sure you have safe wiring.” She glanced at Vince. “I guess it sounds silly, but I believe houses have personalities.”

Vince laughed in a kindly way, but Trent seemed less sympathetic.

Well, too bad.

She was tired of arrogant men who passed judgment on her—men such as her ex-fiancé, who also happened to be Lauren’s brother. Poor Lauren was the one who’d figured things out and spilled the truth about him cheating. Not that Dennis had been terribly upset when Emily confronted him. He’d seemed to think his sleeping with other women wasn’t a big deal... She shook the thought away. She was in Montana now, with a whole new life.

Midmorning she remembered the crystal she’d brought home from the Emporium, so she went and hung it in the window that pulled the most sunshine.

“Hey, what’s that?” Eduardo called, and came into the living room, with Trent following. “All of a sudden there are rainbows everywhere.”

Emily laughed. “I hoped that would happen. I love crystals, and some people say they have healing power and create positive vibes.”

Trent’s eyebrows rose.

She smiled blandly at him. “You never know.”

Eduardo nodded sagely. “I don’t know about the mystical stuff, but something that pretty must send something good into a place.”

Emily decided he’d just won her grateful-forever award.

The morning passed pleasantly, then during a coffee break she got a surprise from Mike.

“Emily, would you consider going out to dinner with me sometime?” he asked when they were sitting on the porch steps, enjoying the fresh air. The others had already gone back inside.

She blinked. Dating wasn’t something she’d expected to do in Schuyler. After breaking off her engagement she had decided romance wasn’t her thing. But Mike seemed nice and having dinner together didn’t necessarily mean romance. More than anything, he probably felt sorry for someone whose kitchen he’d just knocked into oblivion.

“That would be nice,” she replied.

“Would Saturday evening be good for you?”

“Sure.”

He smiled, drained his coffee cup and headed indoors.

Emily pursed her lips, unsure what to think. While she wasn’t the best judge, she hadn’t sensed that Mike was especially attracted to her. He certainly hadn’t acted the way guys did around her sister.

Oh, well. The evening out would be pleasant. Mike taught history to high school students during the school year. She enjoyed history, so they’d have plenty to talk about.

Inside the house, she glanced at Trent, who was pulling up the ancient carpet from the dining room floor. Dust was flying in a thick cloud, though she’d vacuumed the thing within an inch of its questionable life.

“Put on a dust mask if you’re staying,” he advised when she started coughing. “Though I won’t be offended if you head downtown or something.”

Once again she had the feeling he wanted her gone, but she only had his words to go by since his face was concealed by both a heavy dust mask and a pair of safety glasses. Anyhow, she probably should make an appearance at the shop.

“In that case, I’ll see you in a couple of hours,” she said.

He nodded and turned back to the carpet.

Emily walked down to the Emporium where she spoke to her manager, who reported everything was going well.

After going through the sales receipts to see if new stock needed to be ordered and chatting with a few customers, she strolled back to Meadowlark Lane. Inside the house she stared in amazement. The wall between the living and dining rooms had been knocked down to floor level, with only the weight-bearing four-by-four posts left standing. Caveman, Vince, Mike and Eduardo were on the roof, so Trent must have abandoned the dining room carpet to take the thing apart.

“Wow,” she said.

He must have worked like a man possessed to have gotten the wall demolished; most of the debris was even cleared away.

“We’ll put in the low divider wall you want,” he explained. “But the way it was built, it’s cleaner to pull everything down and rebuild. The support beams will need to be faced, and we’ll frame them at the top to echo the molding in both rooms. You’ve come up with a good plan. The change will create a more contemporary, open feeling without erasing the vintage appeal.”

The long statement seemed uncharacteristic, especially since his face remained hard and stony, and his admission about it being a “good plan” held a grudging tone. But there was nothing actually wrong in what he’d said, so she nodded and collected a broom to sweep up the remaining bits of plaster and dust.

* * *

“I’VE GOT THE list you emailed,” Alaina said into the phone on Thursday. “I’ll take A through H, okay?”

“That’s terrific,” Janet Goodwell told her. “Most people hate recruiting bachelors and bachelorettes for the auction and I have to do most of it myself. Of course, my arm-twisting skills will probably deteriorate because of your willingness.”

“If you prefer, I could just make cookies for Saturday’s bake sale,” Alaina suggested. It wasn’t what she preferred, but she didn’t want anyone to guess that she’d deliberately volunteered in order to be the one to recruit Mike.

“Don’t you dare,” Janet nearly screamed. “I’ve got cookies running out of my ears. I need recruiters.”

Alaina put down the phone with a satisfied smile. Joining the Volunteer Firefighters Auxiliary was the least she could do, considering the work they accomplished all over town. And when they’d announced it was time to prep for the annual barbecue and auction, she’d broken a speed record volunteering for the planning committee.

The others had laughed and assumed she’d done it to avoid being tagged as a potential bachelorette—members were barred from participating that way. But she’d had something far more devious in mind, including taking the first part of the alphabetical list of potential auction volunteers...the section with Mike Carlisle’s name.

Alaina glanced at the clock and picked up the receiver again to dial Emily.

“Hello, Alaina,” Emily greeted her cheerily. “How are you today?”

“I’m good. I just wondered if you wanted to get lunch. The Roundup Café makes a mean fire-grilled burger.”

“That would be great, except I ordered sandwiches for the guys. They’re going to be delivered by 11:30.”

“Oh.”

“Why don’t you come over and join the party? We’ll have plenty of food.”

Alaina’s heart started rat-a-tat-tatting. She genuinely wanted to get acquainted with Emily, but she also wanted to run into Mike. Now she could end up eating lunch twice in one week with him. It wasn’t a date, but more contact than she usually managed.

“It sounds like fun,” she agreed. “But I want to bring something. What do you need?”

“How about chips? We have doughnuts left and I got a humongous container of fresh-made potato salad from the grocery deli.”

“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

Hanging up the phone, Alaina jumped to her feet. When she’d decided to come back to Montana, she had been sure she’d see Mike often. After all, he was friends with her brothers and several cousins, and as Trent’s office manager it had seemed a certainty Mike would cross her path frequently, at least during the summer. But he’d proven remarkably adept at treading a solitary path. She didn’t think he was avoiding her in particular; it was more a serious case of lone wolf syndrome.

Well, it was time to change all of that.

CHAPTER FIVE

SOME OF THE tension eased from Trent as the crew broke for lunch. Emily’s absence had left him free to take down one of the problem walls and dispose of the debris, and he’d done it in record time. His pockets were stuffed with the bits and pieces he’d recovered, while the rest had been thrown into the far end of the Dumpster.

“Alaina is joining us for lunch,” Emily’s voice said in the next room, where she’d gone to answer her cell.

His gaze raced around the area to double-check, but there was nothing that might prove suspicious. Imagine if Alaina saw one of his painfully written notes proclaiming exactly what he thought of Gavin Hawkins? And hidden in one of the still-standing walls was the paper he’d tried to make sound very legal, stating that Trent Hawkins no longer had a father because Gavin Hawkins was a son of a bitch. The language on some of the other messages was even worse, learned courtesy of Gavin’s foul mouth.

The doorbell squawked and his stomach tightened. Emily hadn’t asked them to replace it, but surely she didn’t want to keep the atrocious-sounding bell. To never hear it again, he’d throw in a deluxe model and install it personally.

Emily stuck her head around one of the plastic curtains they’d hung to control dust from traveling as far. “Hey, the sandwiches are here. Are you hungry?”

Her smile was engaging and Trent was struck by surprise that she’d abandoned her previous life to move to Schuyler. Didn’t she have a boyfriend or family who’d objected? The McGregors had hated it when Alaina had been working in New York.

“Sure,” he answered truthfully. He’d skipped breakfast, something he couldn’t admit since he encouraged his crews to show up at work with good meals in their stomachs.

“I moved the card table and chairs to the patio since it’s so dusty in here,” she explained. “Come and get it.”

Come and get it.

A faint nostalgia went through him at hearing the expression his aunt Sarah...his mother often used. Mother or aunt... Even now he still mentally qualified his relationship with her, as he did with the whole family. Not that she’d ever insisted he call her Mom. Alaina said “Mom,” but she couldn’t remember any parents except Parker and Sarah McGregor.

Trent waited until Emily had disappeared then did another visual search of the space. As he walked toward the back of the house, Alaina popped through the front door.

“Hey, big brother. Don’t tell my boss, but I’m taking a long lunch today.”

His lips twitched, and he was surprised to discover his sense of humor wasn’t entirely absent, despite his self-imposed tenure on Meadowlark Lane.

“I won’t mention it to him,” he answered. “Emily says we’re eating on the patio.”

“Great. That’s one of the places I didn’t think about seeing the other day.”

He led her through the dining room and kitchen into the long mud porch that served also as a utility room along the side of the house. Curiously, the original design had the door to the backyard on the opposite end of the porch, so getting there was basically a zigzag.

“This is interesting,” Alaina murmured as they traversed the length of the porch away from the patio. “Isn’t there a door that opens directly into the backyard?”

“Not right now, but one of Emily’s renovations is to put a hallway along the dining room to a casual sitting room, with French doors onto the patio. She also wants us to cut another door on the mud porch and close off the existing one. That way food can be easily brought outside—she’s got a thing about creating outdoor living space.”

Reluctant as Trent was to admit it, Emily’s plans for the house weren’t bad. Montana wasn’t Los Angeles, so there were fewer months where outdoor living was feasible, but everyone in Schuyler flocked outside when the weather was mild enough. And her plan for a well-equipped outdoor kitchen would be the envy of cooks all over town.

“Oooh,” Alaina breathed as they followed the path around the side of the house. “This is lovely.”

The rough brick patio was scented by a trellis covered by honeysuckle. The large yard was overgrown, but multicolored wildflowers provided a kaleidoscope background of hues.

“Hi,” Emily greeted Alaina. “I should have warned you the seating is makeshift in this restaurant.”

“The atmosphere makes up for it. I just wish I remembered living here,” Alaina said, wistfully.

“You used to live here?” Eduardo asked.

“Before our folks were gone.”

“Sure, sure, I remember now. It was before you moved out with the McGregors. So this is where Gavin and Fiona lived.” Eduardo looked around. “I was real sorry about what happened to them. I remember Gavin saying he had the best kids and wanted to have a dozen before he and Fiona were through.”

“Really?” Alaina asked, her face alight. “I never knew that.”

“Your dad and me went to school together and I used to see him around town. We weren’t exactly friends. He just made everyone feel like his best buddy. What a great guy.”

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