Page 49 of #Resort Love (Lakeview Harbor #1)

Chapter One

“Rock, paper, scissors?”

Axel knew he was exhausted, but was he hearing things now too? Looking up, he spotted his buddy Connor grinning at him from across the room. “What?”

“Rock, paper, scissors,” Connor repeated. “To see who stays and waits for the last decorator.”

Oh. That.

Yeah, the two of them were in charge of meeting with the three decorators they had narrowed the pool down to for the resort.

How they had drawn the short straw on this task, he wasn’t sure.

All he knew was that everyone else was conveniently out of town, leaving him and Connor responsible for making the decision.

Right now he was sitting at the large table they had set up in the lobby of the lodge.

It had become their universal space for meetings, eating, and just hanging out and talking about the work going on at the resort.

They were six months in and coming down to some of the final stages, but it might be another four to six months before they were officially open for business.

If anyone had told him a year ago that he’d be one of the owners of the Lakeview Harbor Resort—one of the few highlights of his messed up childhood—he would have said they were crazy.

After all, how would a kid who was thrown into foster care and stayed there until he aged out have the means to be one of the investors?

Well, technically he didn’t have the means.

Cash. Money. Nothing. But what he did have was the skills to be hands on with the reconstruction of the resort.

His investment was in actual physical labor.

All the guys were doing it to some extent, but Axel was working one on one with all the contractors and getting dirty on a daily basis.

It was a labor of love. Yeah, it was a corny way to look at it, but it was the truth.

When life had been miserable when he was growing up, he got to spend part of his summers here at the resort.

This was where he met his best friends—Walker, Connor, Milo, and Slater.

And now they were all owners here. Talk about a dream come true.

“How late is he?”

“She,” Connor corrected. “And she’s an hour late. I was planning on hopping a flight out to Boston to see Annabeth. This was the last thing we needed to do, and there’s a storm coming in tonight, so I was hoping to fly out before it hits. Slater’s got a pilot buddy who says he’ll take me. So…?”

“I get it. You want to get out of here, and you wanted to do rock, paper, scissors to make it fair.”

“Well, we both know it wasn’t really going to be fair. You always choose rock,” he laughed. “All I had to do was choose paper and I would have won. But it gave the impression of being a choice.”

“Yeah, well…rock should win. It’s the heaviest. I mean…why paper? In real life, a rock would crush paper,” Axel reasoned. “It’s just science.”

“Um…”

“Oh, shut up,” he murmured. “Just go. I’ll hang out here and wait. Although I really wanted to go into town and pick up a few things.”

“Honestly, I don’t see why you can’t. She’s an hour late. To me, that means she really doesn’t want the job. If she shows up and no one’s here, then that’s on her.”

“Okay, then which of the other two do you want to hire?”

But Connor was already backing toward the door. “Why don’t we take the weekend to think about it? If I’m going to make this flight, I need to head out now.”

Axel waved him off. “Just go. I’ll see you…Monday?”

“Monday night. And I’m flying back with Slater so you’ve got the entire resort to yourself this weekend. All the other contractors are off because we’re waiting on some permits. Take a little time for yourself and relax. See ya Monday!”

Once he was gone, Axel stood and stretched.

He’d been sitting and staring at blueprints and looking over the decorating proposals the two designers had left for them earlier today.

He wasn’t overly impressed with either of them, but what the hell did he know about fabrics and color schemes?

He was just a carpenter. He worked with his hands and was good at it.

He left all the other nonsense to the professionals.

But…he had agreed to handle this selection, and he was going to.

Maybe.

Neither of their plans appealed to him so he wasn’t sure what to tell the guys when they asked. It could just be that his tastes were different, but he didn’t feel good about playing eeny-meeny-miny-moe with such an important decision.

If only the third designer had shown up!

“I hate people who don’t do what they’re supposed to,” he mumbled, walking into the kitchen for a snack.

What he wanted was a nice steak cooked on the grill and maybe some sweet potato casserole and apple pie a la mode for dessert. It was wildly specific, but it was just something he’d been craving this last week.

And he fully blamed Connor for it.

The guy was an incredible chef, and most nights when he was here at the resort, he cooked; and not basic stuff, but five-star, gourmet meals.

Was it any wonder he was feeling spoiled?

Although that was going to be coming to an end—sort of—soon.

Next month, Connor was going to be moving his daughter here with him to Harbortown, and they were going to be renting a house in town.

That was something Axel was planning on doing down the road, but for now, as long as no one minded him living in one of the cabins, he’d love to save some money for a little longer.

And the cabin wasn’t bad.

Not really.

It was a one-bedroom, one-bathroom tiny home with a small living room / kitchen combo. He did all the renovations on it himself and was very pleased with the outcome.

Was it ideal long-term? No. But for now, he was fine with it.

One of the best parts about living at the resort?

There was always someone around. Granted, most days almost everyone was gone by five, but then one of the guys was always staying on the property.

It was rare for him to be the only one here, and it looked like that was the way it was going to be this weekend.

He told himself it was fine; after all, he was used to being alone. He’d grown up in foster care and even though he lucked out with the family he lived with, he still spent a lot of time on his own. Solitude was the norm.

But it was something he would love to change.

Someday, he thought with a sigh.

For now, he wasn’t going to think about it. He was going to run into town and grab some groceries and a few other necessities before settling in for a stormy weekend in his cabin.

After grabbing a handful of chocolate chip cookies, Axel checked the weather app on his phone. If the rain was still a few hours out, he would take his motorcycle into town. He loved driving on the winding mountain roads. But if the storms were close, he’d play it safe and take his pickup.

And…

“Pickup it is,” he murmured, feeling disappointed. Still, it was better to be safe than sorry, right?

Locking up the lodge, he jogged down to the parking lot and paused to take a look around.

It never ceased to amaze him how proud he was of the place and the transformation it was going through.

He’d loved the resort as a kid—and he adored Walker’s grandparents—but they had really let the place get into a state of disrepair that was almost too much to overcome.

But they had been putting in long hours for months now, and he was finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

“Finally.”

Climbing into the truck, he had a moment of second-guessing himself. Should he stay a little longer and wait for the designer or should he say screw it and do what he needed to do?

“Screw it.” Like Connor said, she was over an hour late, so clearly that meant she didn’t want the job, so why should he keep waiting around?

And with that, he pulled out of the parking lot and headed into town.

It was rare to see other cars out this way.

The Lakeview Harbo Resort was pretty much the last thing on this particular road, and anyone driving down this far was typically going to the resort.

But about a mile away, he spotted an old pickup truck—older than his—on the side of the road.

He slowed down but didn’t see anyone in it and figured whoever got stuck, they must have gotten a ride into town for help.

Either that or he’d see them walking there.

But by the time he hit the small downtown area, he didn’t see anyone walking and decided that it wasn’t any of his business. He had shopping to do.

At the grocery store, he saw a few familiar faces—Swati from the real estate office, Pat from the day spa, and Mr. Reed, who owned the bookstore.

They all smiled and waved, but it looked like everyone was trying to get their groceries before the storm hit.

He bought himself a couple of steaks and knew he’d gladly trudge back and forth from his cabin to the lodge because the kitchen in the lodge was superior to the small one in his cabin.

There was a frozen version of a sweet potato casserole, and he grabbed it, and the small bakery department had an apple pie, so he picked one and then happily strolled back over to the frozen food aisle to grab some vanilla ice cream.

Maybe his solitude wouldn’t be so bad after all.

The rest of his shopping cart looked like a ten-year-old was buying groceries—lots of snacks, frozen pizzas, and sodas. Not a vegetable in sight.

At the checkout, he even grabbed several candy bars and grinned when old Mrs. Bentley—and yes, that’s what it said on her name tag—shook her finger at him.

“You are a grown man, Axel,” she gently chided. “This is no way for a grown man to eat! You need to find a nice girl and settle down or learn to cook!”

He didn’t take offense.

“Aww now, Mrs. Bentley, you know you’d be brokenhearted if I settled down,” he teased.